[mythtv-users] diagnosing HDHome Run Prime zero byte recordings

[David Linville]

On Fri, Oct 18, 2013 at 11:05 AM, Gary Buhrmaster <gary.buhrmaster at gmail.com
> wrote:

> On Fri, Oct 18, 2013 at 1:55 PM, David Linville
> <dlinvill at networksdown.com> wrote:
> .....
> > vch=26 name=USA auth=subscribed cci=none cgms=protected-copyonce
>
> Your MSO is providing no cci information, which means the
> Prime is required to implement the cgms rules (i.e. copyonce).
>
> First, I presume your CableCard shows as "Validated" ("Activated"
> in some earlier releases of the firmware).  If the card is not fully
> validated it will often not set the cci to be "unrestricted", even if
> it is so marked on the stream, which is what you really want to
> see.
>
> Note that I seem to recall that there was a fix in later Prime
> firmware that partially fixed the cgms issue if the cci was
> explicitly set to unrestricted.  If you are not on the latest firmware,
> even if the card is validated you might end up not being able to
> record it.
>
> Also note that there have been some requests to CableLabs
> to reconsider whether enforcing cgms when cci is none makes
> any sense, but that is a long process.
>
> Anyway, with the presumption that you have a validated CableCard,
> and you are still getting cci=none and cgms=copyonce,
> you need to contact your MSO to get the content properly
> marked as cci=unrestricted, or remove the cgms value.
> Unfortunately, your local CSR is unlikely to know what you
> are talking about, so you will need to be persistent to escalate
> to the appropriate staff.  There are some hints over on
> the SiliconDust forum sites from others that have had the same
> problem and gotten their issues addressed for some MSOs.
> Maybe you can find your provider to see how they got it
> fixed.
>
>
I didn't mean to sidetrack the original issue.  I just wanted to
demonstrate that bad cable company configuration can lead to zero byte
recordings even when everything looks clean during a channel scan.  The
cgms value seems to change throughout the day.  This means even running a
daily check for encrypted and/or authorized channels won't catch an issue
like this.

Everything you said is accurate.  The cablecard is fully activated (Card
Activation = success in web ui.) This is with Suddenlink cable and is
clearly an MSO issue.  My original complaint to Suddenlink when this was
isolated to one HD channel only succeeded in getting 4 more HD and 5 SD
channels mis-configured before I gave up.  I now just use a second
hdhomerun non-prime to record QAM on the unencrypted SD copies of these
channels.
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