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The Great HDCP Fiasco
Toasty16 writes "According to an article on Firingsquad, our shiny new Radeon and Geforce cards won't be able to play HDCP-encrypted content, even though they have been advertising HDCP support as a feature for a few generations. Want to watch that new Blu-ray movie on your custom built PC at full resolution? Sorry, retail graphics cards won't be able to do that; only OEM-built computers from Dell, Sony, HP and the like will have that functionality built in."
tech people need to band together and make a MUTUAL BENEFIT tech company -- one where the goal is not to profit from the world but to provide solutions for members to get around problems like this.
I don't actually know anything about HDCP, but I assume it is an "end to end" system, where every component in the stream must support each other.
Until this point HDCP was just from the video output to the display device.
This new standard is basically the OS saying that in-between the protected drive and the video card, there must now be a protected path to enable the full resolution of the HD source. The video cards will still work with HDCP equipment, it's just that HD-DVD or Blu-Ray playback will not deliver full resolution on that setup.
To be brutally honest, this is horribly depressing for those of us that know better but just acceptable enough for most users (720p being a higher res source than they were used to anyway) that few outside the technical realm will really raise much of a stink. Most will live with reduced resolution output without even knowing it; full path HDCP support will be another checkbox to move people at Best Buy to look at a higher end system (video or PC).
Stuff like the broadcast flag which does affect a wide range of viewers in a very annoying way would raise a lot more ire.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Usually one has a couple other options when breaking encryption. For example, some unscrupulous hardware company employee could release the keys to the Internet anonymously. Or, somebody posing as a manufacturer could release them as well.
Although "bricking" is a possibility with the platform, it's unlikely to occur because potentially millions of people (voters) would be quite upset.
What's more likely is somebody caught with the "stolen" keys gets sentenced prison or worse.
I noticed all the listed companies are Wintel outfits. As such will Apple cave into this too? Might Apple and Microsoft team up to support HD-DVD instead? If Apple and Microsoft team up does that mean I can expect snowball fights in hell?
Computers allow humans to make mistakes at the fastest speeds known, with the possible exception of tequila and handguns
The key that you need is embedded in a chip such that you need a million-dollar laboratory to get at it.
I'm sure there are at least a few people in the world with access to that equipment.
The short version is that it will let the Powers That Be remotely revoke the privilages of any hardware with keys that are known to have been cracked.
Revoke the privileges of licensed, standards-meeting hardware, maybe.
What I see happening is someone building an emulator that essentially runs the player software in a sandbox that makes it think everything is fine and dandy. Of course, it will have to be updated fairly frequently as new releases include hardware disabling codes for the older keys, but that will be a game of catch-up that the media corporations will never win.
That is, assuming the technology succeeds commercially at all. I personally don't think it will take off, because there's no incremental upgrade path, or a particularly compelling reason to upgrade for the vast majority of the population. Sure, you could play a high-definition movie at quarter resolution on a regular TV, but what's the point? The DVD version will be much cheaper, and look just as good on that display. To get any benefit will mean buying a high-end TV, a new player, and media that costs more. Thanks, but no thanks. And I say that as technology-loving geek who owns hundreds of DVDs. My parents - who watch DVDs on TVs that are 10-20 years old - would probably laugh at the suggestion.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
I had a years subscription to CinemaNow. It was a hundred bucks for a great selection of poor quality porn and and B- movies. I had 700 crappy movies to choose from that I could start watching in a few seconds.
The good - 700 available movies right from my computer with a slowly changing selection. No massive hard drive, no piles of disks, no evidence of how much porn I watch, and no time wasted organizing all those movies. I could get bored and in under a minute be watching a new movie. The DRM was barely noticable when watching streaming. I would never buy/download a movie from them though because of the DRM.
The bad - Movies sucked. Quality at 700kbp sucked. No 5.1+ sound.
I hear about this new Vongo service where not only do you get streamed movies but the starz channel streamed also. The quality looks as crappy as CinemaNow at about the same 700kbs quality.
I guess my point is, by the time these new HD discs really start taking off and they have a selection worth investing money into watching them, will streaming movies already be here and good enough. Since DRM requires a connection anyway, why not just watch them streaming. I don't think the current 700kbs or even 1500kps is going to cut it, but I live in a rural nowhere and already have access to 5000kps for under $50/month. In 3 years I could easily have a connection of 10,000kbs and with better compression could be watching streaming >DVD quality movies in 5.1 surround over the internet.
If I could find a service that offered HBO/Showtime movies, pc games, and a few TV channels (all in streaming >DVD quality) I would be more than willing to shell out $50/month for the service. As long as the service meant having the DRM in the background unnoticed. After testing the waters with CinemaNow, I don't think I want to go back to shovelling out $25 here and there to build another throw-away collection of plastic discs that will inevidately be outdated or resold in special editions 4 or 5 years down the road again anyway.
Streaming should also mean that it doesn't matter what plugs or O/S I am using. As long as they get their money and can keep tabs on how many computers I am streaming movies from simultaniously then they won't need some grand copyright protection scheme (hopefully). If I had thousands of movies and programs remotely stored and organized for me that I could watch at the click of a button, then why in the hell would I waste my time trying to record them or steal them? KISS
SuperAudio (it had some other names too) were a Sony technology for higher quality sound than CDs, basically, a DVD where all the capacity were used for high quality sound.
... which died a quiet death after a couple years.
Never took off - CDs are "good enough", nobody bothered to upgrade. No customers meant that record companies outside of Sony didn't bother releasing content on the format
The same will happen to these high definition video disks. You'll see.
There's no way I can go out and pay for a HD drive, a new monitor and then watch retail purchases HD content.
It's going to be downloading rips for me it would seem.
*shrugs*
I remember stumping up for a DVD decoder card back in the day - seemed a fair wad of cash, but I did like the picture. Basically it would seem the cost of entry to the new HD DRM future is going to be astronomical - nobody is going to bother...
For the average joe who watches movies on say a player in the lounge, a desktop and a laptop when out and about - exactly how much is it going to cost to upgrade from DVD to HD? How much do they possibly think I'm going to pay extra to replace my equipment that currently meets most of the specs with NEW - JUST TO GET ROUND THEIR F'IN DRM *slams head into desk* That's it - I'm sitting the next gen out.
Maybe Stallman is pretty smart to insist that DRM not be a part of GPL III after all. Do we really want to go down this path with Linux? A firm stand now might (I did say might) send the industry a wake up call that not everyone will accept intentionally crippled hardware.
Tired of all the isms, don't exploit people as an employer, or a government, mmmmK?
When will the CEO's of these companies with infinite incomes, realise that the rest of us on finite incomes, only have finite amounts of money to spend on the essentials of life:-
- such as over-inflated housing (well here in Sydney anyway)
- over-inflated petrol (GAS to those in the US) prices
- over-inflated food prices (that are blamed on over-inflated petrol prices)
- over-inflated toll road prices (well here in Sydney anyway)
- over-inflated Pay TV prices, that have just as many over-inflated ads as Free to Air
- still expect us to spend money on their DRM'ed over-inflated crap that they call entertainment
- and find extra money to spend on new over-inflated equipment to view the same crap on over-inflated screen, when we all thought that we had bought equipment that would allow us to view what very few movies that are worth purchasing.
I choose to spend my very sparse, very precious extra money left over after the essentials getting out in the world, driving through Australia's beautiful bush in my 4WD, taking photographs on my Digital SLR, and seeing real music played live by local artist (and purchasing my music direct from the artist, at the gig), rather than give that sparse, very precious money to fund some over-inflated wanker, so that he can have another mansion overlooking the harbour within which he can snort another fat line of cocaine, using a rolled up $100 note, that came out of MY pocket.
To those wankers I say PHARK YOU.
Three of Nine.
A highly sensible and valid point. What the hell are you doing on
There is another method to get round the HDCP trap, which is to buy one of the Spatz boxes http://www.engadget.com/2005/07/15/spatz-techs-dv
Now, HDCP also allows a revocation method - but it is not at all clear how the revoked keys would be transported. It could be that a new HD-DVD/BD disk carries them and disallows display for that disk, or burns this data into the player's NVRAM. I cannot believe that the latter would be legal ("I put this disk into my player and it broke it entirely". "Oh, yes, sorry, 20th Century Fox has revoked your television rights for using a non-approved display device". "Mother of pearl - call my lawyers!"), so we have a situation where some DVD makers could choose not to allow display on HDCP-stripping devices.
I think the way around this one would be to ensure that they lose as much money as possible on that. Every time someone discovers a non-stripper compliant disk, they post the name of the disk on a central web site (LiveJournal or some such), and we all go out and buy the disk. The next day, we all go back and return the disk and demand our money back - "Hey! This disk doesn't play on my projector. My other ones do!". Doesn't matter if you have a projector, HDTV or a HD-DVD player - we just all go out and do a consumer return. And clearly tell them why the disk is going back. This causes the studios and shops to lose more money than a simple boycott of the goods.
After a while, they're going to notice that the HDCP-stripper friendly disks sell more than the hostile ones (which they've lost a boatload on). Companies, in the end, are amoral creations designed to make profit. They are, in the round, economically rational. They will shift.
And once the device-discrimination stops, we can start the frame grabbing parties to P2P the contents of their disks. Hell, did I just say that out loud?
--Ng
"Sorry, to my eyes DVDs look just fine.. and none of my hardware needs replacing for any other reason. If it ain't broke."
Exactly what I think. However, I suspect that the studios will stop producing content for our dvd players and "force" us to move to bluhddvdextraplus++
http://www.intellipool.se/ - Intellipool Network Monitor
If you don't have laws like this in the US then you're mugs. Tell you what, I'll sell you a ham sandwich which includes two slices of bread. You got a sandwich, what more do you want?
On another note, if US do have this rule, isn't it interesting that ATI and Nvidia board manufacturers haven't started provided full HDCP compliance? It seems to indicate that HDCP requirements won't be necessary for another year yet...Delayed Vista? Maybe...
Karem
When all is said and done, nothing changes...
<plagiarise victim="self">
The average eye with 20/20 vision is capable of resolving one minute of arc, a sixtieth of a degree. This equates to roughly 300 dpi, when viewed at a distance of one foot. Let's say the average distance from a couch to a TV is 7 to 10 feet. At 7 feet, you can resolve 300/7 = 43 dpi, at 10 feet it's 30 dpi.
So in order to fully resolve a 720p picture (1469 pixels diagonally) at 7 feet, the TV would have to be at least 34 inches diagonally to make out all the detail. At 10 feet you'd need a rather large 50 incher. For true 1080p, even at 7 feet, anything under 50 inches and you're missing out - and at 10 feet you'd have to get a whopping 74 inch TV! At 10 feet, you need a 30" screen even to make out plain old standard-definition DVDs properly.
</plagiarise>
So unless you've got a particularly large TV or a particularly small loungeroom - or a projector - you may find investing in a high-definition TV to be entirely pointless. You simply can't see the extra detail. Of course, watching high-def movies on a computer monitor is different; we sit much closer to them, say around 18 inches away. At that distance, you'd want a 200 dpi screen (at 24", that's an impressive 4183 x 2353). Or you could get one of these - except it doesn't support HDCP...
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Currently DVDs are 720 x 576 (PAL), which is good enough for me, at least for the next 5 to 10 years.
... DVD was a natural replacement and solved all of those issues.
VHS degraded over time, was awkward to use, bulky, hard to navigate exactly, low resolution
Unless you have a 60" TV and can see the DVD encoding blocks and resolution. This is a niche market though - most people (especially in the UK and Europe) simply do not have massive TVs.
So unless DVDs suddenly start shipping with poor encoding, thus trying to make HiDef discs look better in comparison, no one is going to care. I'm going to buy £20 BluRays - I only watch most films a couple of times anyway - rental seems a better option even for DVDs, TV series are worth buying, but they're less likely to be in HD anyway, or not as worthy of HD. High BluRay prices will simply mean less sales to consumers of content, and more rentals.
A good film that's worth owning is like a good book. It doesn't need the resolution to be good, it's all about the content, the acting, the story. As long as the DVD is looked after, it's all that 90% of people will need. With clever filters DVD resolution can be upscaled very nicely as well, so it will look good on most HDTVs, as long as the DVD player is decent (+ progressive output). If you can afford a HDTV, then spare a bit more for a decent player, eh?
How long will it be, though, before being "Trusted" is required for other things? Like connecting to the Internet, for example ('cause we gotta stop those damn hackers)? How long will it be before Free Software is banned entirely, since it's fundamentally incompatible with DRM (regardless of what Linus thinks)?
/. is ineffective. I ditched my TV some times ago, now I also avoid cinema because I find it unbearable to give money to someone who use it to take my rights away from me.
As great parent post said, this is only movies. Do you need movies? Do you want DRM everywhere? Then vote with your money and and stop watching those crappy movies. All off them. And tell your friends why you do it, just bitching on
'"The idea of monopoly rights to specific aspects of objects is neither compatible with a free market..."
Of course it is.'
No, it is not.
'And what's the alternative?'
Ah, that is a problem for the free market to solve now isn't it? Going to the government and asking for special laws to enable your business model just really smacks of free market thinking now doesn't it?
If the free market cannot come up with a better solution than "Give us a government granted monopoly on our creative/inventive 'products.'" then perhaps we need to admit that the free market is not always the best answer to life's problems.
Would some true free market thinkers care to step up to the plate? Offer possible workable alternatives?
all the best,
drew
( zotz posting as AC from another machine )
And this of course does not even cover this fun scenario: I crack my unit and do not release the keys so that they do not know which one it is, then I simply keep releasing the actual movies in .avi format. Oops. How are they going to put an end to that?
HDTV sales are drying up because everybody who cares already bought one. Do you honestly expect a market that has basically already reached saturation is suddenly going to have a 100% replacement rate in that hardware? Bear in mind that the average household income in the U.S. is $49,722, which means an HDTV big enough to see any quality improvement over an ordinary DVD costs almost all of the average U.S. household income for an entire month after taxes. That's not something you just throw out because some paranoid Hollywood nutcases decide you should.
Here's my proposal, and I think we could make it stick, at least here in California: make the Hollywood studios pay a steep tax on the sale of every HD-DVD or Blu-Ray that enforces HDCP restrictions to help defray the added disposal costs of landfilling all of the thousands of glass picture tubes (containing mercury and other nasty substances) in the backs of all the HDTVs that they obsolete. Maybe that would make them think twice about this.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
And if you actually read the product descriptions, it says those devices have HDCP-compliant in and out. They're just signal boosters for really long cables, they don't remove HDCP from the signal.
Give a man fire, and you warm him for the night. Set a man on fire, and you warm him for the rest of his life.
Usually if they do accept the return, you'll just get the same thing back anyway. So you're plan has been foiled already
No, his plan isn't foiled. Getting the same thing back in return is the plan. You just missed the point.
If you buy a movie disk, and it ceases to function, it's a warranty return and most stores will give you equivalent merchandise and renew the [excessively short] warranty return period. If you keep "breaking" the disks by playing them in your unapproved player, soon one of two things will happen.
1) The store will get fed up with your daily return of yesterday's replacement and file a retailer's complaint against the manufacturer (which has a LOT more weight than just an end-user's complaint).
2) Your player will run out of banned-key storage and end up allowing the disk (and any further disks) to play without banning them.
Bonus points to those that get both eventualities to happen at about the same time.