Download streamed TV to play later (1 Viewer)

[Ingwe]

Thank you all. See my edited post. I changed the destination of the downloads to my portable hard drive and it has saved the downloads there. Haven‘t yet tried playing anything yet.

 

[Ingwe]

Pah! think I may just have trashed my new 2TB hard drive! Having downloaded two series of Happy Valley to my Transcend Hard Drive, I thought I'd see whether it played on my TV at home. I was disappointed to see that the names of the files saved were all long letters and numbers and hadn't retained the names on the i-player.

But worse was to come. When I plugged it into my Sony TV USB and selected that drive, it said the drive would need to be registered so I pressed ok. But no files were shown. Then when I went back to the Mac and plugged in the Transcend hard drive I got a message that the drive could not be recognised by this computer. there were three options: initialise, ignore or reject. I tried initialise but nothing has happened. So now I have a hard drive that I can't use! Help anyone?

 

[kevenh]

When I plugged it into my Sony TV USB and selected that drive, it said the drive would need to be registered so I pressed ok.

With your subsequent issues, the Sony registration process must of changed the 2TB boot records (or some low level setting)

back to the Mac and plugged in the Transcend hard drive I got a message that the drive could not be recognised by this computer. there were three options: initialise, ignore or reject.

And back on the Mac, it’s not recognised as a Mac OS ready format / type.

I’m not current enough on Mac “speak” to help. Sorry.
Is “initialise” like the Windows “quick format”?
If I was you, and the 2TB drive content is replaceable I’d look at a full reformat of the drive.
But maybe Mac has utilities to rebuild boot partitions. That could be a thing to look at.

 

[kevenh]

And before plugging the 2TB drive into the Sony TV again, look into what the TV’s supported external file systems are.

 

[Ingwe]

With your subsequent issues, the Sony registration process must of changed the 2TB boot records (or some low level setting)

And back on the Mac, it’s not recognised as a Mac OS ready format / type.

I’m not current enough on Mac “speak” to help. Sorry.
Is “initialise” like the Windows “quick format”?
If I was you, and the 2TB drive content is replaceable I’d look at a full reformat of the drive.
But maybe Mac has utilities to rebuild boot partitions. That could be a thing to look at.

I'd be happy to full reformat the drive if this was possible. But plugging in the drive to the mac after the three options set out in my earlier post noting happens. The initialise option seems to do nothing. Possibly because the Mac doesn't recognise the drive now. The Sony registration has clearly stuffed the drive!
I'll look further on the internet to see if there's a way to get the mac to recognise the drive and then see if I can reformat the drive. Thanks for the suggestions.

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[Widge]

Pah! think I may just have trashed my new 2TB hard drive! Having downloaded two series of Happy Valley to my Transcend Hard Drive, I thought I'd see whether it played on my TV at home. I was disappointed to see that the names of the files saved were all long letters and numbers and hadn't retained the names on the i-player.

But worse was to come. When I plugged it into my Sony TV USB and selected that drive, it said the drive would need to be registered so I pressed ok. But no files were shown. Then when I went back to the Mac and plugged in the Transcend hard drive I got a message that the drive could not be recognised by this computer. there were three options: initialise, ignore or reject. I tried initialise but nothing has happened. So now I have a hard drive that I can't use! Help anyone?

You cannot play downloaded iplayer files without using the same iplayer program pointing to where the files are, it is encrypted. So basicly replaying them on your mac, maybe using an HDMI cable to your tv.
If you want to be able to just play the files on anything, you have to use something like get_iplayer to create standard video file, also as you have found out, the drive has to be formatted such that it is compatable for the tv and the mac if you want to just plug it into your tv.

 

[Ingwe]

You cannot play downloaded iplayer files without using the same iplayer program pointing to where the files are, it is encrypted. So basicly replaying them on your mac, maybe using an HDMI cable to your tv.
If you want to be able to just play the files on anything, you have to use something like get_iplayer to create standard video file, also as you have found out, the drive has to be formatted such that it is compatable for the tv and the mac if you want to just plug it into your tv.

Thank you. Is there a way I can get my Mac to now recognise the Transcend hard drive?

Edit:
Ok, phew, have managed to format the Transcend HD by using disc utility and reformatting. Ok so I've lost all the downloaded TV shows from player that I was hoping to view on my Avtex. I thought it'd be an easy matter of simply downloading the files from i-alter to my mac but instead of keeping them on the mac, would direct the downloads to the Transcend hard drive. Too simple I suppose.

 

[Widge]

Thank you. Is there a way I can get my Mac to now recognise the Transcend hard drive?

Unfortunately i dont know macs at all, i will ask around some mac users that i know, but hopefully there is one watching this thread that can point you in the right direction.

 

[kevenh]

I thought it'd be an easy matter of simply downloading the files from i-alter to my mac but instead of keeping them on the mac, would direct the downloads to the Transcend hard drive. Too simple I suppose.

BBC content uses DRM controls.
You can download media for offline use but only - as you’ve verified - for playback with the original iPlayer App you used.
Maybe internet peeps have worked out how a different iPlayer location can be used but you’ll surely be tied into using iPlayer.

yy Tnx for news on recovering your drive

 

[Ingwe]

You cannot play downloaded iplayer files without using the same iplayer program pointing to where the files are, it is encrypted. So basicly replaying them on your mac, maybe using an HDMI cable to your tv.
If you want to be able to just play the files on anything, you have to use something like get_iplayer to create standard video file, also as you have found out, the drive has to be formatted such that it is compatable for the tv and the mac if you want to just plug it into your tv.

Thank you. As the Mac is physically small, as is the Transcend 2TB hard drive (so that both could stay in the van) if I were to start again and download content from i-Player to the TB drive via the Mac and then play back on the TV using the Mac with TB drive connected via an HDMI/USB lead, would this work in your opinion?

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[Pausim]

Thank you. As the Mac is physically small, as is the Transcend 2TB hard drive (so that both could stay in the van) if I were to start again and download content from i-Player to the TB drive via the Mac and then play back on the TV using the Mac with TB drive connected via an HDMI/USB lead, would this work in your opinion?

We use a USB C to HDMI lead from my wife’s Mac to the motorhome tv without a problem. I don’t see why there should be a problem as long as the iPlayer has access to the drive it downloaded the programme to.

 

[Widge]

Thank you. Is there a way I can get my Mac to now recognise the Transcend hard drive?

Edit:
Ok, phew, have managed to format the Transcend HD by using disc utility and reformatting. Ok so I've lost all the downloaded TV shows from player that I was hoping to view on my Avtex. I thought it'd be an easy matter of simply downloading the files from i-alter to my mac but instead of keeping them on the mac, would direct the downloads to the Transcend hard drive. Too simple I suppose.

I would guess that the mac hard disk utility would allow you to pick different types of formatting. For the tv it probably needs to be in Fat32 or NTFS format, see link.

https://www.sony.co.uk/electronics/support/articles/00148248

then the disk should be able to be moved between the mac and tv at will. You just need to use a program like get_iplayer to record the compatable files.

 

[kevenh]

For the tv it probably needs to be in Fat32 or NTFS format, see link.

https://www.sony.co.uk/electronics/support/articles/00148248

Do consider exFAT - Microsoft developed it for removable storage and it supports higher drive capacity than fat32

Plus, like fat32, it also not OS specific.

Edit: nice link to Sony drive info yy

 

[Ingwe]

Thank you all for your swift and helpful input. I'm not techie enough to play with _iplayer and also, the formatting stuff is beyond me.
So, having successfully reformatted the 2TB drive using Disc Utility, I've abandoned the notion of having a small hard drive for playing content whilst in the van. I shall stick with the Firestick.
But I have backed up my Mac Air using Time Machine to the Transcend hard drive, so today has not been a total waste.

 

[kevenh]

the formatting stuff is beyond me.

For the future then, two links from apple about formatting: -
1. Info on using the Mac disk utility.

Erase and reformat a storage device in Disk Utility on Mac

In Disk Utility on your Mac, erase and reformat a storage device to use with a Mac.

support.apple.com

2. At step 6 from above procedure: info on Mac supported file systems:

File system formats available in Disk Utility on Mac

In Disk Utility on your Mac, format disks or volumes using Apple File System (APFS), Mac OS Extended, MS-DOS (FAT) and ExFAT.

support.apple.com

But I have backed up my Mac Air using Time Machine to the Transcend hard drive

If you’re staying within the Mac environment then don’t worry about the fat32 or exFAT multi OS supported file system.

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[cbrookson]

If you have an Apple Mac then have a look at Get IPlayer.
It will download BBC and ITV TV and Radio.

PS There are also windows and linux versions here.

Cheers

 

[Ingwe]

If you have an Apple Mac then have a look at Get IPlayer.
It will download BBC and ITV TV and Radio.

Cheers

Thank you. The downloading bit is fine. Where I’ve come unstuck is playing the downloaded content on my hard drive without keeping the hard drive attached to the Mac Air. I’d thought if I could download stuff from iPlayer, store it on my stand alone hard drive and plug that into the van’s Avtex. But it’s apparently not that straight forward.

 

[cbrookson]

Yes, Avtex formatting is particularly fiddly. It's bad enough trying to update them with a USB.

I've gone down the route of using a Pi Zero media server and a Kindle TV Firestick.

For a simple solution: You are probably better off using a media player with the hard disk or USB plugged in and connected by the HDMI to the TV. I've used one of these. It runs on 5V so you can use converters from 12V.
Cheers

 

[Gellyneck]

If you have an Apple Mac then have a look at Get IPlayer.
It will download BBC and ITV TV and Radio.

PS There are also windows and linux versions here.

Cheers

Does it download ITV programmes? I thought it was only BBC iPlayer and radio.

 

[wfdTamar]

The hard drive you store video on needs to be formatted so the TV can read it. This is usually Fat32. You can use Disk Utility to format a drive this way. What I’d do though is keep using your hard drive as the Time Machine backup (which all Mac users should have). Just buy a USB thumb drive for TV use as any TV has the power to run those (not all can power a hard drive via their USB ports).

Leave the USB thumb drive in the format it came in. Try it in the TV first and see if it wants to format it. If it does just let it format it. Now plug it into the Mac. If the Mac can’t see it and wants to format it (initialise it), you need software that allows it to read and write that format drive.

This is the best one. It’s been around for years. Worth having so you can work with drives formatted for Windows.

Microsoft NTFS for Mac | Paragon Software

Boost Your Mac with Paragon File System Link. Read/write Microsoft NTFS files on your Mac for free.

www.paragon-software.com

As others have also said iplayer most likely has anti piracy that won’t let you plonk the files just anywhere so anything can play them. This also prevents you doing what the whole thread is about - watch stuff when offline (with no internet or not enough data). Not to pirate it, just to watch what I would have if home. iplayer May let you do it with a small amount of files, or time limited perhaps.

I‘ve bought PlayOn Home (only works on Windows). It doesn’t do Iplayer. Closest is a paid service called AcornTv. It also only does files in 720p max. My Hymer TV is 720p so that’s ok.

PlayOn Cloud does do Iplayer and also can save in 1080 if you want, but each files costs 3 times what a 720p one does. It works on a Mac. There’s a trial version.

Theres also StreamFab which is very expensive, but it’s a lifetime licence. It does Channel 4, but not the BBC. Also heaps of the big ones (Netflix, Amazon etc). You can buy the whole package, or small bundles. Or get it for a month or year.

Streaming Video Downloader | Download Streaming Videos Fast and Easy

DVDFab All-in-one downloader is the best solution for downloading videos from streaming services such as Netflix, Youtube, Amazon Prime, HBO MAX, and so on.

www.dvdfab.cn

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[VXman]

Thank you. As the Mac is physically small, as is the Transcend 2TB hard drive (so that both could stay in the van) if I were to start again and download content from i-Player to the TB drive via the Mac and then play back on the TV using the Mac with TB drive connected via an HDMI/USB lead, would this work in your opinion?

You could stick a chromestick into your HMDI on the TV and then cast from the Mac to the chromestick - save on having annoying cables. (Assuming you can cast from a Mac like you can from a PC?)

 

[VXman]

Does it download ITV programmes? I thought it was only BBC iPlayer and radio.

It looks like it's just BBC from what I have seen. (not used it) Why would you not use the official BBC version instead? Does that not work on a Mac?

 

[cbrookson]

Does it download ITV programmes?

Yes it does - look in the preferences

Cheers

 

[Gellyneck]

Yes it does - look in the preferences

View attachment 690104

Cheers

Guess that's Windows GUI?
Only dabbled with Linux command line.

 

[kevenh]

Guess that's Windows GUI?
Only dabbled with Linux command line.

Looks more like a Mac gui but either way, do you realise cbrookson is describing an app called "Get IPlayer"? Not the BBC iPlayer app. Just checking yy
There is a Linux version of Get iPlayer too (at the link <<)

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[busbuddy]

Does downloading from all4 overcome its hdmi non-supporting or is that still an issue

 

[Widge]

It looks like it's just BBC from what I have seen. (not used it) Why would you not use the official BBC version instead? Does that not work on a Mac?

Certainly the pc version is only bbc, the reason for using it, is that it produces standard video files, so you can just put them on a usb key/disk and play the directly on your tv, without the need for a computer and cables etc.

 

[Pausim]

Why would you not use the official BBC version instead? Does that not work on a Mac?

The BBC iPlayer works fine on a Mac.

 

[Gellyneck]

Looks more like a Mac gui but either way, do you realise cbrookson is describing an app called "Get IPlayer"? Not the BBC iPlayer app. Just checking
There is a Linux version of Get iPlayer too (at the link <<)

Yip, get_iplayer I was talking about and using command prompt in Mint.