[mythtv-users] Can Myth 'tune' these 'free' converter boxes?

[Ronald Frazier]

> I don't consider that to be a fair assessment.
>
> What the cable companies are doing is unreasonable.  If they wanted a
> viable solution for conditional access they could have promoted cable
> card in a sensible way but instead they've figured that the way to
> maximize profits is to rent more STBs.
...
> What's the power draw of 2 Motorola DHC 3200 units doing mpeg -> 1080i
> component -> 2 HDPVR units compared with 1 HDHR recording the same two
> channels?  What's the carbon footprint of that difference assuming
> coal power generation?


Wow, where did all that come from? I wasn't addressing anything about
what would be ideal in fairy tale land or anything. I was addressing
the simple assertion that companies like comcast adding encryption to
their feed is going to kill mythtv, which it won't.  Your HDPVR
comments are beside the point, because before this brief period of
time of unencrypted digital feeds you needed the HDPVR to do those
type of things anyway. A year ago (or however long ago it was before
they started with unencrypted digital signals), your options were
1) use an analog card to capture SD content straight from the coax cable
2) use a digital card to capture local HD content straight from the coax cable
3) use a cable box to decrypt content and capture that via an analog
capture card (coax/composite/svideo) or via HD-PVR (component).
IR/firewire channel changing required.

Now, your option are only slightly different. #2 and #3 are unchanged.
#1 now requires a DTA, making it pretty much the same as #3 (just
substitute "cable box" with "DTA", and the DTAs I've seen don't have
component out). Now, seeing how little the landscape has changed
before vs after (ignoring the brief transitional period), I have a
hard time grasping the idea that myth is in any danger of being killed
off. Again, I don't care about what would be ideal...that wasn't the
discussion.