Prime is Available for Preorder!

[thomaszoo]

This was posted this morning at Silicondust:

HDHR3-CC pre-ordering just went online:
http://www.silicondust.com/products/hdhomerun/prime/

(HDHomeRun PRIME is available for pre-order from NewEgg today, with HDHomeRun PRIME 6CC to be available for pre-order in the coming week).

Hopefully SageDCT will work with it or, even better, it will be officially supported by Sage.

Wayne

[tmiranda]

Just placed my pre-order (again). I trust NewEgg so hopefully this time it's for real.

[zoso]

I think the fact it is linked from SiliconDust's website validates it regardless of the retailer.

Will keep an eye on these integrate when they come out. I am fairly happy with Ceton and SageDCT, but there are still hiccups here and there so if these work like a standard Homerun for copy freely content I may switch (also assuming they don't have the availability issues that Ceton had.)

[heffe2001]

I would preorder one, if I knew it was going to be supported in Sage one way or another. Just can't justify shelling out the 250$ for something that may or may not work for us..

[jptheripper]

i got the email directly from silicondust announcing it.

Shipping of the 6 tuner version first, with the 3 tuner version shortly after, in volume in july.

[Ron]

It says that CC won't be charged until near ship date. Guess it doesn't hurt to get "in line" and hopefully there will be some further announcements indicating whether or not there will be support by Sage. If no word when it comes closer to July, then you can always cancel your order before CC gets charged.

[evilpenguin]

Does anyone know if this also does QAM/ATSC, or is it just strictly CC?

[jkohn]

Originally Posted by heffe2001

I would preorder one, if I knew it was going to be supported in Sage one way or another. Just can't justify shelling out the 250$ for something that may or may not work for us..

Yeah I would really like to see this directly supported by Sage for copy-freely content. I would even be willing to pay extra for that support. This would allow me to eliminate two cable boxes that I currently use for standard cable (I only use Sage for OTA broadcast).

I've kept an eye on the SageDCT progress, but that solution seems less than optimal to me. Not to take away from Andy has accomplished but that solution seems klunky compared to how the original HDHR works with Sage. And if I'm going to move to CC the solution needs to be rock-solid (which my original HDHR's are).

[matt91]

Originally Posted by heffe2001

I would preorder one, if I knew it was going to be supported in Sage one way or another. Just can't justify shelling out the 250$ for something that may or may not work for us..

Me too. I would like to, but I can last another few weeks to see how things shake out.

[PLUCKYHD]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

Does anyone know if this also does QAM/ATSC, or is it just strictly CC?

I am pretty sure it is cable card only like the cetons. It may support qam but highly doubt you will see ota.

[wrems]

I agree with Plucky. When you watch the video they show the back of the unit and it doesn't have any coax inputs, just the m-card. They'd be shooting themselves in the foot if they did, now people will have to buy both the Prime and the HDHR for separate costs.

[evilpenguin]

Its hard to tell straight on like that but there's a coax input on the far right side. It actually needs it even for Cable Card, the m-card is just for decrypting the signal, not for receiving it.

[thomaszoo]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

Does anyone know if this also does QAM/ATSC, or is it just strictly CC?

In one of the threads at SD recently that question came up and they did state that it works as a QAM tuner. The question was actually for the two unit version. You can read it for yourself here:

http://www.silicondust.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9940

Wayne

[stevech]

Originally Posted by matt91

Me too. I would like to, but I can last another few weeks to see how things shake out.

Is this correct: Sage would have to accept encrypted video via ethernet from the HDHR Prime. To decrypt the stream from a LAN and display, or to store on disk in encrypted form for later decryption/display, doesn't Sage have to pay CableLabs to accredit the software complies with the DRM rules - much as has Microsoft with Media Center? Perhaps the cost is too onerous for Sage?

Sigh. This would be an cableCARD capable tuner with IP packet output.

[tke743]

Nick from SD has stated that the prime will function just like a standard HDHR for copy freely content. I've preordered as I have FIOS.

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by stevech

Is this correct: Sage would have to accept encrypted video via ethernet from the HDHR Prime.

Partially. The HDHR Prime will output digital video in plaintext if the video stream is not marked for copy protection. TWC and Bright House both seem to mark almost everything with copy protection. Comcast and Verizon seem to only mark premium channels with copy protection.

Originally Posted by stevech

To decrypt the stream from a LAN and display, or to store on disk in encrypted form for later decryption/display, doesn't Sage have to pay CableLabs to accredit the software complies with the DRM rules - much as has Microsoft with Media Center? Perhaps the cost is too onerous for Sage?

Maybe. We haven't gotten a definitive answer on this question. But, there doesn't seem to be a OpenCable certification for software players. So, its also possible Sage only needs to use an "approved" DRM scheme. Basically, that's Microsoft Playready.

[heffe2001]

Originally Posted by reggie14

Maybe. We haven't gotten a definitive answer on this question. But, there doesn't seem to be a OpenCable certification for software players. So, its also possible Sage only needs to use an "approved" DRM scheme. Basically, that's Microsoft Playready.

That won't help people with extenders will it, since they have to have a protected path from the original file to the display device? (Or that's my understanding anyway).

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by heffe2001

That won't help people with extenders will it, since they have to have a protected path from the original file to the display device? (Or that's my understanding anyway).

Well, that depends on what you mean by "help." Based on the fact that the Xbox is not a certified product (see the list of all certified products here), it sure doesn't look like extenders need to be certified either.

The XBox is an interesting case. I think you can use full-res component video output on the XBox even for protected recordings. That shouldn't be allowed in the OCUR spec. I think the same thing goes for TiVo models that support CableCard. I'm not sure how they get away with this.

In any event, I think the fact that the XBox is not certified is pretty good evidence that Sage extenders would not need to be certified. However, the PlayReady implementation on those devices might not let you output protected content over component video.

On a separate note, I'm curious about people's expectations for using the HDHR Prime in Sage. Are some of you ordering it because you think Sage will officially support it? Or do you think you'll have to use something like SageDCT to use it?

[cat6man]

Originally Posted by reggie14

On a separate note, I'm curious about people's expectations for using the HDHR Prime in Sage. Are some of you ordering it because you think Sage will officially support it? Or do you think you'll have to use something like SageDCT to use it?

or do you think the esteemed user community here will uncover a highly creative additional way to make these work with sageTV?

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by cat6man

or do you think the esteemed user community here will uncover a highly creative additional way to make these work with sageTV?

That's pretty much what SageDCT is.

I'm not entirely sure I'd get an HDHR Prime if support only comes from a community-developed add-on. I've done that with firewire recording, but I'm pretty convinced the current instability in my server is caused by the firewire STB driver and/or sgraphrecorder. Both pieces of software have been abandoned. I knew that going into it, but decided to try it anyway because it was basically free. That's not the case with the HDHR Prime.