Best practices for getting encrypted cable into Sage

[stefano540]

Hello,
my local cable provider, Comcast in Saratoga, CA, is switching all channels to encrypted on 10/9, thus defeating my current solution for HD locals using an HDHomerun and an antenna (there are trees that block some channels....). What is the least troublesome setup to get this working ? I am open to both the HD Prime and the Ceton solutions. From reading the forums people seem to be equally happy or unhappy with both....
Questions that I am trying to resolve:
- Is the Ceton PCiE card very heat sensitive ? does it generate heat on its own ?
- Is the Ceton USB solution stable, with no hiccups ?
- Is the HD Prime device stable ? I see that there are lots of firmwares being mentioned.
- Does Comcast flag any channels to prevent recording ?

Compute power and network bandwidth are not an issue, and am running windows 7 and 4 extenders (2HD 100, 1 HD 200 and 1 HD 300) so I would like to keep on milking the Sage platform as long as possible.

I am sorry if I am asking questions that have been answered before, but I currently don't have the time to wade through 12 months+ of postings to draw my own conclusions.
Thanks a lot,

Stefano

[mechling-burgh]

Here in Pittsburgh I'm running the HD Prime on Comcast and get all channels but the premiums (HBO) and the like. All local channels retransmitted in the clear in HD. The prime has been very stable for me in windows 7 using an Intel network card not the realtek network card. I recording to local drives not UNC paths. I would have no problems recommending the HD Prime. The Ceton card I don't know a lot about but it seems to have less troubles than the HD Prime with some way Comcast has been broadcasting some channels in a few areas. In Pittsburgh I have not had any of these problems.

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by mechling-burgh

Here in Pittsburgh I'm running the HD Prime on Comcast and get all channels but the premiums (HBO) and the like. All local channels retransmitted in the clear in HD. The prime has been very stable for me in windows 7 using an Intel network card not the realtek network card. I recording to local drives not UNC paths. I would have no problems recommending the HD Prime. The Ceton card I don't know a lot about but it seems to have less troubles than the HD Prime with some way Comcast has been broadcasting some channels in a few areas. In Pittsburgh I have not had any of these problems.

+1 for HDHR Prime. I have the 3 tuner variety running Sage Server on top of Windows Home Server 2011. I am recording to network drives (not sure what it matters since the HDHR is a network device), but it works fantastically and getting the cablecard installed and configured was a breeze.

[stefano540]

Thanks a lot to mechlin-burg and Spartan for responding so quickly. I just placed my order with J&R for an HDHR Prime.
Stefano

[KryptoNyte]

Whoa. Am I missing something here? If you're cable company is encrypting channels, it's my understanding that the cable card tuners aren't going to help you (with SageTV anyways).

[mechling-burgh]

I think he means they are encrypting QAM not setting the copy flags.

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by mechling-burgh

I think he means they are encrypting QAM not setting the copy flags.

I have Comcast in Calaveras County, Ca., and they recently made it impossible to receive any cable in analog. For $1.99 month per old TV, I can see television via a tuning adapter rental. Is that 'encrypting' QAM?

[BobPhoenix]

Originally Posted by tvmaster2

I have Comcast in Calaveras County, Ca., and they recently made it impossible to receive any cable in analog. For $1.99 month per old TV, I can see television via a tuning adapter rental. Is that 'encrypting' QAM?

No that just means you can't use a NTSC tuner like a PVR500 any more. Your locals should be and maybe some of the other channels as well will be recordable via QAM. A QAM tuner would be necessary like the Hauppauge HVR-2250 or the AVer Media Duet. Now not all chanels will be available on QAM most likely. So you can either get a STB and record in HD (HD-PVR, Colossus) or SD (SVideo/Composite on PVR500, HVR-2250) or you could get HDHomerun-Prime or Ceton and record with SageDCT. However you may find you still don't get all channels/shows because of the Copy flags on the shows. In that case you would have to use HD-PVR with SageTV or Windows Media Center to record with DRM.

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by BobPhoenix

No that just means you can't use a NTSC tuner like a PVR500 any more. Your locals should be and maybe some of the other channels as well will be recordable via QAM. A QAM tuner would be necessary like the Hauppauge HVR-2250 or the AVer Media Duet. Now not all chanels will be available on QAM most likely. So you can either get a STB and record in HD (HD-PVR, Colossus) or SD (SVideo/Composite on PVR500, HVR-2250) or you could get HDHomerun-Prime or Ceton and record with SageDCT. However you may find you still don't get all channels/shows because of the Copy flags on the shows. In that case you would have to use HD-PVR with SageTV or Windows Media Center to record with DRM.

actually, I hooked up an older, TiVo Series 2 to the cable feed entering the house. This works great with Cox Communications, but with Comast, zero channels received. I was too angry to hand over $1.99.

[darcilicious]

Originally Posted by BobPhoenix

In that case you would have to use HD-PVR with SageTV or Windows Media Center to record with DRM.

I'm pretty sure that HD-PVR + WMC does NOT give you DRM.

Currently, I'm recording with a Hava via component with WMC and I don't get DRM; and someone else I know that records with HD-PVR via WMC doesn't have DRM either...

[BobPhoenix]

Originally Posted by darcilicious

I'm pretty sure that HD-PVR + WMC does NOT give you DRM.

Currently, I'm recording with a Hava via component with WMC and I don't get DRM; and someone else I know that records with HD-PVR via WMC doesn't have DRM either...

Correct. I was assuming he wanted to stay with SageTV and copy flags may prevent the HDHomerun prime from recording all channels with SageDCT. So your options (to stay in SageTV) are to use HD-PVR on those channels in SageTV OR switch to WMC and record with DRM on HDHomerun prime. I would never switch to WMC just to record on HD-PVR it works fine in SageTV. Sorry I didn't make that clear.

[darcilicious]

Ah gotcha! Thanks for the clarification.