How to Transfer AVI to Tivo on Mac OS X
You might have a TiVo in your living room and want to watch some interesting AVI movies from your Mac. Or you have a big TV and prefer to watch movies on it. So it would be great if you can transfer some of your interesting AVI movies or videos from Mac to TiVo for playback. However, since AVI is not compatible with TiVo, you need to convert AVI to TiVo-friendly format, MPEG-2, on Mac first.
This article provides an easy and economical way to change AVI to TiVo compatible format on Mac (Snow Leopard, Lion included), and then upload the videos to your TiVo (including TiVo series 1, series 2 and series 3). First of all, you need to download and install the AVI to TiVo Video Converter for Mac. It is a professional app to do the video conversion.
Part 1: How to convert AVI to TiVo on Mac OS X
Add video files to the app
You can directly drag and drop AVI files to the app. Or just go to the "File" menu, choose "Add Video Files". The app supports batch conversion, so that you can add several AVI files to the program at one time!
Select MPEG 2 as the output format
In the format drop-down list, you need to choose MPEG-2 as the output video format, for MPEG-2 format is fully compatible with TiVo.
Start to convert AVI to TiVo Mac
Hit the "Convert" button, let this app finish converting AVI to TiVo on Mac for you. The process may take a few minutes depending on the size of your AVI files.
Part 2: How to upload the output files to TiVo from Mac
Download and install the TiVo Desktop software which is free and can be downloaded here: www.tivo.com/buytivo/tivogear/software/. the program enables you to stream the iPhoto library and iTunes music to your TiVo. But the TiVo Desktop won't give you any video functionality off the bat, so you're required to enable its hidden video transfer feature first.
Now you can click "Stop" in System Preferences > TiVo Desktop. Now go to Applications > Utilities > Terminal > type: defaults write com.tivo.desktop FileVideo -dict-add VideoUIEnabled -bool true
Reopen System Preferences > TiVo Desktop, and you'll see a new Videos tab. Then check the box to publish the video files and choose the folder where your MPEG-2 videos is located in.
Finally, on your TiVo, you can scroll down to the bottom of your Now Playing List, and you'll see your Mac listed there. Choose the videos which you wanna transfer, and then TiVo would transfer them into your Now Playing List. That's all.
Note: Before you click the "Start" button, your MPEG-2 videos must already be located in your chosen folder. If you decide to add more videos to that folder later, you'll need to stop and start TiVo Desktop again for it to recognize your new videos.
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