Direct TV question

[rmbu]

I am thinking of switching to direct TV. Right now I have cable and use a set top box the STB is a Motorola DCT 2249 I use the S-Video out of the STB and it goes to the input of the PVR-350. I control the channel change with a USB-UIRT. This works OK but sometimes the channel does not change correctly.

My question is when I move to Direct TV will I be able to control the channel change with the USB-UIRT. I would prefer to use serial but all I see is the USB on the back of the new direct TV boxes. I plan to get all HD direct TV equipment I know that sage will no record in HD.

Does anybody have experience with using direct TV and sage and can pass along some advice.

Thanks.

[JUC]

with directv you can also use the usb-uirt. But-some boxes do allow changes by serial connection. The D10-100 works and I think many people here use them.
JUC

[jlindborg]

None of the HD capable boxes from DirecTV support serial chanel changing - I use serial with my SD DirecTV box and I have a Huges E86 HD capable box as well, however I'm using the fab new r5000 mod from NextCom wireless which does everything (including changing channels) via USB: http://www.nextcomwireless.com/R5000/home.htm

tad pricey but it's also the only way to get digital HD recordings...

but yes, you can use USBUIRT to blast Ir signals to the tuner as well - it's just a bit awkward with multiple tuners and isn't as snappy/reliable as serial.

If you don't plan on doing HD (i.e. you aren't going for the r5000 style mod), just get a cheap SD tuner off Ebay - I got two of them for $20 a pop last time. I'm keeping a couple in reserve just in case the DMR police lock things down and I gotta revert to old school analog captures...

[rmbu]

Someone told me the SD boxes will not work with HD dish and other HD boxes.

If I went with Direct TV I would have one box SD for my Sage server, one box HD for the living room TV, one box HD for the bedroom TV, and one box HD for the guest room TV. Total 3 boxes HD and 1 box SD.

Can someone confirm if this will work?

Thanks

[dbfresh23]

Yes, someone who told you that was wrong. If you have a dish that supports HD you can also use SD boxes. The catch is that to use the new MPEG4 HD boxes you need a newer dish that supports them, those dishes will still work with SD boxes. In fact 90% of the channels you'll get with those HD boxes will be SD channels.

[jchiso]

Originally Posted by jlindborg

None of the HD capable boxes from DirecTV support serial chanel changing

The Hughes HTL-HD and DirecTV H10 are both controllable via the serial port with the external tuner plugin.