I wonder if Ceton is ever going to ship their cablecard adapters...

[panteragstk]

This doesn't look promising. Doesn't look good.

[GKusnick]

I have no personal stake in this since I don't use cable, but I'm curious why you take this as a bad sign. They said quite clearly what's causing the delay, which is a temporary problem with parts availability. All the major hurdles that could have killed the product are behind them. The only remaining uncertainty seems to be when the product will be available, not if.

[sic0048]

It's refreshing to see a manufacture be so open about their issues too. Nothing is worse than seeing a manufacturer simply be mute when an annouced deadline comes and goes without any communication.

[tmiranda]

That's a superb letter. If only more companies were so forthcoming as Ceton.

[SomeWhatLost]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

This doesn't look promising. Doesn't look good.

what part isn't promising?
parts inventory is crap right now... I am just glad I am not in purchasing... some resisters I needed are 6 to 8 week lead times.... not common values, but not super special either... just stupid resisters...

some IC's are 8 to 14 week lead times...

not sure what parts they are using, or what their actual lead time is, but if they waited to the last minute to start ordering parts like most small start ups do, they probably really are having sourcing issues...
but they will find parts somewhere.... maybe they will send a team in and steal some parts back from the somali pirates?

anyway, they will be pumping these out in mass quanities soon... and everyone will be happey again... until the next big thing comes along...

[MitchSchaft]

assuming this even works with Sage....

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by MitchSchaft

assuming this even works with Sage....

It won't, there's no cablecard support in Sage.

[src666]

I think it will work as a clear-QAM tuner without a cablecard, but that doesn't buy us anything we don't get from other solutions, other than a single device with 4 tuners.

[Rico66]

Sure, but that sounds like an expensive clear qam tuner to me.

[src666]

Originally Posted by Rico66

Sure, but that sounds like an expensive clear qam tuner to me.

Wasn't trying to justify the cost/benefit ratio, just pointing out the fact that it can be used that way.

[ace007]

Got a email from them this evening

We want to pass along some good news and let you know that the Ceton InfiniTV 4 quad-tuner cards are now in production! Ceton personnel are currently overseas supervising the final assembly and testing process. We're sorry for the unexpected delays but many other companies were hit with parts shortages as we were, including Apple for the release of iPad and iPhone 4. Delivery of units will begin as soon as final testing and shipment from overseas have been completed. We'll update you shortly as soon as we can confirm an actual delivery date.

There has been much discussion and speculation in the community about the driver installation procedure. InfiniTV 4 will not come with a driver CD. Initially the driver will be downloaded from the www.cetoncorp.com website and installed by the user. We are working with Microsoft to integrate the InfiniTV driver into Windows Update so that it will be installed automatically when detected by Windows in the future.

Thanks for your interest and support!

Cheers,
The Ceton Team


I don't think I'd be buying one until I see if somebody can get them to work reliably with Sage and/or the SiliconDust versions comes out which I think I like better but it'll be interesting.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by ace007

I don't think I'd be buying one until I see if somebody can get them to work reliably with Sage and/or the SiliconDust versions comes out which I think I like better but it'll be interesting.

I'm glad they are finally rolling this out. I was worried. I don't think I'll get to use cablecard (don't really want to) because directv is giving me too good of a deal. I'd rather have an internal solution, but oh well.

Now who's gonna be the beta tester?

[robmarch]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

I'm glad they are finally rolling this out. I was worried. I don't think I'll get to use cablecard (don't really want to) because directv is giving me too good of a deal. I'd rather have an internal solution, but oh well.

Now who's gonna be the beta tester?

I will most likely pick one up, as the idea of being able to record my digital channels is pretty appealing, and I'm not able to control my cable box currently with sage (which would only give me one fully capable feed).

4 tuners is plenty for me, with no limitations, and my costs would go down not renting a cable box.

If sage can make it work (drm responsibility is in the hardware, right?) then that is great, otherwise I'm going to be pretty tempted to migrate to windows media center.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by robmarch

4 tuners is plenty for me, with no limitations, and my costs would go down not renting a cable box.

If sage can make it work (drm responsibility is in the hardware, right?) then that is great, otherwise I'm going to be pretty tempted to migrate to windows media center.

Keep in mind that the cable card tuners will obey the 5C encryption code on each show. This means that the cable company can code a show in such a way to prevent ANY recording. Others can be recorded, but not copied, etc, etc, etc.

This in itself isn't too bad, but many times the cable company doesn't pay any attention to the 5C setting and it turns out to be incorrect (ie more restrictive than it should be).

There is a way to use SageTV to control their cable card tuners. It is called the SageTVMCTuner. I've never tried it, but people seem to use it.

[panteragstk]

The only cable company available in my area is Time Warner so this solution is not for me. Even with MC I wouldn't be able to view any content on any other client due to the restrictions of time warner. Too bad verizon canceled expanding fios. I'm going to end up with directv because of lack of choices in my area.

I'd be all over this if fios were in my area, but I'm not willing to shell out the cash for a cablecard setup when time warner is my only choice. No thanks.

I do hope we can find a way to get this to work with sage though. It will make things better for those of us that can use cablecard.

[robmarch]

Originally Posted by sic0048

Keep in mind that the cable card tuners will obey the 5C encryption code on each show. This means that the cable company can code a show in such a way to prevent ANY recording. Others can be recorded, but not copied, etc, etc, etc.

This in itself isn't too bad, but many times the cable company doesn't pay any attention to the 5C setting and it turns out to be incorrect (ie more restrictive than it should be).

There is a way to use SageTV to control their cable card tuners. It is called the SageTVMCTuner. I've never tried it, but people seem to use it.

I'm hoping that since they are now advertising their own multiroom dvr that they will be encouraged to appropriately set the drm flag, otherwise they are in for a world of customer complaints.

I'll have to dig into the MCTuner things some more, thanks for the tip.