Anyone here have a cablecard PC?

Y

ynnek888

Limp Gawd
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Feb 11, 2006
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Just wondering if anyone here actually have a CableCard PC? How well does it work? Where did you get it? what cable company do you use? Can you easily watch your HD recordings on other Vista computers?


I've been reading about it off and on, and it appears HP and Dell don't offer the cablecard setup anymore..

Velocity Micro seems to have a "relatively" cheap deal, with their S85 system.. Two internal tuners for just under 2 grand.

Looking to replace my old PVR250, SnapStream 3.4, and analog cable setup some time.....
 
I've been curious to know that as well. Please chime in with your experiences. Anyone know when a DIY CableCard PCI card will be available?
 
there are pci CC tuners but as far as i know they are oem only and only a few companies can use them... no consumer access. you also loose all of the "on demand" functionality on the current gen CC's. the CC also needs to be installed by your provider and setup by their tech.

there is a new slandered coming into play the is two way so in essence it will turn a pc into a fully functional dvr with "on demand" an movie streams and such.
 
I work in the industry and just last week I installed 2 cable cards into two ATI external CC tuners. Apparently they don't accept dual stream cards at this time. These tuners only work with Windows Vista Home/Ultimate and once the cards were activated everything was smooth sailing. The guy I installed them for is a moderator over at the Greenbutton.com and he was telling me you can't buy these tuners by themselves. They must be purchased from an OEM and that's basically what he did. I think it was a Gateway HTPC that he basically gutted out and put into his own personal enclosure. I was pretty impressed at how simple the process was. The only negative part, as a previous poster mentioned, they dont allow for video on demand at this time, at least not until the Cablecard 2.0 spec cards are out.
 
Gamerdad said:
The guy I installed them for is a moderator over at the Greenbutton.com and he was telling me you can't buy these tuners by themselves. They must be purchased from an OEM and that's basically what he did.
Click to expand...
http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs...1&productId=8198552921665246461&storeId=10151

I've been reading about it off and on, and it appears HP and Dell don't offer the cablecard setup anymore..

Velocity Micro seems to have a "relatively" cheap deal, with their S85 system.. Two internal tuners for just under 2 grand.
Click to expand...
How about two tuners for under $1350?
http://msmvps.com/blogs/chrisl/archive/2007/12/07/1384849.aspx
http://msmvps.com/blogs/chrisl/archive/2007/12/07/1385290.aspx
 
I just read in gizmodo that dell is putting them into their xps 420s now.
 
CrimandEvil said:
http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs...1&productId=8198552921665246461&storeId=10151
Click to expand...
hmmm... I don't think it will work on any Vista Premium/Ultimate PC though. I thought it required a special BIOS that has a hardware layer flag that allows for operation of the digital tuning unit..

Functionality
Optional/secondary external TV tuner supporting NTSC, ATSC, Clear QAM and CableCARD™ (to be obtained from local Cable TV provider). With the addition of a CableCARD1 and depending on cable TV subscription, this tuner enables viewing and recording of premium channels, including HD (ESPNHD, HBOHD, etc.) Adds ability to simultaneously watch and record TV signals on models that ship with ATI TV Wonder Digital Cable tuner.

Compatible Models
Units already shipping with ATI TV Wonder Digital Cable Tuner
Click to expand...
 
w1retap said:
hmmm... I don't think it will work on any Vista Premium/Ultimate PC though. I thought it required a special BIOS that has a hardware layer flag that allows for operation of the digital tuning unit..
Click to expand...
I never said it did. He said he wasn't sure if they sold them seperately, it's the same tuner that comes with any CC system so if you need/want to add two more (or three more) then just there you go.
 
You can buy a tivo HD for $250, with two tuners, and it actually works. Those ATI tuners are like $200 apeice and only work with an entire OEM computer. The price just doesn't make sense yet.
 
You can buy a tivo HD for $250, with two tuners, and it actually works. Those ATI tuners are like $200 apeice and only work with an entire OEM computer. The price just doesn't make sense yet.
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I'm considering the TIVO because my wife loved our old Series 1. Can you get the shows off of the TIVO and say put them on a Media Server to share with other devices, ie Media Center PC's..Creative Zen..etc?

Are the HD TIVO's you buy now...supporting the new Cable Card spec?
 
schizo said:
You can buy a tivo HD for $250, with two tuners, and it actually works. Those ATI tuners are like $200 apeice and only work with an entire OEM computer. The price just doesn't make sense yet.
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If I buy a Tivo HD and then build a small HTPC for everything else I'm still playing just as much for two devices as I would be for a single Dell.

I've already thought this out, when they were $1500+ for a single CC tuner system it just didn't make sense to get one. Now with Dell offering a single tuner system for less a little over $1000 and a dual tuner system for just a little over $1300 thats an incredible buy.

Oh, and theres the whole terrible UI thing to consider. Having used a Tivo (and several cable STB DVRs) I just can't stand the UIs used on them.
I'm considering the TIVO because my wife loved our old Series 1. Can you get the shows off of the TIVO and say put them on a Media Server to share with other devices, ie Media Center PC's..Creative Zen..etc?
Click to expand...
No. Tivo does have software that can do this but it currently doesn't support the Series 3 or Tivo HD products yet and I doubt you'll see it supported anytime soon.
Are the HD TIVO's you buy now...supporting the new Cable Card spec?
Click to expand...
Yeah.
 
Anyone have anything concrete about sticking the innards of a 420 into a regular ATX HTPC case? I don't have any experience with Dell so I don't know how they are with proprietary stuff.

I think I'm probably going to end up going with Dish and just lease an HD-DVR/Receiver from them and use my HTPC for everything else, but it'd be nice to keep this as an option.
 
Dell's mobo is BTX so it's not going to fit into an ATX case without you modding it into a BTX case.
 
w1retap said:
hmmm... I don't think it will work on any Vista Premium/Ultimate PC though. I thought it required a special BIOS that has a hardware layer flag that allows for operation of the digital tuning unit..
Click to expand...


Yup...the unit would have to be flashed with an OCUR bios supplied by the manufacturer. That's one of the many reasons cable card units are only available OEM.

Check out the Facebook group "Digital Convergence Specialists". Not only is there good info there, but you can ask some of the brightest minds in the industry (including Chris Morley and Rahul Sood) questions.
 
ty, joined the group. Hopefully some work-arounds will appear. I'll keep my eye out.
 
Yes, you can get HD and SD shows off the TiVo onto your computer, then put them on your ipod, etc. Support was enabled a month or two ago. But that only works for programs that are CCI byte 0x00 (copy freely). Many cable companies label everything 0x00, some label everything but broadcast channels 0x02 (copy once) like mine. You can't count on it. And yes, they support cable card.

As for prices:

$250 TiVo HD, 2 cablecard tuners
$200 eSATA 500GB expansion drive for the TiVo for a total of ~80 hr of HD and ~850 hr of SD
$500 Home-built HTPC with a e4500, 2GB RAM, nV 630i graphics, and a 500GB drive in something like a NSK2480. Can go even lower-end if you're running XP/vista MCE with hardware video acceleration rather than linux. (Or use a xbox360/PS3 with TVersity for $100 less.)
-------
$950 total

vs.

$1300 Dual-cablecard tuner HTPC

Of course if you hate the TiVo interface (infidel!) your choice is clear. Personally, I think the TiVo interface blows everything else out of the water.
 
Wheres the Tivo subscription fee added in at? :rolleyes:

1 Year = $129
2 Years = $249
3 Years = $299

The 3 year option (which we all know to be the cheaper of the three options) puts it at $51 less then the Dell's dual tuner system.

.... What was your point again?
 
Yes, after 4 years the dell HTPC is a better deal, if you price in a separate HTPC just to play downloaded TV shows. But you know, the tivo has one distinct advantage-- unlike OCUR HTPCs, it actually works.
 
CableCard PC's work too. I don't know where you get the notion they don't. You just have to have the cable company know how to activate the CableCard. Beyond that, Microsoft has fool proof directions on their website how to set it up.
 
w1retap said:
CableCard PC's work too. I don't know where you get the notion they don't. You just have to have the cable company know how to activate the CableCard. Beyond that, Microsoft has fool proof directions on their website how to set it up.
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Exactly. You don't hear about terrible installation nightmares anymore like you did when CC first came out.

And you have to price on an HTPC if you're going to do anything other then TV. That is, unless you don't plan on watching DVDs or any other videos. :rolleyes: Also, being "cheaper after four years" doesn't matter since you can't run the Tivo without a subscription, you have to buy one so it has to added into the total cost of the machine. We both know you're spinning it to make the Tivo look better (for some reason).

Schizo, it seems your out of touch on this.
 
I really don't think there's any comparison; the vast majority of people would be better served with a TiVo, playing DVDs and movies off a xbox360 rather than a whole computer. Since you hate the tivo interface, that's not for you... but it would be my first suggestion for everybody else.
 
I think there is a huge value in going with a PC on this. Tivo is great, but it lacks the all encompassing ability like the PC has. Where can I catalogue my DVD collection, what about music, videos and pictures. Tivo can't do that as well as Media Center can. So even though Tivo may be cheaper... you aren't exactly comparing apples here.
 
Hi all,
I got a little bored a few weeks ago and, long stoty short, I now have an XPS 420 with 2 CableCard tuners (well, almost).

It's confirmed that Dell does offer the DCT for the xps420, and it was my least expensive option. Dell shipped the DCTs separate and they will show up today, I will take some pics when I get home.

The XPS unit is 'ok' from a looks perspective. As usual, I hate the way the inside looks and I need to add a few HDDs and there is only room for 1 more.

The sideshow feature is downright gimmicky (more a poke at MS than dell).

I won't actually have my cable cards from comcrap until the 22nd (due to some travel).

Again, I will post more as I work through it.

Finally, I cannot see any difference inside vista ultimate regarding cablecard support. I know about the specialized bios, but I was hoping to see some mention of it in the OS.
 
Rip us a copy of your OS and backup your BIOS to a file. Then someone with the same mobo could load the custom BIOS onto it, and we could also compare versions of Vista and implement the changes in a regular version of Vista. Then in theory the cable card solution would work. :p
 
Hi All,
I realize I neglected to follow up on my experience with the cable cards and XPS420.

Firstly, let me say that I am pleasantly surprised by the Dell hardware and how easy it was to set-up.

On to the cablecards:

So I got 2 tuners and first things first...they are big. With the stand, it's almost the size of a freakin wii and with two of them...it's just hard to place them. The USB cables are short as well so they need to be close to the computer AND they both require a separate power feed. Why ATI did not offer a 'y' cable is beyond me.

When the comcrap technician came, he brought a bunch of cards. One worked right out of the box and the other we needed to swap the card a number of times. In fact, we never got it working but I convinced him to leave the 'bunk' card. At this point, I began to get swamped with work and went about 5 weeks with one tuner. After a month or so, I had a lull at work and decided to get the issue fixed. I thought the tuner was bad (after trying 4 cable cards) and here is where I discovered something ugly.

Dell, it seems will not support the hardware after 30 days if it's from a 3rd party vendor. ATI/AMD would not support it because it's not an off the shelf product and directed me to dell. After weeks of literally regressing from a very nice guy to the most screaming-ist a-hole on the planet I gave up. It was that bad. On a last ditch effort I called comcast again on the phone and was directed to a wonderfully informed gentleman who noted that the original doucheba----er, technician had read the cards information wrong to the provisioning department. We reset the information, re-paired the card and tuner to the cable system and 5 mins later, I had duallies up and running, recording and watching.

It should be noted that one should immediately upgrade the firmware on the cards and ensure that you are resolving QAM256 to receive HD and premium content.

The cards work flawlessly in vista and the dell remote is even pretty nice. Channel change time is a little slow, but the clarity is wonderful and I almost NEVER need to restart my system. The biggest hurdle here is comcast and the coax connection.

I would challenge most people though to give up the notion of having the PC next to the TV and go with a media extender to watch TV on. It's a great idea to have one little box next to the TV and you can put your HTPC in a closet with all the noisy popcorn popping hard drives you can squeeze in there.
 
sorry a little off topic here

how much do you have to pay per month for the comcrab CC?
 
When I used to have them not too far back, they wanted the same price as adding another STB.
 
As I understand it--having worked with the cable card tech on the development end--the problem has never really been the cable cards...it's always been the cable companies and DRM. There's so much STUFF required on different levels to make the whole package work properly, it was a big headache for those trying to be first to market.

I think that the technology is slowly coming into its own. As more manufacturers work to adopt the cards into their configurations, it is my hope that they'll also find a better way to handle digital rights management so that it doesn't feel so blasted restrictive.
 
CableCards for the PC isn't worth it unless you can purchase the devices separately instead of buying a "special" computer, and they support on demand services, like comcast on demand.
 
Deviationer said:
CableCards for the PC isn't worth it unless you can purchase the devices separately instead of buying a "special" computer, and they support on demand services, like comcast on demand.
Click to expand...

The sad thing is I don't think it's the manufacturers of any the equipment that are restricting the content or availability...it's the media distributors and licensing bodies that are tightly controlling things.
 
Couple of thoughts.

1) The Cable Cards are like 2 bucks a month.
2) I would really disagree with the assertion that DCTs are only worthwhile as standalone devices. I think it's important to note that it is the Cable Cos that require all this lock down and I give kudos to MS for stepping up to the plate to pay lipservice to the DRM requirements and pioneer these devices. I always point to Media Center as an example of exactly how 'leading edge' microsoft can be, it far and away trumps any Media frontend available through common CE devices including TiVo and the STBs provided by sat and cable companies. If you can imagine, you can buy a stripped down cablecard computer, with a couple of tuners and then use the box to sling media all around your house or wider network. Once the media is on the computer, it's really easy to manipulate it (provided it's not flagged as protected) and the bottom line is that it's about as stable as any CE device out there.

I am currently doing all of the network and electronics for a condo in Idaho and I was able to convince everyone involved that doing this with the combination of media extenders was a great way to go. This way, we don't need to have coax to every room and the media extenders are all wireless so in essence, a power cord and HDMI cable is all you will need. That is pretty slick.

Now couple the HTPC with MSs new live mesh initiative and you have the ability to sync all your documents into the cloud with the potential to make that video abailable (after transcoding) on the net.

The only drawback I really see here is that DOCSIS 3 will likely enable BiDi cable cards for on demand stuff, but I already have my netflix account through MCE. Additionally, I also can access my entire music collection in any room...which you can't do with a STB. So i guess the point is this...if you are going to get an HTPC, do your self a favor and save the hassle of piecing it together and get a pre-built with cablecards. My experience with them has been wonderful and I am looking forward to another deployment in the very near future.
 
so other than allowing your to record hd what does this setup offer that a htpc and hdhomerun can't?
 
It allows encrypted HD and other encrypted channels.. HDHR does not.
 
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