What is the difference between manual and automatic padding when making recordings?

The T4•R offers two ways to ensure you don’t miss the begin­ning or end of your record­ings: Auto­mat­ic Pad­ding (the default option) and Manu­al Padding.

Auto­mat­ic Pad­ding (Default) #

Auto­mat­ic pad­ding uses broad­caster sig­nals to determ­ine exactly when pro­grammes start and end. The T4•R begins mon­it­or­ing 30 minutes before the sched­uled start time and starts record­ing when it detects the broadcaster’s sig­nal. It will also wait for the broadcaster’s end sig­nal, con­tinu­ing to record for up to 2 hours after the sched­uled end time if necessary.

This meth­od works well when broad­caster sig­nals are accur­ate, as it auto­mat­ic­ally adjusts for pro­grammes that start early or run late. How­ever, if broad­casters don’t send cor­rect sig­nals, you might miss the start or end of a programme.

Manu­al Pad­ding #

With manu­al pad­ding, you choose how much extra time to add before and after each record­ing, from 2 to 10 minutes. While this gives you con­sist­ent con­trol and doesn’t rely on broad­caster sig­nals, it may record unne­ces­sary con­tent or still miss parts of pro­grammes that start very early or run very late (such as live events).

When record­ing con­sec­ut­ive pro­grammes, manu­al pad­ding is adjus­ted to avoid over­lap. This means some pad­ding may be omit­ted to ensure the core con­tent of each pro­gramme is captured.

How to Adjust Pad­ding Set­tings #

To change your pad­ding settings:

1. Go to Home → Set­tings → Record­ings → Pad­ding Options → Pad­ding Type
2. Select either Auto­mat­ic or Manu­al

If using Manu­al Pad­ding, you can set both start and end pad­ding times (2−10 minutes) in the same menu.

You can also choose how record­ings start play­back. Under Play­back Start, select either:

• Recor­ded Start: Begins from the very start of the recording
• Sig­nalled: Begins where the broad­caster indic­ated the pro­gramme starts (default)

Tip: When play­ing back a record­ing with manu­al pad­ding, the play­back bar shows mark­ers where the broad­caster sig­nalled the programme’s start and end, mak­ing it easy to skip to the actu­al content.