JDPFu.com 2025

KMTTG is a GUI front end to curl, comskip, comcut, tivodecode, and whatever transcoder you like. It has configuration settings to use any external program for each of these needs. You may replace any of them and/or create custom trancoding scripts for your needs. Many common transcoding needs are provided with the distribution.

Here’s a custom xvid_hd.enc script that crops, scales and 2-pass xvid encodes normal widescreen content recorded on a tivo series 2. The content may come from any of the HD channels.

Xvid 2 pass, 640×358 widescreen format

	
Encode command or script (single line)
	
Known keywords: FFMPEG, HANDBRAKE, MENCODER, PERL, INPUT, OUTPUT, PWD




	
Pass 1

  MENCODER INPUT -fps 30000/1001 -nosound -vf lavcdeint,crop=464:358:6:58,scale=640:358 -xvidencopts bitrate=1300:max_key_interval=250:trellis:max_bframes=1:vhq=3:pass=1 -ovc xvid -passlogfile INPUT.log -noodml -o OUTPUT


	
Pass 2

  MENCODER  INPUT -fps 30000/1001 -aid 0 -oac mp3lame -lameopts cbr:br=160 -vf lavcdeint,crop=464:358:6:58,scale=640:358 -af volnorm -xvidencopts  bitrate=1300:max_key_interval=250:trellis:max_bframes=1:vhq=3:pass=2 -ovc xvid -passlogfile INPUT.log -noodml -o OUTPUT


	
Encoded output file extension



avi

This script isn’t the issue. Further it has been working for years and continues to work once the content is downloaded and converted to MPG via tivodecode.

I enjoy time shifting and location shifting of paid media from my cable company. That includes premium channels and on-demand movies. My main use is to play content on a mediagate network attached media playback device in a bedroom.

Recently, about the last 2 months, the on-demand recordings refuse to download completely via the TTG interface. Usually the download stops after about 1-8MB have completed. That is usually under 1% of the total size of the program. Worthless.

To record on-demand shows, just start the desired program through the cable box interface, then find any program in the tivo guide with about the correct length of time and record. The recording works perfectly. No issue. It is just pulling the content off the tivo that fails.

To be clear, the tivo DRM flag is not set for any content from my cable company that I’ve seen. Only internet downloaded shows that tivo provides get marked with this flag. There is no way around the no-download-flag, period. Nobody has found a way around it.

To solve the issue, I’ve tried a few things:

1. started the recording after the content begins. On-demand often shows ads for other shows before the real show begins. Perhaps some do not allow transfer signal is sent. No joy.
2. manually attempted to download the content using the Tivo web interface. No joy.
3. manually attempted to download the content using curl. No joy. Curl is the same program that kmttg uses for downloads. It normally works perfectly.
4. used Spinrite to check the drive for errors. None were found.

No joy means the download stops at exactly the same place, regardless of download method, with only 1-8MB completed.

At this point, I don’t have any solution to the problem and no good thoughts for something to try next.

Please help with a solution!