After 20+ years finally getting cable (But have some questions)

[SWKerr]

I am finally going to have the option to get Cable. I live just outside Raleigh NC and was wondering if anyone has any experience using Spectrum Cable and Cable Card with the HDHomerun Prime? Are most channels marked copy freely?

Also: I am running on an unRaid box and wanted to know if the HDHR Prime is supported on the unRaid docker?

I will be getting Internet from Spectrum but I am trying to figure out if getting the TV service is going to be something that will work for me. Today I get locals via several HDHRs with an antenna, plus a Hauppauge Colossus with a DirecTV STB. I have looked at multiple Online streaming TV services but nothing meets my needs at the current time.

[JustFred]

Originally Posted by SWKerr

I am finally going to have the option to get Cable. I live just outside Raleigh NC and was wondering if anyone has any experience using Spectrum Cable and Cable Card with the HDHomerun Prime? Are most channels marked copy freely?

Also: I am running on an unRaid box and wanted to know if the HDHR Prime is supported on the unRaid docker?

I will be getting Internet from Spectrum but I am trying to figure out if getting the TV service is going to be something that will work for me. Today I get locals via several HDHRs with an antenna, plus a Hauppauge Colossus with a DirecTV STB. I have looked at multiple Online streaming TV services but nothing meets my needs at the current time.

It's very difficult to give a general answer that applies to all of "Spectrum", given that your local Spectrum (at this point) still retains a lot of the character of the cable company that pre-dates the Spectrum rebranding.

For example, Spectrum in Los Angeles Ca used to be Time Warner. TW tagged almost all channels as copy once, making them impossible to record using Sage + CableCard. Only the local stations were copy freely (of little value for anyone already using HDHR tuners). Changing the name from TW to Spectrum hasn't had any effect on that policy. Of course it's still possible to sign up for CATV, rent a couple their cable boxes and capture using something like the Colossus or HD-PVR (using Component inputs). But my personal experience with that "solution" has met with disappointing reliability. And are you willing to accept Component's video quality?

One way to confirm what your Spectrum does for copy protection: go to a neighbor's house and get into the service menu for his cable box (it's trivial; cable box User Guides are easily found online). Bring up the status for any channel of interest; it'll show the status of the copy flags.

[MacDaddy]

I'm using the unRaid/Sage/OpenDCT solution with a Prime on Comcast here in Houston. I moved from a multi HD-PVR configuration to cablecard about six months back and have been completely happy. The one hitch I remember was having to use my windows laptop to update firmware for the Prime. Sorry I can't confirm specifics for your provider, but just wanted to confirm the technical architecture works.

[sic0048]

Congrats! I think Spectrum service and a cable card tuner is one of the best option available currently.

I'm in the Upstate of SC, so not too far. We use Spectrum (old Charter), a cablecard and the InfiniTV 6 ETH tuner. One cable card ($5 rental) and I have access up to 6 concurrent streams. Most of the channels are copy freely, but we also have a pretty basic level of service. It is also very stable, although occationally I will have a show that doesn't record because the show was marked as copy once or copy never for some reason. It only happens once every six months or so however.

Setting up SageTV with a cable card isn't hard, but requires an additional service like OpenDTC. There are plenty of threads here to walk you through the process. Again, it isn't hard, but it also isn't plug and play like other tuners may be.

I actually ran across my Spectrum cable box today while cleaning. We don't even have it hooked up because Sage works so well.

[dgeezer]

I'm just outside Greensboro and have Spectrum (formerly Time Warner) and everything except the locals is marked copy once. Or at least it was when we still had cable TV with a cablecard. I suspect that it's the same in Raleigh. We still get our internet from Spectrum but dropped the TV part since I have a working OTA setup.

I think that before the merger all the Charter regions had most everything copy freely and time warner only had locals copy freely. It still seems to be that way. I had hoped that the merger would bring Charter's less restrictive policies to the Time Warner regions but I don't think that's going to be the case.

[SWKerr]

Thanks for the comments! I have looked at the Silicondust site as well and saw a very recent post that Cary (which should be on the same system) is pretty much all flagged as copy once. I don't see me picking up the TV option unless I hear different. I suppose I could replace my current DirecTV receiver with a Comcast box but since I called to quit last year and they cut my bill in half I doubt it will be better or cheaper.

[btrcp2000]

FWIW before I went back to my old r5000 dish boxes, I had two Hauppauge Colossus cards that both were able to receive signals via HDMI, changed channels with usbuirt. This was across two providers, Time Warner (pre-Spectrum) and Dish. Might be an option for you as well. Also had HDPVR, which required nightly windows reboots.

Personally I would be hesitant to invest in stuff that relies on Copy-freely. Several years ago I had a firewire setup that was perfect until TW flipped the switch to copy-once and the whole thing vanished overnight.

[BobPhoenix]

Originally Posted by btrcp2000

FWIW before I went back to my old r5000 dish boxes, I had two Hauppauge Colossus cards that both were able to receive signals via HDMI, changed channels with usbuirt. This was across two providers, Time Warner (pre-Spectrum) and Dish. Might be an option for you as well. Also had HDPVR, which required nightly windows reboots.

Note: I never required reboots with HDPVR just with my Colossus card. Picture quality was definitely better with the Colossus or I probably would have stopped using it because of that.

[Fuzzy]

Spectrum, I believe, still posts their policy as it was with Charter, that things are copy freely, except premiums. That said, these flags are set locally at the head-end, so even on old charter systems, it will vary. My charter service actually leaves quite a few premiums copy freely, but oddly enough some free things are copy once - like the SD version of my local PBS.

You could certainly use the following link to see if you can get your local head-end to 'fix' the copy flags.

http://www.spectrum.net/support/gene...v-programming/

[SWKerr]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Spectrum, I believe, still posts their policy as it was with Charter, that things are copy freely, except premiums. That said, these flags are set locally at the head-end, so even on old charter systems, it will vary. My charter service actually leaves quite a few premiums copy freely, but oddly enough some free things are copy once - like the SD version of my local PBS.

You could certainly use the following link to see if you can get your local head-end to 'fix' the copy flags.

http://www.spectrum.net/support/gene...v-programming/

At this point I need to have an actual account to open any kind of inquiry. The guys laying the cable think that it will probably be next week before everything is fully in place so I can request the service. Were you actually able to connect with a person to request a change to a bad copy once flag? That would almost sound like they care about customer service.

I'll have to see what kind of deals I can get as a new customer but I doubt I would be willing to add TV to the internet package before I knew the copy flags were setup to be more Cablecard friendly. I think I will try to make a request after I get an account and add TV if I make any headway on getting the flags fixed to my liking.

Also: with the Time Warner merger confusion it is hard to tell what kind of options I really have. I wonder if I went into a store if they have actual demos of what is available in my area. Spectrum has a X1 app but I wonder if it works in Time Warner markets yet.

[KryptoNyte]

The gent that mentioned going over to a local friend's house that already has Spectrum and check their cable box had a good idea. Even after some folks requested alteration of copy flags, we're like 12 months in now, I'm not aware of one single previous Time Warner market that has lifted the flags. They seem fairly bent on keeping things the way they were, which is unfortunate.

[will]

Originally Posted by SWKerr

I will be getting Internet from Spectrum but I am trying to figure out if getting the TV service is going to be something that will work for me. Today I get locals via several HDHRs with an antenna, plus a Hauppauge Colossus with a DirecTV STB.

So I checked with my cable boxes and pretty much all the channels (except broadcast channels) were marked as "copy once" with Spectrum in Buffalo, NY

In this region, Spectrum was Time Warner Cable before the switch.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by SWKerr

At this point I need to have an actual account to open any kind of inquiry. The guys laying the cable think that it will probably be next week before everything is fully in place so I can request the service. Were you actually able to connect with a person to request a change to a bad copy once flag? That would almost sound like they care about customer service.

I'll have to see what kind of deals I can get as a new customer but I doubt I would be willing to add TV to the internet package before I knew the copy flags were setup to be more Cablecard friendly. I think I will try to make a request after I get an account and add TV if I make any headway on getting the flags fixed to my liking.

Also: with the Time Warner merger confusion it is hard to tell what kind of options I really have. I wonder if I went into a store if they have actual demos of what is available in my area. Spectrum has a X1 app but I wonder if it works in Time Warner markets yet.

I don't think you need to actually have an account. You are inquiring about the services you are considering paying for. That includes the flagging policy matching what they publish on spectrum.net.