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School me on HD DVRs


El Karacho1647545492

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Long story short, I'm sick of TWC charging me for renting their crappy, constantly needing a reboot and occasional replacement DVR. I'd rather just buy myself a good one.

 

Anyone done this? What cable box/DVR do you have and what do you recommend? Does TWC hassle you at all about it, and are there compatibility considerations? Newegg isn't as easy to navigate in this regard as for my usual purchases.

 

Also looking to do the same for a cable modem, but that'll be a bit easier to research.

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Problem atleast when i worked at TWC was switch digital . They cable cards didn't support it so using your own DVR ment you didn't get all of the channels.

 

 

I ditched cable TV a long time ago.

 

roku Box +

Hulu Plus

+News group account

+Plex Server

 

= watch anything I want

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Problem atleast when i worked at TWC was switch digital . They cable cards didn't support it so using your own DVR ment you didn't get all of the channels.

 

 

I ditched cable TV a long time ago.

 

roku Box +

Hulu Plus

+News group account

+Plex Server

 

= watch anything I want

 

Pretty much all I watch on TV is live sports. As long as that's the only way to get it in good HD, they'll keep me suckling at the cable teat.

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Whats a cable card, I'm :dumb: in this regard

 

Cable Card is essentially an "open" tuner. Doesn't have the lockdowns/controls that the Cable Box has. In theory you should be able to take your Cable Card to any provider and it all works the same.

 

You want your own DVR - so you load it with a Cable Card - and then you switch to WOW from TWC...WOW should treat the Cable Card the same, and all your programs are on YOUR DVR, not the Cable Co's.

 

Cable Cards had plenty of drawbacks - no VOD, no Interactive PPV, sketchy guides, etc...

 

When I left TWC some of it was worked out - but some of it still sucked.

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Cable Card is essentially an "open" tuner. Doesn't have the lockdowns/controls that the Cable Box has. In theory you should be able to take your Cable Card to any provider and it all works the same.

 

You want your own DVR - so you load it with a Cable Card - and then you switch to WOW from TWC...WOW should treat the Cable Card the same, and all your programs are on YOUR DVR, not the Cable Co's.

 

Cable Cards had plenty of drawbacks - no VOD, no Interactive PPV, sketchy guides, etc...

 

When I left TWC some of it was worked out - but some of it still sucked.

 

 

Am disappoint :no:

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Problem atleast when i worked at TWC was switch digital . They cable cards didn't support it so using your own DVR ment you didn't get all of the channels.

 

I don't know if that's a cable card issue, or the HW/SW you put the cable card into. I know it's possible because Ceton's have that capability. http://cetoncorp.com/

 

IIRC you actually get the SDV box from your cable provider I think, but the HW/SW you are hooking the box up to has to support that capability too.

http://cetoncorp.com/products/infinitv-4-pcie/

 

It's been a little bit since I've dug into this topic so I'm a little rusty.

 

Looks like (newer) Tivo's support it too. http://support.tivo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/307/kw/sdv/r_id/100041

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it's not that they not supporting it per say.It was a technical limitation something to do with being 2 way.

 

Maybe I should clarify. IIRC cable companies must, by some law or regulation, support cable card. So the card decrypts the stream incoming to the 'cable box'. They have to be able to supply you with a cable card, and their systems must work with cable cards. But sometimes they ‘run out’ of cards. The aren’t all that interested in not having 100% control of your cable eco system so they don’t have a ton of cable cards.

 

Yes, cable cards are not two communication compatible, so you cannot receive guide info (from the cable provider), VOD, or natively work with SDV.

 

Guide Info: I would imagine most of the ‘good’ solutions have their own guides built into them. Instead of getting to info direct from your cable provider, they just ‘grab’ the info from elsewhere.

 

VOD: Who gives a shit?

 

SVD: At least TIVO and Ceton support SVD. You just have to check if your provider uses SDV, and that they can supply an SDV adapter.

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it's not that they not supporting it per say.It was a technical limitation something to do with being 2 way.

 

It's come a long way in the last few years, go do some research on http://www.avsforum.com/f/

 

The HTPC section is good for the Ceton product. I imagine the TIVO stuff is in some specific section too (PVR/DVR or HDTV recorders).

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