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Hi. I want to record certain terrestrial TV to keep long term (personal keepsake ie certain winter olympic events) and basically thought I could just buy a hard drive and plug it into my LG TV and use the functions on the TV when the programmes pop up. However, it appears it's not that simple, due to copyright encryption I will only ever be able to replay on that TV, so the day I change TVs the recordings are lost, it seems
What's the solution please, if I want a copy that I can watch on any device or more to the point any TV (or at least cast), at any time in the future. Am I looking down the right lines of laptop, iplayer/ itvx, screen recording software, video format (MP4?)? Or is there a better/more conventional solution.
Cheers 🥂
What's your tv connected to - a dish? an aerial? the internet?
I've used Freesat PVRs (humax) that record to their own internal hard disk but also let you copy the recordings across to a USB thumb drive and the files weren't anything proprietary or encrypted (AVI files iirc) - played fine on a laptop
Aerial Freeview and internet. I think if there's no restrictions with a pvr and I can take off further copies then I'm better buying one of those rather than an external hard drive.
What's the solution please
If you can record SD on a Humax box it may not be encrypted.
Alternatively downloading from YouTube may be an option if you pay.
But even then the downloads may be encrypted 🤷🏻♂️
Edit: they are.. DRM is not your friend here.
That said stuff on YouTube stays on almost forever and I believe the BBC are putting some stuff on there this Olympics.
Maybe do a bit of research on specific models - just to check what file format they use (and check they have USB connectivity to copy material off)
If the recordings on your TV only play on your TV then thats going nothing to do with copyright encryption of the broadcast material (that would prevent it being recorded at all) - it'll just be the TV itself using some sort of obscure or propriety format for whatever reason.
No need for a hard drive as broadcast telly files aren't especially big - you can fit loads of telly on a thumb drive. Maybe do a quick test recording onto a thumb drive, find out what the file format is and then see if theres any online file conversion sites that will reformat it to something more conventional
EDIT
Doing a quick google it seems they save files as .ts files which if memory serves is the same file format as DVDs use - the .ts file its basically a 'container' and really theres an MPEG file inside
Free apps like VLC will play them and should also allow you to resave them as something more conventional
Limitations: Recordings made directly from the TV are often encrypted and designed to be played back only on that specific TV.
Conversion: To convert recorded TS files to MP4 for playback on other devices, use software like - or online converters like -
Supported Formats: LG TVs support various video formats and codecs for playback, including MP4, AVI, MKV, and TS
This is what I found regarding LG TVs, but yes it seems there may be work arounds re conversion software. So thanks for the suggestion, I'll buy a cheap usb stick and play around.
Re YouTube, it's part of the reason I've decided I want some hard copies of certain sports/events. I've found stuff disappears.
‘Hard drive’ will a hard drive be fast enough or would you be better with an SD card or SSD?
that aside, I’d test record something now. Then see if you can extract the video file from the encrypted container using Handbrake, MakeMKV, or maybe VLC.
The DRM might be provider-side, in which case I doubt these will work to ‘free’ your recording.
good luck.
Which channels are the Olympics being shown on ?
There's software for the Raspberry Pi called get_iplayer and that saves programmes as unencrypted files.
(If it's just a few programmes send me a message and I'll do it for you).
For this use case I'd probably wait for the 'best of' Blu-Ray or just torrent it. I have little reservation morally in downloading a programme which is free to watch but locked into some proprietary player for no good reason, it's not like they've lost out on a sale.
No need for a hard drive as broadcast telly files aren't especially big - you can fit loads of telly on a thumb drive. Maybe do a quick test recording onto a thumb drive, find out what the file format is and then see if theres any online file conversion sites that will reformat it to something more conventional
On my LG I couldn't get a pendrive to work as recording media, so I have a hard disk hanging out the back. I think it probably will work, it's just very particular about what sticks you feed it.
If you can get it up on your laptop then you could record the feed with OBS studio. If not then you could probably use a hdmi splitter, a usb hdmi capture device, and OBS. This is how people record console gaming sessions etc.
Just had a ChatGPT session about this and it suggests the best option is using NextPVR, MythTV or Plex DVR with a TV tuner connected to a PC or NAS. That would do me, but not sure about recording from the LG TV. ChatGPT is worth a bash though, loads of info.
If you're tech savvy you can root the LG telly to obtain the encryption keys, then use this to convert the recordings into usable video files:
GITHUB.COM Which channels are the Olympics being shown on ?
There's software for the Raspberry Pi called get_iplayer and that saves programmes as unencrypted files.
(If it's just a few programmes send me a message and I'll do it for you).
This - get_iplayer is also available for Windows...
I'm not particularly tech savvy, so would want a reasonably simple solution. I'll look into the PVR / DVR options above. OBS studio is what I'd looked at when thinking down the lines of laptop, iplayer/itvx, record screen, I'll tinker with that. Thanks for the help, all.
This - get_iplayer is also available for Windows...
/p>
Had no idea this existed, thanks!
Manhattan box
I used get_iplayer for Windows to download some Glastonbury stuff - works fine 👍
MythTV worked really well when I set it up. Was not user friendly at the time, but was a number of years ago. Did really nifty advert jumping at one point as well.
- OBS studio was very user friendly, I've yet to see what the quality is like on the big TV screen. I'll look at get iPlayer
YouTube
You can use yt-dlp to save YouTube videos