That's not true. It is fairly limited though. However, you can get CableCARD hardware for your PC. I know this is true because my girlfriend (I know, weird, right?) has a Sony VAIO PC that came with one. It's made by ATI and has an multi-stream CableCARD slot in it.
In fact, in Windows 7, you can buy your own CableCARD hardware, and it will support the tuning adapters required for switched digital video.
Granted, it seems like it only works with Windows... but it's certainly not restricted to TiVo.
I don't know if you can buy this hardware at Fry's or Micro Center, but it does exist and end users can get it.
You'll notice that most of the people whining about CableCARD in this thread use Tivo. This should tell you something about where the problem really is: millions of people use CableCARD-enabled cable boxes with no problem.
People don't generally have problems with TiVo+CableCARD setups (once the cable company gets it set up). CableCARDs generally work fine. No, the problems are generally with the tuning adapters we're required to use. These are pieces of hardware provided by the cable company.
In fact, the TiVos do comply with the standards quite well. Unfortunately, TiVos are one-way receivers, and don't comply with the Switched Digital Video standards, because that's not part of the CableCARD standard.
The solution was to add the external tuning adapter, which the cable companies did a really bad job of supporting. The devices are buggy and the people on the side of the cable company had no idea how to handle them.
Yes, the cable company-issued STBs with cable cards do work pretty well, because they have built-in two-way communications. See below as to why I won't rent a cable company DVR.
By the way, around here, Time Warner charges TWO fees for the DVR: $7.95 "digital converter" fee, and $8.95 "DVR service" fee. That's $16.90/month for their DVR service. TiVo service is $12.95/month if you pay monthly, or $10.75/month if you pay yearly.
Yes, there is the initial investment - even the refurbished HD TiVos are nearly $200. It's up to the end-user to decide whether that's worth it. For me... it sure was. Here's why.
I would rent a cable company DVR if it didn't have the following problems (BTW, for techies out there, our DVRs are SA 8300HDC's running SARA):
* It should understand that it should only record one of the same episode. e.g.: HBO plays Entourage at 10:00PM on Sundays. Then they replay the same episode several times over the next week or so. The DVR should understand that it should only record that episode once. TiVo does, but the Time Warner DVRs in this area do not. * It shouldn't corrupt recordings. * It shouldn't delete all recordings every time there's a software update. * I should be able to set up a series to record - not just a channel, start time, and end time. * I should be able to set it to record only new episodes, not repeats.
Those are all requirements for me, and unfortunately, the cable company DVRs here simply do not do any of those things.
Other nice things about the TiVo, but aren't requirements:
* Setting DVR from the Internet. * Setting DVR from my BlackBerry. * YouTube on my TV. * NetFlix on my TV. * Amazon Video Store on my TV. * Videos from my computer on my TV. * RSS (Video and Audio podcasts) on my TV * eSATA expandability - Time Warner has the eSATA port on their DVRs shut off.
Note: There may be DVRs from other cable systems that don't have all of these problems.
What you're experiencing is called Switched Digital Video. It's not really a scam. It's a way to save bandwidth.
The part that sucks for you, as an owner of a CableCARD-enabled TV, is that CableCARD-enabled devices are generally one-way. The set-top boxes have two-way communications. Basically, on an SDV set-top box, when you change channels, the box asks the headend "I want channel XYZ, what's the frequency?" - and then the headend responds. But your TV doesn't have that capability, so you just have to locate the frequencies on your own.
The best part is - if nobody is watching a particular channel in your area - it may not be available to you at all because the headend stops transmitting channels that nobody's watching.
Wait, don't they do this with DSL, gas, and electricity? Sure, you still have one company that owns the lines/pipes that come to your place of residence... but the service comes from whomever you choose.
Yeah, but you're allowed to use a third-party e-mail client, router, operating system, etc. if you want to, because they're not doing anything that prevents you from doing so.
Yes, I have heard of MythTV... however I didn't know that it supports CableCARD. Wait - it doesn't, that was an April fool's joke.*
That means that if you're on a cable system that is anything like mine, MythTV + Digital tuner will get you... all your basic cable in analog, and then your local networks in ClearQAM. I expect my DVR to be able to receive all of the channels I pay for.
* (That seriously wasn't actually meant to be facetious. I actually read the mailing list post jokingly announcing CableCARD support and believed it for a moment. Seriously, I'm not a dick.)
Hrm, I suppose I have become a bit complacent. The whole CableCARD thing boils down to access control (I think the industry calls it "seperable security"). As a prior commenter posted, it's either that, or you have to physically install a tap to block the signal.
But you're right - ideally, I buy a piece of hardware - a TiVo, a PCI or USB tuner, whatever... plug it in, and things go, and I don't have to rent anything from the cable company. Or, hell, maybe I even have to call them to have the device authorized. Fine. Whatever, I still didn't have to rent anything. I may be wrong, but I *think* that's what Tru2Way is supposed to solve. That is, of course, if it ever comes to fruition.
So, I guess I agree with you, it's not a perfect solution. Maybe I should have said that it's the "best available solution that still allows me to receive the content I want"
Why am I stuck choosing between Verizon and Comcast?
Holy hell, you have a choice between Verizon and Comcast? I have a choice between Time Warner Cable and Time Warner Cable. And I live in an apartment, so no satellite dishes.
Perhaps you should not be paying for a device that honors such things?
That's the problem. There's really not much other choice. If you want to use a device that is capable of transferring shows to other devices, it's pretty much TiVo HD or Windows Media Center, if you want to use CableCARDs - and both of those solutions honor the broadcast flags.. Either that, or you can set up some other computer-based solution and use an IR blaster and a cable box, or you can just do analog cable.
Time Warner sets the broadcast flags more strictly than the actual broadcasters. Everything (except the local broadcast channels) are set so that I cannot copy anything from the TiVo. You can't blame TiVo for honoring those (they'd probably be sued if they didn't), but you can blame Time Warner for not honoring the policies of their content providers.
Just wait until we get "free/unlimited/unmetered cable TV and VOD" but you're internet is limited - that way, the cable company makes money no matter how you get your content!
You've got a point there. The TiVo + CableCARD solution (which I also use, through evil Time Warner Cable) is a good one, unless you want PPV or On-Demand services. I live without the On-Demand services, but my roommate is a huge boxing fan - and most of the "good" fights are pay-per-view (and ridiculously priced), so we still need to keep a regular Scientific Atlanta box on top of the TiVo - $7.95/month, in addition to the ~$2.50 for the CableCARD in the TiVo.
At the same time, I also need to have a Cisco "tuning adapter" connected to the USB port of my TiVo (to support Switched Digital Video), and about once a month, it stops working. I need to call the idiot "techs" at Time Warner, go through the process of power cycling the tuning adapter and the TiVo (which never fixes the problem), then finally I can get transferred to a higher level tech to have them send the proper signal to make it work again.
You probably don't need a tuning adapter or anything like it with FiOS, but I can tell you that people who use them with cable are not happy with the solution.
Oh, and that's another thing. They had to send a technician out to install the card. Seriously. The guy put it in the slot, called a number and read some numbers on the screen to the "tech" on the other line.
Did I read that correctly? "rely on them to get on with our everyday lives"? I think my life would go on just fine if I never connected to Xbox live again.
I'll concur with Galactic Dominator - I used Linux emulation for almost a year as part of my backup strategy, before switching to duplicity. I still use dump (and yes, I'm doing dumps of live, mounted, read/write filesystems - all of them - nightly.
I also use ZFS on my system, and have never had corruption or a failure of any kind. As for double parity mode - I'm not sure what the status is, but as of version 8.0, ZFS is no longer considered experimental.
If you don't like how AT&T and/or Apple operate... go to Verizon and/or buy a BlackBerry or something.
* Don't get me wrong, I agree - if Apple bricked the devices on purpose, that's pretty bad - and at the very least the policies should have been spelled out clearly in the first place - every other phone on AT&T can be unlocked with a short call to customer service.
That's exactly right. The difference between bricking the Xbox versus banning it from Xbox live is this: Xbox live is a SERVICE and to connect to that service, you need to abide by their terms. If you don't like it - don't connect - but play your Xbox all you want offline. I suppose there could be monopolistic behavior there too, since Xbox units can't connect to anything other than Xbox live, but that's a different discussion...
Many of the carriers do provide official unlocks - including AT&T. I think they just don't do it on the iPhone, which is ridiculous. I was able to get my BlackBerry unlocked by calling them and waiting a week for them to send me the code.
I just cooked some delicious beef ravioli. The instructions clearly state "boil 5 minutes, or to your taste." I think if it were Apple brand ravioli, the ravioli would probably be toxic if I cooked it less than 5 minutes, and would completely disintegrate if I cooked it any longer. Also, the ravioli would be rendered completely inedible unless I cooked it in Apple brand cookware, ate off of an Apple brand plate, and used Apple brand silverware.
Of course, I would probably also need to use Apple brand toilet paper some time after that.
I guess I'll stick with this brand of ravioli, it seems to allow me more freedoms.
A cellular network could be set up with measure to enforce that only approved phones and applications may run, and that is the approach of CDMA (Verizon Wireless).
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Granted. It is a workaround... but it would be a start, I suppose.
That's not true. It is fairly limited though. However, you can get CableCARD hardware for your PC. I know this is true because my girlfriend (I know, weird, right?) has a Sony VAIO PC that came with one. It's made by ATI and has an multi-stream CableCARD slot in it.
In fact, in Windows 7, you can buy your own CableCARD hardware, and it will support the tuning adapters required for switched digital video.
Granted, it seems like it only works with Windows... but it's certainly not restricted to TiVo.
I don't know if you can buy this hardware at Fry's or Micro Center, but it does exist and end users can get it.
You'll notice that most of the people whining about CableCARD in this thread use Tivo. This should tell you something about where the problem really is: millions of people use CableCARD-enabled cable boxes with no problem.
People don't generally have problems with TiVo+CableCARD setups (once the cable company gets it set up). CableCARDs generally work fine. No, the problems are generally with the tuning adapters we're required to use. These are pieces of hardware provided by the cable company.
In fact, the TiVos do comply with the standards quite well. Unfortunately, TiVos are one-way receivers, and don't comply with the Switched Digital Video standards, because that's not part of the CableCARD standard.
The solution was to add the external tuning adapter, which the cable companies did a really bad job of supporting. The devices are buggy and the people on the side of the cable company had no idea how to handle them.
Yes, the cable company-issued STBs with cable cards do work pretty well, because they have built-in two-way communications. See below as to why I won't rent a cable company DVR.
By the way, around here, Time Warner charges TWO fees for the DVR: $7.95 "digital converter" fee, and $8.95 "DVR service" fee. That's $16.90/month for their DVR service. TiVo service is $12.95/month if you pay monthly, or $10.75/month if you pay yearly.
Yes, there is the initial investment - even the refurbished HD TiVos are nearly $200. It's up to the end-user to decide whether that's worth it. For me... it sure was. Here's why.
I would rent a cable company DVR if it didn't have the following problems (BTW, for techies out there, our DVRs are SA 8300HDC's running SARA):
* It should understand that it should only record one of the same episode. e.g.: HBO plays Entourage at 10:00PM on Sundays. Then they replay the same episode several times over the next week or so. The DVR should understand that it should only record that episode once. TiVo does, but the Time Warner DVRs in this area do not.
* It shouldn't corrupt recordings.
* It shouldn't delete all recordings every time there's a software update.
* I should be able to set up a series to record - not just a channel, start time, and end time.
* I should be able to set it to record only new episodes, not repeats.
Those are all requirements for me, and unfortunately, the cable company DVRs here simply do not do any of those things.
Other nice things about the TiVo, but aren't requirements:
* Setting DVR from the Internet.
* Setting DVR from my BlackBerry.
* YouTube on my TV.
* NetFlix on my TV.
* Amazon Video Store on my TV.
* Videos from my computer on my TV.
* RSS (Video and Audio podcasts) on my TV
* eSATA expandability - Time Warner has the eSATA port on their DVRs shut off.
Note: There may be DVRs from other cable systems that don't have all of these problems.
Different encryption is what the CableCARD is for. Seperable security they call it. Except CableCARD devices can't access VoD and PPV.
True. But IMO that's not as elegant as a device that just does the tuning.
Also, don't forget, Hollywood is doing everything they can to close the Analog Hole.
What you're experiencing is called Switched Digital Video. It's not really a scam. It's a way to save bandwidth.
The part that sucks for you, as an owner of a CableCARD-enabled TV, is that CableCARD-enabled devices are generally one-way. The set-top boxes have two-way communications. Basically, on an SDV set-top box, when you change channels, the box asks the headend "I want channel XYZ, what's the frequency?" - and then the headend responds. But your TV doesn't have that capability, so you just have to locate the frequencies on your own.
The best part is - if nobody is watching a particular channel in your area - it may not be available to you at all because the headend stops transmitting channels that nobody's watching.
Wait, don't they do this with DSL, gas, and electricity? Sure, you still have one company that owns the lines/pipes that come to your place of residence... but the service comes from whomever you choose.
Yeah, but you're allowed to use a third-party e-mail client, router, operating system, etc. if you want to, because they're not doing anything that prevents you from doing so.
Yes, I have heard of MythTV... however I didn't know that it supports CableCARD. Wait - it doesn't, that was an April fool's joke.*
That means that if you're on a cable system that is anything like mine, MythTV + Digital tuner will get you... all your basic cable in analog, and then your local networks in ClearQAM. I expect my DVR to be able to receive all of the channels I pay for.
* (That seriously wasn't actually meant to be facetious. I actually read the mailing list post jokingly announcing CableCARD support and believed it for a moment. Seriously, I'm not a dick.)
Hrm, I suppose I have become a bit complacent. The whole CableCARD thing boils down to access control (I think the industry calls it "seperable security"). As a prior commenter posted, it's either that, or you have to physically install a tap to block the signal.
But you're right - ideally, I buy a piece of hardware - a TiVo, a PCI or USB tuner, whatever... plug it in, and things go, and I don't have to rent anything from the cable company. Or, hell, maybe I even have to call them to have the device authorized. Fine. Whatever, I still didn't have to rent anything. I may be wrong, but I *think* that's what Tru2Way is supposed to solve. That is, of course, if it ever comes to fruition.
So, I guess I agree with you, it's not a perfect solution. Maybe I should have said that it's the "best available solution that still allows me to receive the content I want"
Why am I stuck choosing between Verizon and Comcast?
Holy hell, you have a choice between Verizon and Comcast? I have a choice between Time Warner Cable and Time Warner Cable. And I live in an apartment, so no satellite dishes.
That's never, ever going to happen, because the cable companies make less money when you don't rent their terminals.
Perhaps you should not be paying for a device that honors such things?
That's the problem. There's really not much other choice. If you want to use a device that is capable of transferring shows to other devices, it's pretty much TiVo HD or Windows Media Center, if you want to use CableCARDs - and both of those solutions honor the broadcast flags.. Either that, or you can set up some other computer-based solution and use an IR blaster and a cable box, or you can just do analog cable.
Time Warner sets the broadcast flags more strictly than the actual broadcasters. Everything (except the local broadcast channels) are set so that I cannot copy anything from the TiVo. You can't blame TiVo for honoring those (they'd probably be sued if they didn't), but you can blame Time Warner for not honoring the policies of their content providers.
Just wait until we get "free/unlimited/unmetered cable TV and VOD" but you're internet is limited - that way, the cable company makes money no matter how you get your content!
You've got a point there. The TiVo + CableCARD solution (which I also use, through evil Time Warner Cable) is a good one, unless you want PPV or On-Demand services. I live without the On-Demand services, but my roommate is a huge boxing fan - and most of the "good" fights are pay-per-view (and ridiculously priced), so we still need to keep a regular Scientific Atlanta box on top of the TiVo - $7.95/month, in addition to the ~$2.50 for the CableCARD in the TiVo.
At the same time, I also need to have a Cisco "tuning adapter" connected to the USB port of my TiVo (to support Switched Digital Video), and about once a month, it stops working. I need to call the idiot "techs" at Time Warner, go through the process of power cycling the tuning adapter and the TiVo (which never fixes the problem), then finally I can get transferred to a higher level tech to have them send the proper signal to make it work again.
You probably don't need a tuning adapter or anything like it with FiOS, but I can tell you that people who use them with cable are not happy with the solution.
Oh, and that's another thing. They had to send a technician out to install the card. Seriously. The guy put it in the slot, called a number and read some numbers on the screen to the "tech" on the other line.
Did I read that correctly? "rely on them to get on with our everyday lives"? I think my life would go on just fine if I never connected to Xbox live again.
I'll concur with Galactic Dominator - I used Linux emulation for almost a year as part of my backup strategy, before switching to duplicity. I still use dump (and yes, I'm doing dumps of live, mounted, read/write filesystems - all of them - nightly.
I also use ZFS on my system, and have never had corruption or a failure of any kind. As for double parity mode - I'm not sure what the status is, but as of version 8.0, ZFS is no longer considered experimental.
You know, that's a good point. I suppose an iPhone would be relatively useless if it had no access to the network.
If you don't like how AT&T and/or Apple operate... go to Verizon and/or buy a BlackBerry or something.
* Don't get me wrong, I agree - if Apple bricked the devices on purpose, that's pretty bad - and at the very least the policies should have been spelled out clearly in the first place - every other phone on AT&T can be unlocked with a short call to customer service.
That's exactly right. The difference between bricking the Xbox versus banning it from Xbox live is this: Xbox live is a SERVICE and to connect to that service, you need to abide by their terms. If you don't like it - don't connect - but play your Xbox all you want offline. I suppose there could be monopolistic behavior there too, since Xbox units can't connect to anything other than Xbox live, but that's a different discussion...
Many of the carriers do provide official unlocks - including AT&T. I think they just don't do it on the iPhone, which is ridiculous. I was able to get my BlackBerry unlocked by calling them and waiting a week for them to send me the code.
I know it's a bit off topic... but does anyone know what the music is in their commercial?
Are you talking about the fact that it costs $20 more than the non-smartphone data plan?
I just cooked some delicious beef ravioli. The instructions clearly state "boil 5 minutes, or to your taste." I think if it were Apple brand ravioli, the ravioli would probably be toxic if I cooked it less than 5 minutes, and would completely disintegrate if I cooked it any longer. Also, the ravioli would be rendered completely inedible unless I cooked it in Apple brand cookware, ate off of an Apple brand plate, and used Apple brand silverware.
Of course, I would probably also need to use Apple brand toilet paper some time after that.
I guess I'll stick with this brand of ravioli, it seems to allow me more freedoms.
A cellular network could be set up with measure to enforce that only approved phones and applications may run, and that is the approach of CDMA (Verizon Wireless).
While this is true with some networks, I don't think it's completely true with Verizon.