On Sat, 2006-12-02 at 20:08 -0800, Ben Barrett wrote: > One *could*, theoretically, bring an s-video or component video output > (although I think most Craptastic set-top boxen only hav composite > video out) into MythTV, and train an RF-transceiver to C's box. It > doesn't sound seamless or entirely easy, but rather, a bit convoluted, > but ... possible today with COTS components. > Sounds like something worthy of an open source bounty :)
There are two newer Comcast digital set-top boxes. One tiny box w/ I think composite out and the other HDTV w/ Firewire. In theory, you could use an IR blaster with both of them, but my last experiment a couple of months ago was doubtful. I found out the hard way an IR blaster was doubtful with these two newer boxes. Now, HDTV box with firewire, you can actually stream the mpeg directly to your hard drive and mythtv is also setup to directly change the channel on this box using firewire directly! (Granite, I didn't get firewire channel changing setup but it is easily possible by way of other methods -- and the code is in Mythtv already to change the channel via firewire.) However, all the channels are blocked on the firewire port except our local free TV/FM channels. (Something like 4-6 channels at most. Yes, even CNN/Foxnews is blocked!) So, if one doesn't want to reverse engineer the newer set-top digital boxes, they can possibly acquire an older digital set-top box with a serial port. If I'm not mistaken, you can change the channel via the serial port (directly connected to your mythtv box). IR Blaster method? I can't remember. > > We consumers should NOT be suffering just because our desires are at > the edge of the bell-curve (of profits!), > and if it doesn't integrate well, then ... I dunno, build a robot to > push the right buttons? > I don't have all day just to watch TV while reverse engineering this feature. It's best left to younger hackers who love to watch TV (aka Playboy) all day. ;-) The other way I look at things like this, I spend a lot of time reverse engineering something while Comcast sits back and rakes in the rental profits off of Linux gurus. It already took me several days to figure out the firewire port was blocked with a copyright feature. Comcast never told me any of this. I told them what I wanted to do with the box the day I picked it up about using the firewire port. Nobody told me it was blocked. At most, I though only the Movie/Pay Per View channels would be block and not my Discovery Channel. :-/ It's their product. If they want to sell it, they have to provide the means. Forgive me if the specifications for the digital set-top boxes have already been posted to implement the features. I rarely record TV/Cable shows. And when I do, I watch them once and delete them as they're a lot of space on my drives and too much time to burn to DVD. I was just checking up on this to see if any of you tried anything recently. > Ben Sorry for the chicken scratch as I'm kind of frustrated with the digital service. Got no real gripes about any else about Comcast. :-) -- Roger http://www.eskimo.com/~roger/index.html Key fingerprint = 8977 A252 2623 F567 70CD 1261 640F C963 1005 1D61 Sat Dec 2 22:10:30 PST 2006 _______________________________________________ EUGLUG mailing list euglug@euglug.org http://www.euglug.org/mailman/listinfo/euglug
