Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Cable Boxes With DVD, MP3, Networking

Posted by simoniker on from the geek-toy-beckons dept.

Bruha writes "It appears that Charter Communications cable division is in the first phase of rolling out a new home media center-style cable box. The article on CNN describes the box with a 80 Gig hard drive, dual tuners (With HDTV), DVD, and WiFi networking capability to allow music to be transferred to the unit along with pictures from your PC. Copyright protection prevents recordings from being copied to the PC, and Charter has ordered 100,000 of these boxes." We covered a preliminary announcement of this box, which uses the Linux-based Moxi software, last year.

20 of 150 comments (clear)

  1. How long? by trout_fish · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How long will it be before the copy protection is broken and TV programs can be copied off? Two, maybe three days?

    1. Re:How long? by ultrapenguin · · Score: 5, Interesting

      If its anything like DTCP, it might not even be broken at all. And infact, that's probably what it uses, since the units support HDTV.

    2. Re:How long? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
      How long will it be before the copy protection is broken and TV programs can be copied off? Two, maybe three days?

      What I want to know is why do the devices have copy protection at all? You're just recording stuff off of the cable channels which presumably you've paid for. People record shows to VHS tapes all the time and even *gasp* share them among friends who may have missed an episode here or there. Why is the fact that it records to a hard drive any different? If these companies had any marketing brains they'd put DVD burners in them to let you save shows to DVD or SVCD format to trade with your friends or to archive for your collection.

      What are these companies worried about anyway? Is it that you won't feel a need to buy their 10 disc boxed set of the Sopranos season 1 for some ungodly overpriced amount? If anything people that make these television programs should be jumping with joy that people want to preserve their legacy in their private collections forever!! Inevitably the show gets cancelled and depending on whether it was good enough may or may not go into rerun syndication.

      Unfortunately we see how that works and have 20 episodes of Friends on a week, but trying to find any of the GOOD programs in syndication anymore is impossible. I'm a citizen and not a consumer. Don't treat me like a piece of shit because I'm just a statistic to you. I spent $1200 building a MythTV box thinking I could sift through the cruft of television to find something good to watch thinking that maybe all the good stuff is hiding at 3am on TNT or USA. Well, it's not. I'm really thinking of just abandoning the project and using it for a Windows gaming box or generic HTPC running Windows XP for playing DVDs, DivX, and games. Television is a lost cause.

      * Posted AC since I'm sick of being moderated as offtopic or flamebait for voicing my god damn opinion.

    3. Re:How long? by ultrapenguin · · Score: 5, Informative

      DTLA

      Basically a digital content licensing/protection sceme created by 5 companies (listed on that site).
      All HDTV tuners and HDTV-connecting equipment has to support this for copy-protected content.

    4. Re:How long? by ultrapenguin · · Score: 5, Informative

      Few months ago I grabbed and read their "informational version" of the standard (the real version wants you to sign a NDA and pay $$$), and in general, its about high encryption to the data traversing high-speed buses between HD equipment (1394, usb2, etc). It provides mechanisms for scrambling the signal if another device is attached to the bus (sniffing) and methods for "blacklisting" known hacked equipment.
      Pretty hardcore stuff, has been around for as long as I know HDTV tuners existed (in japan at least), and has NOT been cracked, hacked, bypassed or in any other way defeated. The encryption it uses (from reading the informational PDF) is pretty strong, there's a mechanism for refreshing keys every so often, etc.

      Pretty bad stuff, if anyone has any POSITIVE information on this, feel free to reply :)

  2. Finally a balance by Trigun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Imagine that, giving us what we've been asking for, with only enough restrictions to make it unobtrusive to the user while still protecting the content providers rights.

    Seems like sanity wins out in the end.

    1. Re:Finally a balance by Trigun · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Because they're not trying to eliminate mp3's or give you a hugely restricted POS hardware. The only thing that you can't do with it is move recordings off the box to the PC. You can still use it as a recorder and move them to some other media.

    2. Re:Finally a balance by shatfield · · Score: 5, Insightful

      But here's the kicker -- these people are competing for TiVo's current and future market share. They know that if they block people from being able to zip through commercials on previously recorded shows, that people will skip this product and go with a TiVo, which doesn't have such a restriction. They are also offering (in my area) this upgraded cable box with PVR for only $7 a month.

      But what happens when these "good enough" devices put TiVo out of business? The good money is on them suddenly announcing that you will no longer be able to speed through commercials. You will only be able to store your shows for x number of days before they will be forcibly erased, you will only be able to watch your recordings from x time to y time, and oh yeah, the $7 a month fee just went up to $14 a month, sorry for any inconvenience. Once their is no competition, the restrictions will be unleashed and we won't have an alternative.

      I say to hell with these upgraded cable boxes, go with TiVo (or build your own) and don't trust the Cable companies to do the right thing. Most of them are owned by big media companies anyways (It's called "Time Warner Cable" for a reason), so you know that they are just itching to control your viewing habits even more than they already do.

      --
      "To make a mistake is only human; to persist in a mistake is idiotic." Cicero
  3. TiVO ++ from India already does all this.. by jkrise · · Score: 3, Informative

    It was covered at Slashdot as well.

    Nothing new here, is there??
    -

    --
    If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
  4. Wait a Minute! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    It uses Linux!

    But it has copy protection!

    I think my head is going to explode with this paradox.

  5. Tivo by grennis · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Bad news for Tivo?

    Apparently, investors aren't worried about it.

  6. Is it available direct? by Sherloqq · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If I could buy this directly and it were cheap and it worked with any cable provider, I'd be much more interested in it than in building my own... *even* if I can't copy the taped programming off of it. Why invent and make your own wheel if someone's not only done it already, but also done it potentially cheaper and better.

    --
    Have EVDO, will travel.
  7. Forward live broacasts!? by the_shaitan · · Score: 5, Funny

    From the article:

    "DVRs allow users to record shows onto a hard drive, and to pause, forward, and rewind live broadcasts"

    How can a DVR allow users to _forward_ a _live_ broadcast???

  8. LOL! by brunes69 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is like exactly what I built for myself.... down to the letter, including the WiFi! It's runnign MythTV. I should have patented it!

  9. Yes, yes, yes by heironymouscoward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I have seen the future and it is this: set-top boxes that record everything coming in and send it back out onto a global P2P network that turns the RIAA/MPAA's hair a delicate shade of pure white.
    "Select 'Share All' to share your TV programmes..."
    Now, imagine this had the backing of a national government, TV companies, movie distributors, cable distributors and banks, and was tied into a simple payment system. Hold your breath, count to five, and you have instant pay-as-you-go TV and video and music on demand.
    Prediction: this will not happen legally.
    Shame for the media industry, it could make them so... much.... money.

    --
    Ceci n'est pas une signature
  10. FreeVo by barcodez · · Score: 3, Informative

    Install FreeVo on a PC with a capture card and video out and you have the same thing without the copy protection.

    --

    ----
  11. Copyright NOT by ajs318 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Copyright protection prevents recordings from being copied to the PC
    No it doesn't. The thing has an analogue out. Possibly even RGB if it has a SCART conector. Nothing is ever going to stop you copying from that, without also stopping you watching it on a TV set.

    Also, the files on the HDD must be readable, and the software to read them must be in the machine. {Think Spectrum fast cassette loaders. Not just fast, but copy-proof because it makes the whole process that bit more sensitive to fidelity - so an analogue copy is less likely to be successful. The first programme on the tape - often written in BASIC so you can just use LOAD "" - has to use the ROM-resident loading routines to load itself. It then implements the fast loader. All you need to do is to get this first programme to load but not run itself - the usual method was by making a fake header - and then modify the fast loader to read all the rest of the programme without executing it}. Now, 20 years on, the same principles apply. The computer has to be able to read the data from the disk in order to display it on the telly. Whatever can be read, can be copied. Light travels in straight lines. Energy is never created nor destroyed. Pressure in a fluid acts equally in all directions.

    Why can't they just write something on the disk that the program [sic] can read, but the pirates can't? - reader's letter in an old Amiga magazine, offering the holy grail of copy protection.
    --
    Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
  12. Re:Hack? how hard could that be? by GigsVT · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Macrovision will not affect your ability to capture video on your computer clearly.

    It will if your capture card has AGC that is freaked out by macrovision.

    --
    I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
  13. Why I'll get one by Christopher+Bibbs · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Yes, there is a risk that these types of boxes could put TiVo and other 3rd party PVR makers out of business, but there are still a few compelling reasons that will draw people such as myself.

    First, one less box sitting in the entertainment center. There is a finite amount of space for AV equipment and a limit to the number of power outlets. Remove a box without losing functionality (at least today) sign me up!

    Second, seemless integration would be made easier. There was a comic over at Penny Arcade that pretty well described the situation many AV geeks are living in. If I could remove a single device from my cabinet, it would make my wife's life easier and thus my life easier. This would be a Good Thing(tm).

    Third, there is an opportunity for new services. Perhaps my cable company is unique (Wide Open West), but they have continued to add services while maintaining or lowering costs. In my opinion they "get it" and know who and what there competition is. I feel certain that when a new use for these boxes is invented (perhaps an iTunes like player and purchasing system) they will be right there trying to offer the services. Would TiVo? Maybe the hacker community could, but that's not the same thing.

    These are just my thoughts, but I suspect that there are a good number of people who feel the same way and will speak with their wallets.

  14. HDTV support at last! by YetAnotherName · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It's nice to see a consumer product support timeshifting of HDTV material. Along with a plethora of HDTV programming, this might be a nice step towards making widespread availability a reality.

    Myself, I ended up building my own, centered around the MyHD card and a RAID array with about a terabyte of available storage. Music, movies, and HDTV. Technology's wonderful!