Anand Parthasarathy Pinnacle's video transfer device launched in India
Bangalore: With a wide selection of legal Indian language movie DVDs available for below Rs. 50, and DVD players breaching the 'lakshman rekha' of Rs. 2000, home cinema viewing is finally affordable and no longer limited to what TV channels choose to offer. And none too soon: the new multiplex culture has taken the cost of theatre admission to levels where it no longer makes sense for many of us. However, armed as we now are with a DVD player attached to our TV sets and our small personal libraries of feature films, there is still a 'missing link' in this ecosystem of digital home entertainment, that has eluded most of us: that is the ability to manipulate the format of our digital collection — say from an old VHS cassette to a DVD and to keep recordings of something that appears on TV and which we want to store for later viewing or archiving. We have heard of services abroad such as TIVO, which does just this. Now finally a cool new tool from Pinnacle, just launched in India, allows us to slot in this last missing piece into the jigsaw of our personal digital entertainment and attain complete control over how we want to use the TV and video content that we have paid for. The Hindu has been enabled to try out "Pinnacle Video Transfer," a palm-sized device with multiple input and output sockets that allow one to record video from TV, DVD or VCR, set top box or games console. You can transfer the video (hence the name!) to a Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP); an iPod or similar music device; one of those increasingly popular portable hard drives that come in sizes around 150 to 200 GB — or even to a USB thumb drive. The device uses the MP4 format — its correct technical name is H.264 — and the resolution of 720 by 480 is up to DVD standard (though not the upcoming high definition standard). This means, that at the best quality that the Pinnacle Video Transfer can give, you can store 3 hours or one standard-length Hindi film on a 4 GB thumb drive that today costs Rs. 850 in India or two movies on an 8 GB drive that costs Rs. 1,600-Rs. 1,700. Of course, you would need an MP4 player to view this — but that is not very difficult to find since free players for PCs are plentifully available for download. We feel the device will be most useful, if you have a lot of movies on VHS cassettes that tend to fade with every passing year. Now you can capture the videos, before they deteriorate further, store them on a thumb drive or two — and later you can convert them into DVDs with a DVD burner. The ability to 'grab' clips or serial instalments from the TV for future viewing is another powerful incentive to spend Rs. 7,400 for the Pinnacle Video Transfer. Now you can tell your spouse: "Please save that instalment of 'Kasturi' or 'Kyunki Saas bhi...' or that Karan Thapar interview for me! Now, I won't have to miss it because I am on a train when it airs!" http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/24/stories/2008022455061100.htm To unsubscribe send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in
