Categories: General Discussion Building & Hacking
OK so my hacked TiVo Series 1 is beginning to show signs of dying, and TiVo wants to charge me $200 to transfer my lifetime membership (which I already paid $200 for in the first place) to a Series 3 which only hold 30ish hours of HD (and costs $600), so that doesn't make sense to me.
I want to do HD recording from Comcast, but as far as I understand it's very difficult or impossible to record uncompressed HD and/or you need ton of computing power to compress it and tons of disk space to store it.
So --- is it it possible for me to build a free DVR (Myth TV or whatever) out of a PC that could record 2 HD signals simultaneously using CableCards? Yes I realize I'll need lots of computing power and lots of disk space.
Sorry if this is laughable question but wanted to know if I'm in the realm of the possible or not. Thx.
Definitely not a laughable question, John. I don't have an answer for you, but I'll give your post a bump in the hopes that some knowledgeable person with an answer jumps on this. My series2 has had its share of problems and I'd LOVE to get something with dual tuners (particularly with all the fall TV premiers spinning up this month). I'd be very interested in what kind of ideas people can come up with for a homebrew solution.
Who can hook us up here?
This is technically possible, but you may run into issues with DRM around the cable card. Cable companies (as far as I know) don't support cablecard hardware unless it supports a completely encrypted data paths all the way through to the DVI port.
In any case, you won't find any Linux based solution at all; your only option is a Windows based DVR with the Intel Viiv stuff through the whole chain.
I've never looked into cablecard frame grabbers, but if you know of one, I can check it out (I'm an EE by trade) to see if it's junk or not...
Dennis
Thanks for the info/offer Dennis. If what you say about cablecards is true, then wouldn't they not work with HD TiVos? I was a beta tester for the HD TiVo and it had component outs and DVI. At that point TiVo wasn't testing the cablecards, so I never bothered to get the cable company to get them to work, so I didn't record HD content, but if I did, I wouldn't have been able to watch it as my TV, which is a Sony WEGA XBR 4:3 HD (one of the first HDTVs), doesn't have a DVI input. John.
Cable Cards certainly work with a Tivo S3 feeding the signal over component.
You might have problems if your cable company sets the flag that requires DHCP.
The problem actually is obtaining a capture card that supports CableCARD. They are sold, but only as buncles with other PCs (typically running Media Center 2007) and are not available for retail sale.
The reason is that any device that purports to support CableCARD must be completely certified, an expensive process. TiVo's done this, as have big OEM companies that buy Cablecard tuners.
The other issue is that the specs needed to support CableCard are not available, again, only available to those who pay the license fees and all that.
The easiest option is to get a cablebox that supports output via Firewire, and use that as your input - it certainly works, and just control the box and get the signal that way. Or just be happy with OTA HD signals.
FYI - the $200 transfer fee moves Lifetime to your new box, but also gives you something like 2 years service on your old one as well
This would only be good for over the air HD TV but no monthly fee 
, for around $699.00 you can get a nice computer duel core, 1 to 2gb memory 500gb hard drive and at leist 1 HD tuner card.Hope it helps BUT I did get a HD TIVO and pay for my lifetime sub to transfer and I love it!
Go with a smile
Kevin
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