[mythtv-users] No More Free DTAs From Comcast

[Gary Buhrmaster]

On Tue, Sep 10, 2013 at 8:14 PM, Kirk Bocek <t004 at kbocek.com> wrote:
> Called Comcast to make a change to my account here in the San Francisco Bay
> Area and discovered that as of a month ago they started charging $1.99 a
> month for my two DTAs. These used to be the two free DTA's you got as part
> of the digital transition.

That sort of makes a CableCard tuner cost effective (since as
I recall a CableCard rental is ~$5/month in the SF Bay Area,
for up to 6 streams depending on vendor of the capture device
you purchase).

I think that at the time Comcast documented something along
the lines of "a few years free, and after that, the cost may
change".  Apparently the SF Bay Area market is worth
$2/month/DTA.  I turned in my two free DTAs near the beginning
of the year after I got tired of storing them.  I would have been
really unhappy if I still had them and ended up paying for the
privilege of storing them at $2/month.

Note that there may be another opportunity for "free" DTAs
in a few months (HD-DTAs in this case), as Comcast starts
to encrypt basic cable (the B1 tier) in the SF Bay Area(*).  As
part of the waiver agreement with the FCC, Comcast promised
free HD-DTAs for two years (as long as you ask during the
change over), with the price after that also depending on market
conditions.  So, when you get your notification, decide if you
want one/two of those new(er) HD-DTAs "just in case".

Gary

(*) I actually have no idea when Comcast will do the SF Bay
Area, but since they are aggressively rolling out encryption
in other areas, we are probably talking months, not years.