User talk:Crow

Wagnerrp writes:

As an alternative to the trouble you are having with firewire tuning, why not just get a CableCard tuner? Anything you can record through firewire, you will be able to record through a CC tuner, and it will be considerably more reliable.

My response:

Yes, a cable-card tuner is the best option, but the tuner is expensive, and the card is an extra $4/month from Verizon. I would like to keep the set-top box for watching live TV, especially for letting a babysitter or other guest use it when I'm out. And since it is supposed to work with Firewire, it makes sense to push Verizon to fix it. I'll probably switch to Cable Card, but hopefully my bug report will result in this working for the next person who tries it.

A few clarifications... perhaps a bit late as you've already started stirring up trouble with FCC complaints. First, the document you are quoting from is old. The revised version is available here. All the verbosity from the 2005 addendum has been removed, firewire video output is only required on devices with internal record capability, and there is nothing in there any longer about firewire remote control capability. wagnerrp 18:19, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

If you just have a standard cable box, there is no need for it to support firewire. Some manufacturers have been getting waivers allowing them to produce DVRs without firewire. Cisco could be entirely within their right to forgo that interface, and considering the absolute dearth of devices that can use it, as well as the hardware and licensing costs, they would be foolish to include it if they didn't have to. Verizon could have their own waiver obviating their need to carry such hardware, but chances are better you've simply been talking to some CSR that doesn't even know what firewire is. The problem was one of ignorance rather than malace. How high up the ladder have you managed to escalate this thing? wagnerrp 18:19, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Should you get firewire working, what then? The requirement is only that it can output video, but not who it is willing to output video to. The firmware could simply be set up to require DTCP/5C handshaking for every connected device, regardless of whether the content in question is marked for DRM protection. Unless you have a rare D-VHS deck, or TV with firewire (or live in Japan where these things were once common), MythTV or TSReader are not sufficient to make the claim firewire doesn't work. wagnerrp 18:19, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

For your LiveTV needs, you are still going to need at least two cable boxes, one for LiveTV and MythTV's dedicated use. MythTV expects to have dedicated access to any hardware it knows about. It has no way of handling something usurping control of a tuner or STB. If you are recording over firewire when someone changes the channel, the recording will fail and be terminated. If you're lucky, the new recording quality routines added in 0.25 will flag that and have the scheduler re-record at a later date. wagnerrp 18:19, 19 March 2012 (UTC)