New one is good through 1/24/2026
Also updated HandBrake to 1.7.3
3.6.2 notes:
Fixes a couple of rare crashes.
Should also pass through audio options better with Handbrake HW formats.
Now reloads RPC data when Cmd-Click>Reload All Info
For MacOS 10.15 (Catalina), 11 (Big Sur), 12 (Monterey), 13 (Ventura), 14 (Sonoma)
3.6.1 fixes 3.6.0's build problem with older Intel devices.
3.6.0 notes:
Features
- Update to TheTVDB v4 API and rewrite with Swift Async. See notes
- Hardware acceleration for M1 Macs with Handbrake See notes
- Cutting commercials while using Handbrake
Improvements
- Latest version Handbrake (1.6.1) with support for hardware acceleration on M1 Macs
- New standard Formats (HB HW Default and HB HW Small)
- Latest version of ccextractor; not ffmpeg and comskip. See notes
- Ventura compatibility: increased max widths, fix progress indicator width
- Any connection problem w/ TiVo displays name in red.
- Heartbeat process to detect any round-trip problems getting to TiVo
- Add TiVo name to text drag/dropped into other apps from Program listing
Bug Fixes
- Turn off tivodecode's MAK verification (redundant check that blocked some PS shows from downloading)
- Use Option-Tab instead of Cmd-Tab in Remote Control for ForwardSkip button
- Fix for Remote control buttons scaling
- Prevent import/Exports while editing formats
- Edit TiVo screen cleanup (+/- button alignment); only change in final release
TheTVDB
cTiVo uses TheTVDB to validate TiVo's season/episode info and provide alternative image choices. TheTVDB has moved to a new API (v4) that now requires a paid subscription, either by the app or the end user; however, cTiVo has arranged for a license that lets us access the API without that subscription. Our thanks go to theTVDB hosts for enabling this.
This was a complete rewrite of the very old TVDB code, and now uses Swift’s Async API. This code is faster and more reliable, but this release only works with macOS Catalina (10.15) or later. Much thanks to @talientinc (Steve Schmadeke) for doing a great job on this rewrite.
HandBrake
The performance of HandBrake using the M1 HW-encoding acceleration is impressive. I've added two new Formats (HB HW Default and HB HW Small). HB HW Default generates a high-quality H.265 file, while HB HW Small generates a lower-quality but very small H.264 file, about a quarter of the size. On my MacBook Pro M1, HW Default runs about 3.7x to 3.9x the speed (450fps v 122fps; about 10MBps v 2.8MBps), while only using one core (versus 8 with sw encoding, which may eventually slow down on Airs due to heat issues). With standard def files, I get over 1,000fps; 27MBps, encoding a 30 minute show in only 50 seconds. Note that here are very few options available while using HW encoding, and while simultaneous encoding works, it does not increase throughput, i.e. with two encodings, each runs at half the speed of one.
In addition, I've written a script to finally enable cutting commercials with Handbrake (HandBrakeCLI.sh), which both those Formats use. It works well, but unfortunately Handbrake is slow at skipping to the useful sections. This adds a little bit of time to the encoding, although one also saves some time by not encoding the commercial sections. Here's some sample results:
| Speed | Size | Cut speed | |
|---|---|---|---|
| HB HW Default* | 391% | 123% | 155% |
| HB HW Small | 354% | 36% | 143% |
| HB Default* | 108% | 133% | 80% |
| Default* | 100% | 100% | 71% |
| Smaller | 56% | 55% | 65% |
| Faster | 162% | 64% | N/A |
Translating, this means that for this particular show (1.8Gb 60 min; 43 min after cutting), HB HW Default encodes in about a quarter of the time and results in a 23% bigger file than the Default Format, and that Cutting takes 55% longer than just Marking the commercials (but it's still 80% faster than Default for Cutting). This particular show took about 32 minutes to encode resulting in 730MB file with Default, so about 8 minutes with HB HW Default.
The * means that this Format includes both stereo and 5-channel AC3 sound; the others just have stereo. Removing the 5-channel with --noAC3 would decrease the size number by about 11%
Note that I have not tested the HB HW Formats on Intel hardware. They should work, and I'd love to hear how it goes for you if you try them.
ffmpeg
Unfortunately, ffmpeg and comskip are not updated in this release. Building the statically linked versions that cTiVo provides is very complicated, necessitating the use of a package manager such as Homebrew or MacPorts. Homebrew does not support generating a version that runs on older machines. MacPorts does, but they haven’t yet supported the v5 release, which the latest version of ffmpeg and comskip uses.
If you do wish to use ffmpeg v5 for its improvements on M1 Macs, I recommend using Homebrew to install ffmpeg, then just Duplicate the Format you wish to use, but specify the executable as /opt/homebrew/bin/ffmpeg on M1 or /usr/local/bin/ffmpeg on Intel. See Edit Formats for more info.
As always, use GitHub Issues to let us know of any problems with this release.
Full Changelog: 3.5.3...3.6.1
