[mythtv-users] Recording HD content from a Comcast/Dish/DTV box

Brandon Stoll mrmagoo at mrmagoo.org
Tue Dec 27 20:52:01 EST 2005


On 12/26/05, Alex Malinovich <demonbane at the-love-shack.net> wrote:
> On Mon, 2005-12-26 at 17:49 -0800, Ian Forde wrote:
> > On Mon, 2005-12-26 at 18:11 -0600, Kevin Kuphal wrote:
> > > There are two ways to capture HDTV.
> > >
> > > 1)  OTA with an HDTV tuner card
> > > 2)  via Firewire from a cable box like the Motorola DCT-6200 (IIRC).
> > > This is limited only to the channels that the cable provider provides
> > > unencrypted on the firewire port
> >
> > Make that 3...
> >
> > 3) Cable QAM with an HDTV tuner card to get the digital channels that
> > that the cable provider provides... effectively a subset of option 1,
> > but suitable for those in places where HD antennae can't be put up
> > effectively...
>
> So if I get an HDTV card like the pcHDTV-3000 and it has support for QAM
> (which I believe the 3k does), I can just plug the cable into the card
> and have it pick up any unencrypted HD channels? So HBO-HD probably
> won't work, but Fox HD should, right? Or is there something else I'm
> missing?
>
> And what about encoding the video? If I get a hardware encoder can it
> encode HD content the same way as regular content, or am I going to be
> looking at doing software encoding for HD?
>
> Thanks much for the help.
>


You might want to find a TV with a built-in tuner or something to that
extent to find out what exactly you're going to be getting over QAM. 
I get the big networks, Discovery Times, and TNT... but from other
comments it seems to vary a lot depending on provider.

I like getting the networks in HD and all, but spending $100+ to only
get like 6 channels is disappointing.

So basically, firewire has 5C copy protection, QAM has little content,
OTA has (understandably) limited content.  Digital broadcasting in the
US is trash.


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