SA 4200HD on Cablevision

[sabre]

I will soon upgrade to digital cable and would like to try and capture HDTV via firewire. Anyone out there use the SA 4200HD with cablevision to do this currently? If so, how many HDTV channels are open (no 5c), and does it play back well with Sage? Also, re: the 4200HD box, do they all have the firewire port on the back; and are they all enabled? Or do I have to ask for one w/ firewire enabled? I ask since some are for sale on eBay, and appear to have the firewire slot, but unsure if these are active (unsure how to tell if it is active). Would be nice to buy rather than rent (also will use Cablecard for normal TV). Thanks

PS-vid card currently Geforce 6200, i know this may not be enough, but heard it can be done.

[up2ng]

I have Nvidia 6200, Cablevision 4200 and firewire.
I am in Upstate NY and all the channels will come in through the firewire connection EXCEPT the analog channels (1-98), I do have trouble with the VH1-MTV channels in the 180's. It seems that the encoding is a little wierd on those channels. I have not had any 5C issues at all and channel changing is a little touchy because the 4200 is SLOOOOW at changing channels.

Any other questions just ask.

I have a Powercolor 6200 AGP HDTV out card using the component out, Sage 5.04, Nvidia PureVideo ,blahblah

[sabre]

Thanks up2ng,

Did you have to specifically ask cablevision for a 4200HD with firewire active, or do you know if they are by default?

Do you get nice playback w/ the 6200, and what kind of CPU usage does playback require? Thanks again.

[up2ng]

If the 4200 box has 1394 (firewire) ports on it, they are active.

I have and 57" Toshiba that I run at 720p (I think its a better picture) and I can watch a recorded HDTV show while recording from the firewire and ATI550 card all at the same time with about 50% cpu useage.
My setup is P4-2.4, 1Gb DDR400 (Dual) and 5 assorted HDD's (20Gb System and 160-200Gb each for recording)

The key to having SAGEtv or any MediaCentric computer work right is to keep it clean !!!!!
I have only what is needed to use SAGEtv and Firefox on this unit, it never locks up and never gives me a problem, don't muck up the works by installing uneeded garbage that you can use on another utility computer.