Update 4/15 @ 8:47PM: Thanks for the referral Michael.  Now I’m only one referral away from getting a DVR expander!

Thanks to an individual by the name of Rodney, I’m now only two referrals away from getting a My DVR Expander. I normally don’t beg for points however, I really would love to get one of these drives and with the program ending soon I don’t have a lot of time. If anybody has a referral that they would like to send my way I would really appreciate it….

Being the geek that I am, I’m constantly looking for new video podcasts that I can watch on my TiVo & iPod touch. Here’s a list of the video podcasts that I currently subscribe to. Let me know if I’m missing something that I should add to my list…

• Apple Quick Tip of the Week
• Diggnation
• dl.tv
• GeekBrief.TV
• Howcast Technology
• iLifeZone
• LabRats.TV
• Mac MediaCast
• MacBreak (video)
• ScreenCastsOnline
• Systm
• Tekzilla
• Typical Mac User
• Unwired

Spotted on Gizmo Lovers.

Earlier today, TiVo went ahead and published a priority page for the 9.3 software release. If you own a Series 2 TiVo, you might want to head on over to the page and sign up. This release is supposed to speed up the TiVo interface including a 5-10 second improvement during the season pass creation process.

This priority list is for TiVo Series2 Digital Video Recorders only!
DIRECTV DVRs with TiVo and TiVo Series1 DVRs are not eligible for this update. If you have a Series3 or TiVo HD DVR, they will receive the Spring update automatically in the near future.

Only DVRs with TiVo Service Numbers beginning with the following numbers are eligible for this software:
110, 130, 140, 230, 240, 264, 275, 540, 542, 565, 590, 595, and 649.

Spotted on Gizmo Lovers.

I just finished installing TiVo Desktop version 2.6. I’ll try and put together a review sometime in the near future. Until then, here’s some screenshots for you to checkout.

As expected, TiVo announced the immediate release of TiVo Desktop 2.6. For a small fee ($24.95), TiVo Desktop 2.6 allows you to watch high quality web videos (a.k.a. video podcasts) directly on your TiVo. I’m in the process of downloading 2.6 right now. I’ll let you know what I think as soon as I get a chance to play with it (probably in the next day or two).

Continue on to read the official press release….

Read more…

Yesterday, TiVo announced that later this year you will be able to access YouTube directly from your Series 3 or TiVo HD DVR (sorry, no Series 2 access). Other then that information, the official press release really doesn’t contain a lot more. Hopefully, “later this year” means some time in the summer as opposed to the winter time frame.

On a number of occasions, I’ve gone on the recorded as saying that TiVo should provide access to YouTube. That being said, I am extremely excited about this news. Anything that brings more content to my TV is a good thing, especially when there’s nothing on TV…

ALVISO, Calif., March 12, 2008 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ — TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO), the creator of and a leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVRs), today announced an agreement with YouTube(TM) that will offer access to YouTube videos directly from the TV via a TiVo DVR. The service will be available later this year to broadband-connected subscribers with TiVo Series3(TM) DVRs, including the new TiVo HD.

Every day hundreds of millions of videos are viewed on YouTube and hundreds of thousands of videos are uploaded. Upon launch of the TiVo-YouTube service, TiVo users will be able to search, browse and watch these videos directly on their television sets through their broadband connected TiVo DVRs. The combination of having the YouTube experience with the convenience and familiarity of TiVo’s intuitive user interface will provide TiVo subscribers with the ability to discover and enjoy the most shared and most discussed web videos in the world on their televisions. Importantly, users will be able to log into their YouTube accounts directly from their TiVo boxes and access their favorite YouTube channels and playlists.

“We’re delighted to be working with the world’s leading online video community so that TiVo subscribers can access YouTube’s popular content on the TV via the TiVo DVR,” said Tara Maitra, Vice President and GM of Content Services at TiVo Inc. “Being able to make available YouTube videos to the TiVo subscriber base using one device, one remote and one user interface is another major step in our commitment to combine all of your television and web video viewing options in one easy to use service.”

Earlier today, Stephen Mack (director of TiVoCast operations) announced that TiVo has added five new channels of content to their TiVoCast service. Each of the newly added channels come from TrueFire.com. For those of you who don’t know, TrueFire is a well known maker of guitar lessons and tutorials.

Since 1991, TrueFire and its collective of 450+ artists and educators, has produced thousands of guitar lessons and interactive video courses, which are available as downloads, streaming video and CD-ROM. We also offer top DVD and Book titles from other publishers.

If you’re interested in playing guitar you might want to check out these channels. I especially like how TiVo organized the channels based on your level of experience with playing a guitar.

As usual, you can subscribe to these channels via TiVo Central Online or by accessing the following menu item on your TiVo: TiVo Central –> Find Program —> Download TV & Movies.

Here’s a list of Mac software which is capable of improving your “TiVo experience”. Some of the applications on this list may no longer work but, I thought I should include them just in case they ever get updated. If you’re a Windows user you might want to check out my Windows roundup which I published back in December of ‘07. A star () next to the application name means that I’ve actually used the application before.

Please let me know if I’ve left anything off the list….

TiVo Desktop : TiVo Desktop is the official Mac application from TiVo.com. The app allows you to browse and listen to your music on your TiVo. Along with this feature, TiVo Desktop also allows you to view photos and publish videos using TiVo Go Back.

Roxio Popcorn : Popcorn® 3 lets you enjoy your video anywhere you want, on the playback device of your choice. Easily make high quality copies of your DVDs and movies. Take television recordings from your Mac to the portable device of your choice for on-the-go viewing or fit 4 hours of video on a single layer-DVD. Now with batch video conversion, support for a broad range of consumer devices, and exclusive support for TiVoToGo transfers, your video will go everywhere you do. Review here.

Roxio Toast: Roxio Toast® 8 sets the standard for burning CDs, DVDs, and now Blu-ray discs on the Mac. Create superior sounding audio CDs with crossfades. Enjoy your TV shows anywhere with exclusive EyeTV burning and TiVoToGo transfers to DVD or iPod®. Copy your audio CDs, movies and DVDs. It’s your digital life, Toast It!

SeasonPassGetter (SPG) : SPG takes TiVo content and transfers it to iTunes. Its main purpose was to transfer regularly scheduled recordings (Season Pass on TiVo) for viewing on AppleTV. There was a lot of interest in content for the iPod, so when a show is transferred to iTunes, SPG will initiate an iPod sync. Wake up in the morning and your shows are ready to go. Review here.

TiVo File Decoder: Portable C program to convert a .TiVo file from TiVoToGo to a normal MPEG file given the MAK for the TiVo which generated the file. Used by several applications including TiVo DecodeManager and several other 3rd party addons.

VisualHub : VisualHub is a great application for converting video files into a number of different formats. One of the nice things about VisualHub is that it provides a TiVo “profile” which allows you to convert video files into a format that your TiVo will be able to playback using the TiVoGoBack feature. More information about this feature can be found here.

TiVo NowPlaying : OS X dashboard widget which allows you to transfer and transcode shows from your TiVo. Review here.

TiVoTool: TivoTool allows you to download, stream, or burn videos from your Series 1 or 2 Tivo or DTivo. You can also send videos to iTunes for viewing on a video enabled iPod. The command line version consists of a subset of these functions and works on Linux.

pyTiVo: pyTivo lets you stream most videos from your PC to your unhacked TiVo. pyTivo acts as a TiVo GoBack server. It loads many standard video compression codecs and outputs mpeg2 video to the TiVo. It allows you to watch videos that are stored on your computer in, say, DivX format without having to wait for the video to be transcoded first.