German developer Meilenstein Software GmbH has released a new version of software for its Televio TV tuner board for the Mac, but for many North American Mac users, this may be the first time they’ve heard of the device.
Televio is a PCI expansion card designed to provide Power Mac users with the ability to tune in TV stations and FM radio frequencies. It comes with an infrared (IR) remote control that can also be used to control other Mac applications using the software that comes with the device.
The Televio tuner card can tune in to 125 TV channels and plays them back at 640 x 480 pixels at 29.97 frames per second (NTSC). The stereo audio is decoded in two channels at 16-bit 32MHz audio analog-to-digital conversion (ADC). The card uses 9-bit audio and video broadcast decoding technology based on Philips’ SAA713x chipset.
What’s more, Televio’s software can also capture QuickTime movies, displays a channel preview made of thumbnail images of selected channels all in one window and shows you what’s on in the Dock. S-Video and Composite Video input is supported, if you wish to import video from analog sources.
A 1.6.x maintenance update added the ability to control other Mac applications with the Televio’s IR remote control. A custom System Preferences pane is installed that enables you to program the remote to control other applications.
Televio’s system requirements call for Mac OS X 10.1.5 or higher; a Power Mac G3 blue and white or G4/400MHz or faster; QuickTime 5 or newer; and 128MB or more RAM. The US version supports NTSC, but Meilenstein also makes versions to support PAL and SECAM TV standards. Televio costs US$149.