• A Coast Capital chequing or savings account (its best to use one with no transaction fees like “The Free Chequing, Free Debit and More Account” or “The High‑interest, No‑fee Savings Account“)
• A PayPal account. Its important that your name is entered exactly the same on both your PayPal and Coast Capital accounts.

To link a new bank account you’ll want to start by opening PayPal and logging in there. Under My Account click Profile, then under Financial Information open Bank Accounts, and from this page click “add”. Depending on your situation, there are a number of ways you can get the rest of the info you’ll need.

1) If you have cheques for the account you want to add, then all you have to is follow the instructions on the PayPal site. Copy the information from your cheque using the diagram supplied.

2) If  you only have online banking there’s a little more leg work to do. Start by logging in at Coast Capital, then open the summary for the account you want to link with PayPal (by clicking on its name). On this page you need to copy the account number (the number circled in red). This number is unique to the actual account, is not the same as your membership number, and is usually 12 characters long. Enter this number in the “Account Number” field on PayPal, and re-enter in the confirmation field.

Then you’ll need to find the transit number for your branch (usually the Coast Capital branch where you opened your account). Look for your branch on this page and copy its number into the “Bank Transit Number” field back on PayPal. Enter 809 in the “Institution Number” field.

And submit! That’s all. In a few days you’ll receive two small deposits, and then you can go back to PayPal and confirm your account. You’ll be able to fund purchases from your bank account, as well as withdraw funds from PayPal into your Bank Account.

Coast Capital will not charge you for PayPal transactions if you have a bank account with no transaction fees, although PayPal will ding you $0.50 for transfers less than $150CAD. This is cheaper than using hyperWALLET ($0.85), and its a lot more versatile. Using PayPal is also a great way to accept credit card payments without having setup a merchant account.

I finally got an iPhone and I’m loving it so far. Everything is working swell, except for MMS (picture messaging) with other Telus clients. Its a quirky situation:

• I can’t send MMS to other Telus clients
• I can receive MMS from other Telus clients
• I can send an receive from non-Telus clients (Rogers, Fido, Bell)

I don’t know what’s going on at Telus. They have been very friendly and understanding on the phone, but the data department seems a little brain dead on the issue. Its a “known issue”, but it hasn’t been resolved. They also closed all the tickets related to the problem without a fix. The rep I spoke with today said I should “check from time to time”. That’s not really an acceptable solution, but I have received a credit for %50 off last month and the promise of another if the issue isn’t resolved.

So no progress yet, and my only suggestion would be to email pictures instead at this point. Are you having the same problem?

Also I’ve attached the latest Telus Carrier Update file (5.1) for others who are on the troubleshooting journey….

UPDATE: Elgato’s Canadian EPG is now out of beta, and purchasers will receive one year of free access with purchase of an EyeTV tuner.

A couple months ago I ordered the Elgato EyeTV 250 Plus from the online Apple Store (free shipping FTW). Technically speaking its a TV tuner, but I bought it for its cassette digitizing abilities – more on that later. I thought that was the only use I’d get out of it too, since Elgato doesn’t offer a Electronic Program Guide (EPG/listings) for Canada. Until now. The past few weeks they’ve been rolling out a beta version of the EyeTV 3 software that includes support for a Canadian EPG.

You might be wondering exactly what an EPG is and why its necessary for watching TV on your Mac. Basically its a file that EyeTV downloads to display the local listings for your area. The truth is that it isn’t really required, but in a world where everyone has a cable box, built in schedules are a given convenience that I know I wouldn’t like to live without. So it goes without saying I was thrilled to read about this beta version.

I signed up and got my beta invitation very soon afterwards. It was a breeze to download, install and configure EyeTV for use here in Vancouver, BC. It seems that some other parts of Canada aren’t covered yet, but I’m sure that’s coming in subsequent releases. It seems that Elgato has partnered with TV Guide Canada to makes this happen. Also worth noting, us Canadians only get a year of free service. Come next October I’ll have to pony up $19.95 (USD no less) for a rewenal. That’s not fair, eh.

Functionally its been almost flawless. There was this weird problem where programs starting at 4:00PM would have a duration of 0:00, but I believe that’s been fixed. I’m with Shaw Cable and all the analogue channels come through fine. I also have the digital cable package and box, but my EyeTV doesn’t pick those channels up for some reason. It does see the digital music channels though, so I don’t know what’s going on there. The quality is fair, but you’d never mistake it for HD. I’ve included a few screenshots that you can click to enlarge. Audio comes through very nicely with steady treble and tight bass.

There’s something nice about being able to pause live TV, or replay something you missed. Start watching or recording with one click. Schedule recordings up to two weeks ahead of time, then have them converted and placed in iTunes for you. There’s lots of cool stuff, its the best TV experience I’ve had thus far. I honestly prefer downloading HD shows/movies from iTunes or similar outlets, but that can take time and you rarely see obscure programming you may want to watch. I and friends have made a number of TV appearances lately. All I had to do to record them was set the time, and when I got home they were ready to post on YouTube.

All of that, and I only bought this little device to convert my VHS and 8mm tapes to DVDs. By the way, it does that very well too. Its as simple as plugging in your device (VCR, camcorder, LaserDisc) with composite or SVideo and hitting record. Then you can export to iTunes (for your iPod, iPhone or AppleTV), Toast (CD DVD or Blue Ray) or via a number of other options.

The EyeTV 250 Plus is a nifty little creature that can finally call Canada home. Its ease of use and capabilities make it worth every cent, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to other Mac users in Canada. If you have any questions about it I’ll take them in the comments..