Future of DVB-C w/CAM (encrypted) solutions with SageTV ?

[voidpt]

Having some problems seeing where SageTV is going with official support for DVB-C w/CAM solutions here in Europe. I'm trying to find some stable & official supported DVB-C w/CAM hardware that SageTV supports out of the box. Not a 'proxy' solution (like network tuner against DVBViewer, and so on). A friend is looking to set this up.

Problem is. My own setup is 2x Digitial-Everywhere FloppyDTV C/CI. Which SageTV officially supports. But this message is now shown on their homepage:

Dear digital everywhere customers,
after several months struggling with difficult market conditions, digital everywhere decided to stop its activities.

Manufacturing of products has been stopped and support has been reduced to the minimum.

digital everywhere wants to thanks all its customers and all the users which with their efforts and feedback greatly help in continuously improving the FireDTV / FloppyDTV.

Not possible to order anymore here in Norway at least. And I wouldn't buy that hardware now because of support and so on.

Been through the regular candidates. And the most 'fresh' DVB-C w/CAM seems to be the TerraTec Cinergy H7. An USB box with CAM slot in the box itself. It can also function as DVB-T (not important for me though). There also is the (older) TerraTec Cinergy C PCI HD CI card.

Both of these solutions work fine on 'clear' / non-encrypted channels. But SageTV is not capable to use the CAM/SmartCard solution to decrypt pay-channels.

So. My question: Do anyone here know of solid (no tuning problems) working DVB-C w/CAM solutions that work with SageTV ? Without having to using a 'proxy' / network tuner.

Wouldn't mind if SageTV tuned in here also. I'll post a support issue anyway if I don't get any solution through forum. They need to support some working DVB-C w/CAM solution that can be bought today. And if they already do, educate me, I don't mind

[Lucas]

+1 on this.

I also have a variety of FireDTV and Technotrend DVB tuner and they seem to work well with SageTV. If a problem appears that is related to the tuner's drivers though, we are pretty much helpless.

I think the best bet is to use Hauppauge tuners since SageTV maintains a pretty good relationship with them.

CI/CAM support is done outside the BDA framework and is specific to each tuner itself so it would be good if SageTV could focus on 1 or 2 products and recommend them so that we know what to buy.

[voidpt]

Originally Posted by Lucas

I think the best bet is to use Hauppauge tuners since SageTV maintains a pretty good relationship with them.

Wouldn't mind at all. As long as SageTV put some research/time into making it stable and functional.

On the Hauppauge topic. As far as I can see the only product available for DVB-C is the WinTV-HVR-930C (External USB with: DVB-C/DVB-T&Analog). It says it's compatible with the WinTV-CI (External USB CAM reader). So it should be possible on a technical level.

Have anyone tried this with SageTV? And even more important. What if you want 2x tuners on one machine? I doubt Hauppauge supports two tuners using the same CI module. But do they supports 2x tuners with 2x CI modules on same machine?

I guess we need to take this up with SageTV directly. Going to put a support incident later in week to see what they say. We really need multiple DVB-C tuner support with CAM that they can commit to support now and in the future.

[rtengvad]

I never got my tuners to work well with sage directly. But I can only second that Sage choose a few models and focus on them so we have a reference when drivers eventually gets obsolete and we are forced to make the move.

I would also like to recommend sage to friends and family, but since I don't know any hardware available that works it’s a bit difficult.


Rasmus

[domotics]

My tests :

- Hauppauge WinTV Nexus-CA (= Technotrend Premium C-2300 Hybrid - analog and dvb-c tuners) : Not recognized by SageTV.

- Hauppauge WinTV HVR-1300 (dvb-t and analog tuners) : everything OK.

- Terratec Cinergy C PCI + CI Module (only dvb-c tuner) : OK for non-encrypted channels (HD included). CAM not recognized.

- Terratec Cinergy HTC USB XS HD (3 tuners: analog, dvb-c and dvb-t - = Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-930C?) + Cinergy CI USB module (= Hauppauge WinTV-CI?) : Dvb-c tuner not recognized, but DVB-T and analog are OK.

- Technotrend Budget C-1501 + CI module (only dvb-c tuner) : everything is OK.

Like Digital Everywhere, Technotrend (http://www.technotrend.com/) seems to stop products for PCs.

It remains Terratec and Hauppauge as an alternative. It would thus be good Sage is interested in these products.

Thank you.

[Lucas]

Originally Posted by domotics

.... Technotrend (http://www.technotrend.com/) seems to stop products for PCs.

Looks like Technotrend has been acquired by CityCom, a Kathrein Group subsidiary. For those who don't know, Kathrein is a major maker of sat receivers.

The new site is www.tt-pc.com.

Time will show how things will progress with existing products.

[voidpt]

Had a chat with SageTV through a support ticket. They will, when time permits, probably look at Hauppauge. No commitments on time-frame, and it is impossible to say how it will work out. CAM's are some tricky beasts to program. So only real life testing will show if this thing can be stable.

So do not run out and buy any Hauppauge hardware because of this. Might end up with TerraTec for all we know. But when I get any more info on progress I'll post it in this thread. Positive development from my point of view though

[reeven]

Guys i need help.

I want to know if this is the only tuner that has DVB-C :

http://www.hauppauge.se/site/products/data_hvr930c.html

from hauppauge .

On their site there are no info about DVB-C, it seem that hauppauge is build for US costumers.

[reeven]

Found it, ONLY HVR-930C has DVB-C, but the tuner is crap, better buy Terratec H5,H7.

[voidpt]

Originally Posted by voidpt

Been through the regular candidates. And the most 'fresh' DVB-C w/CAM seems to be the TerraTec Cinergy H7. An USB box with CAM slot in the box itself. It can also function as DVB-T (not important for me though). There also is the (older) TerraTec Cinergy C PCI HD CI card.

Both of these solutions work fine on 'clear' / non-encrypted channels. But SageTV is not capable to use the CAM/SmartCard solution to decrypt pay-channels.

Originally Posted by reeven

Found it, ONLY HVR-930C has DVB-C, but the tuner is crap, better buy Terratec H5,H7.

Be careful though. As far as I know, SageTV do not support the CAM/SmartCard to decrypt pay-channels on TerraTec.

In response to my earlier posts in this thread. I have not had the time to push for any testing myself. Have not heard anything from SageTV either. As it stands now for my own setup I have my 2x FloppyDTV tuners, and they work. So until I get into a quiet period where I have time to spare, I will probably not look at other tuners.

One possbility for others who needs pay-channels on DVB-C. Look into the DVBViewer Recorder for SageTV (site link) by Stéphane. Through DVBViewer you can probably get any DVB-C card to work. But it adds to the overall complexity. And it is not a user-friendly setup to get going initially. Although I think it's pretty stable when its up and running. Some years ago I used a similiar setup against MyTheatre, it was rock solid.

Hope you get find a solution