Lack of good HD tuning solution -- Anyone else feel this way?

[jp1982]

I've been using sageTV for a few years, and really like it. I use SageMC which has a good interface, and really meets my needs.

But when I think about it, my DVR's primary purpose is recording TV. And with the current year being 2010 and HD being almost necessary, I really feel like this setup is coming up short.

For most people, a clear-QAM tuner will get not much more than locals. So maybe 10-20 channels out of hundreds of channels that are available. Any solution besides clear-QAM tuning, to me, feels like a hack, and sure runs like one.

I used to have a firewire tuning solution (firestb), which worked well, until my cable company disabled HD channels over firewire. I then went to 2 HD-PVR, which has great video quality, but is just not very reliable (optical sounds not reliable, and units need to be restarted often).

With ATI's digital cable tuner working with WMC, and more cable card tuners coming (such as the quad-tuner from Ceton), it feels to me like Sage may start losing a lot of users.

Does anyone else feel the same way as me? In that there are just no single solution that are easy to setup, get all channels and are a reliable way of getting HD working with Sage?

[vividweb]

I use two HD-PVR's with my satellite set top boxes and feel that they have about a 99% up time. I use optical audio. I have one HD-PVR that needs to be restarted about every 6 weeks, but the other works flawlessly. I have never missed a recording.

[Fuzzy]

The answer is for Sage to implement a cablelabs certified DRM system. unfortunately, for them to do so, would also require their extenders to be CableLabs certified, they would have to create an entirely new DRM aware encoder for placeshifter, and would ahve to switch to a DRM capable container. If they didn't want to royally piss the entire community off, they would also have to ensure there was a way to transcode to a low-quality DRM free version (allowed by cablelabs), that could be used for mobile devices, and comskip analysis.

If they got these things working, I'm sure there would be a LOT of people looking at using sage with cablecard.

Also something to realize, is that depending on your cable co's DRM flagging, you may very well be able to use the new cablecard tuners with the 7MC plugin that is in a bit of development. It basically allows sage to start and stop recordings in 7MC, and if they are DRM free, it can then send them to sage via network encoding.

EDIT: I'd also like to point out that my R-5000 mod'd Dish Network boxes work great.

[Skirge01]

Originally Posted by jp1982

Does anyone else feel the same way as me? In that there are just no single solution that are easy to setup, get all channels and are a reliable way of getting HD working with Sage?

Can't say that I do. I spent quite a bit of time getting my entire setup working properly, but it was worth every drop of sweat, every ounce of blood, and every stern look I got from my wife for the colorful metaphors I was using. DirecTV and HD-PVRs are a fantastic combination. My sole wish is that I could get VOD, but we have so much already recorded--which is "on demand"--I'm not sure I'd ever use it.

It'll be a cold day in hell before I go to a DRM-restricted Cablelabs product.

[Fuzzy]

While I think DRM is pointless, and a fruitless effort by the content providers to fight piracy, it is here to stay. When I think about how I use SageTV, and the media involved, there is nothing that my above listed DRM features would prohibit. What I would gain, would be a fully integrated solution, with CableCard bringing the exact MPEG stream into sage. I'd still be able to watch it, still be able to placeshift, and still be able to comskip. Tuning speed and reliability would be perfect, from the beginning.

[briands]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

While I think DRM is pointless, and a fruitless effort by the content providers to fight piracy, it is here to stay. When I think about how I use SageTV, and the media involved, there is nothing that my above listed DRM features would prohibit. What I would gain, would be a fully integrated solution, with CableCard bringing the exact MPEG stream into sage. I'd still be able to watch it, still be able to placeshift, and still be able to comskip. Tuning speed and reliability would be perfect, from the beginning.

Are you sure you would be able to comskip??? Wouldn't that require the commercial detection decoder to be DRM compliant as well. Something tells me that would not be possible.

[Skirge01]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

While I think DRM is pointless, and a fruitless effort by the content providers to fight piracy, it is here to stay. When I think about how I use SageTV, and the media involved, there is nothing that my above listed DRM features would prohibit. What I would gain, would be a fully integrated solution, with CableCard bringing the exact MPEG stream into sage. I'd still be able to watch it, still be able to placeshift, and still be able to comskip. Tuning speed and reliability would be perfect, from the beginning.

It may be here to stay, but as long as there's a way around it, I'll be utilizing the workaround. When the broadcasters "mistakenly" enable the "do not record" flag (again), I don't want to miss a recording. When they decide that I only have 24 hours to watch a live event I paid for on PPV, I won't be losing money. When they decide to tie me to a chair, prop my eyes open with toothpicks, and force me to watch commercials, it will be a good day to die.

[SWKerr]

I don't agree that it is here to stay. Music companies have figured out that if you deliver a good product at reasonable prices without DRM prople will buy it regardless of if you can get it illegally for free. At some point media companies will figure out that the complex and limiting nature of DRM creates a barrier to adoption for the users that are willing to pay for it and does nothing to prevent true pirates.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by briands

Are you sure you would be able to comskip??? Wouldn't that require the commercial detection decoder to be DRM compliant as well. Something tells me that would not be possible.

If you had read my previous post, you'd see that part of my requirements was teh ability to downrez to a lower quality, DRM free file. This is currently allowed in the CableLabs specs (920k pixels, I believe, approx 720p). The requirement is that any 'unsecure output' be limited to this pixel count. As such, the comskip analyser itself would not need to be DRM compliant, just have the need for the file to be transcoded first (transcoding to something like 320x240 MPEG2 would be plenty)

[Skirge01]

Originally Posted by SWKerr

I don't agree that it is here to stay. Music companies have figured out that if you deliver a good product at reasonable prices without DRM prople will buy it regardless of if you can get it illegally for free. At some point media companies will figure out that the complex and limiting nature of DRM creates a barrier to adoption for the users that are willing to pay for it and does nothing to prevent true pirates.

I want some of what you're smoking. I honestly hope you're right and I'd love to see it happen, but I think there's too much money involved. Maybe some day, many years from now. The only reason it worked with music was because of Napster and MP3s. Pandora's Box had already been opened when the music industry caught on. CDs and their "master-quality audio" had no protection in place. Plus, the internet pipes were fat enough to make the mass consumption easy for anyone to download music. We're well on our way, but we're not at that point yet with video. DRM reared its ugly head before we go far enough down that particular rabbit hole.

[Skirge01]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

If you had read my previous post, you'd see that part of my requirements was teh ability to downrez to a lower quality, DRM free file. This is currently allowed in the CableLabs specs (920k pixels, I believe, approx 720p). The requirement is that any 'unsecure output' be limited to this pixel count. As such, the comskip analyser itself would not need to be DRM compliant, just have the need for the file to be transcoded first (transcoding to something like 320x240 MPEG2 would be plenty)

While I don't know about the Cablelabs specs, something doesn't add up here. If the specs allow up to 720p to be "unsecure" (which sounds like they're being more generous than I anticipated), then why would it need to be transcoded to 320x240? 320x240 is only 76,800 pixels?

[aaronb]

Originally Posted by Skirge01

While I don't know about the Cablelabs specs, something doesn't add up here. If the specs allow up to 720p to be "unsecure" (which sounds like they're being more generous than I anticipated), then why would it need to be transcoded to 320x240? 320x240 is only 76,800 pixels?

He means just for running comskip. There's no need to transcode to a really high quality to do that, and the edl files would then work with the original.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by aaronb

He means just for running comskip. There's no need to transcode to a really high quality to do that, and the edl files would then work with the original.

this.