Digital converter with WMC

[ala1970]

I am very confused. I have Analog Cable with 2 dual TV tuners (4 tuners total) in a Windows 7 PC. On October 27th, I will completely lose TV unless I have installed Digital Converters. I have ordered them from the cable company, but I don’t understand how this is going to work with Media Center. The box has a channel switch (3/4) and a remote. It seems as though you have to keep your TV on channel 3 or 4 and choose other channels through the box. Can someone please tell me how to make this work with Media Center so I can still use the guide to record on 4 tuners?

Thanks

[Ed]

Each Tuner will only now record 1 show per tuner only set it up in TV setup as STB and you need IR blasters, it all (info) can be found here. Might not be optimal.

[ala1970]

Thanks for your reply, but I don't understand what you mean by "STB" and "need IR blasters" and where is "here"? I know the tuners came with IR blasters, but I never could make those work so I just use a receiver that sits on the desk for the remote.

Thanks

[Ed]

http://digitalmediaphile.com/index.php/ ... -with-mce/

[sbaeder]

Thanks for your reply, but I don't understand what you mean by "STB" and "need IR blasters" and where is "here"? I know the tuners came with IR blasters, but I never could make those work so I just use a receiver that sits on the desk for the remote.

Thanks

STB == Set Top Box - i.s. the new digital converter that will take in the digital signal from the cable company (which is I assume where you are getting the TV from) As was said, you will now have to get WMC to "tune" the boxes your going to get, and not the analog "tuner" card, which needs to be "fixed" on 3/4...

this is all spelled out with pictures, etc. in that post linked above...

My $0.02...At this point, you may just want to consider going the cable card route - i.e. upgrade to a digital tuner...but given that you have hung onto analog signal for this long means that you're probably going to find a way to make this work for you...

Good Luck...

[ala1970]

Thanks, I'll need it.

[ala1970]

Thanks for your reply, but I don't understand what you mean by "STB" and "need IR blasters" and where is "here"? I know the tuners came with IR blasters, but I never could make those work so I just use a receiver that sits on the desk for the remote.

Thanks

STB == Set Top Box - i.s. the new digital converter that will take in the digital signal from the cable company (which is I assume where you are getting the TV from) As was said, you will now have to get WMC to "tune" the boxes your going to get, and not the analog "tuner" card, which needs to be "fixed" on 3/4...

this is all spelled out with pictures, etc. in that post linked above...

My $0.02...At this point, you may just want to consider going the cable card route - i.e. upgrade to a digital tuner...but given that you have hung onto analog signal for this long means that you're probably going to find a way to make this work for you...

Good Luck...

The IR blaster I have has 2 different ends (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00SUB ... ge_o01_s00).
There’s no adhesive on the bigger one, but there is a little round Velcro disc presumably to attach the larger end. Which one do I put over the DTA? If it’s the larger one, will the Velcro work? What do I do with the other one? Is that just to give the remote more range?

Also, do I have to use a separate DTA for each tuner. There is an IR port on the back of the USB receiver that I currently use for the remote. If split the signal from the DTA to both tuners, will I be able to plug an IR into the back of the USB receiver and only use 1 DTA for both tuner cards?

Thanks

[mdavej]

You're really going about the the worst possible way. Just get a Homerun Prime and cable card.

[bigsid05]

Wow, I can't believe you're still on analog cable. It's really not worth setting up an external tuner box with IR blasters, get a digital tuner for your PC (the HDHR Prime can be had for as little as $60 used) and get a CableCARD from your cable co.

[Scallica]

^^^I agree. Stop this madness and get a CableCard/HDHomerun Prime and enjoy your WMC system.

[stuartm]

Since your cable is going Digital, you need a little more information. It is possible, (although unlikely) that your cable co will supply your old Analog channels Digitally in Clear QAM (you should ask the cable co) if they do then you can just replace your dual analog tuners with dual digital tuners (There are multiple options for such tuners) and be done with it.
You would also be avoiding the quality degrading steps of Digital to analog and back to digital conversion that trying to use the adapters would introduce. If the channels will be encrypted then your best option really is to go with a cable card tuner (again multiple sources for those). Getting a multiple IR blaster, multiple digital to analog converter setup to work will be much more difficult and be much less reliable than getting new tuners.

[ala1970]

^^^I agree. Stop this madness and get a CableCard/HDHomerun Prime and enjoy your WMC system.

FYI, I don't actually think my cable is currently an "analog" signal, but that's the way I had to setup the tuners originally in WMC to see all the channels. Now, TWC says they are going "All Digital" on October 27, but when I mention analog, they imply the signals are already digital, so I don't really know about that. I just know I will have NO TV on October 27 without an alternative. I am looking at the Homerun, but it only has 3 tuners. I currently have 8 available (4 in 2 PCs) even though I usually only use 4 at a time at the most, so I can probably do okay with the 3 from the Homerun.

I am very confused about this whole situation and I am just trying to find a way to keep as many tuners as possible and not lose the functionality I am used to with WMC. However, if I am recording through the HDHomerun and just watching on WMC, I guess I’m still losing some of that control. At any rate, I have to do something.

How do you access the Homerun unit to use the DVR in WMC? When watching recorded TV on the Homerun, would I be connecting through my network and watching recorded TV directly from the Homerun unit in my house, or is it recorded in some cloud and I would be watching over the internet with buffering.

Thanks for the help

[mdavej]

No internet is involved. If you need more tuners, consider more Primes or 4 or 6 tuner Cetons.

I don't understand what sort of control you'd be losing. You simply need to replace you analog tuners with digital ones. Everything else works the same as before.

[sbaeder]

Couple of things...

"analog" over a cable channel is what you have been using, since all the RF stuff is technically "analog"...but they use that to send "information" to you. So what you are talking about is the analog TV signal information...don't get too deep into the actual mechanics... Your TV (and tuner cards) know how to tune (and use) that information, and while the signal is sent over cable, it is the analog equivalent - at this point, there is no MPEG formatting or "digital" involved. i.e. this is the "good old days" of TV transmission...

Right now, you have tuner cards that know how to "tune this", and then decode the TV signal, AND turn it into something that WMC stores on the PC and that can be played back by WMC. So the tuner card is doing the work to convert the "analog" content to "digital" form.

To reclaim that "space" on the cable network, you cable company is going to eliminate the "analog" ones... [Note: AGAGIN, don't get hung up on exactly how they do all the "magic" - but just like over the air transmission, they are converting to a process that sends the digital information, and not the older "analog" format] Tis is because one "analog" channel needs a lot more of the RF bandwidth on the cable and they can fit a lot more "digital" channels into the same space used by the "analog" channels.

To put it a different way, today, you have a process where the cable company takes the now digital information it gets from a digital broadcaster (your local broadcaster), turns it back into the OLD "analog" format, and then sends it over the cable to be picked up by your tuner (which was told by WMC to "tune" to that cable channel. The tuner then converts that information back into digital (MPEG2) for WMC to store on disk. WMC knows how to tell each and every tuner what to do to "tune" the channel it wants to record.

So, the question now is how to get WMC to talk to the new DTA boxes that you can get from the cable company, and how do they talk to the tuners, etc. My GUESS is that each DTA can tune ONE digital "channel" and convert it back to ONE analog channel. Think back to the really old days before cable tuners were built into all the TVs. You had a VCR, and you told it record channel 102, and it could tune to that channel on cable. But to watch it, you set the TV to channel 3 or 4, and that was that.

Think of the DTA like that. It has the information from the cable going IN, and a signal that goes OUT to your TV. WMC would tell the specific DTA to "tune" the channel, and the "tuner" would be set to record the output (ch3/4) and it would go into WMC...I'm guessing the DTA box outputs a signal on Ch3/4. *IF* that is the case, you would need one DTA for each tuner input, and it could only go to ONE channel at a time, so you would need to somehow hook two separate DTA's into the "tuner" and set one turner for Ch3 and the other for Ch4...My guess is that wouldn't work, so you would only be able to record ONE channel for each tuner...

This is why almost all of us here say - just ditch it. Bite the bullet and go digital - Either ditch WMC, and go with the Cable Co solution for a DVR, go Tivo (which uses a cable card to "tune" the digital cable signals, or go HDHR Prime.

To your other questions...Think of the HRDR as a 3 channel at a time "tuner" that sits out on the network. It uses the cable card (and possible a second box to do something called Switched digital - but lets skip that for now) to "tune" the requested channel. The system knows how to work with WMC so WMC sees 3 separate tuners, and it can send any tuner the command to "tune" to the requested channel - just like now. The HDHR decodes (i.e. pulls off the digital information for the channel) and sends it back to the PC to be stored on disk.

So with one HDHR, you can decode 3 signals at the same time (record OR watch live). and as mentioned above, if you need more, buy a second box. Sounds like you have two WMC boxes today, and the HDHR can be shared between them (so you could have one box recording off 4 and the other off the other 2 all at the same time (assuming you have two boxes)...

This is probably the BEST way to keep WMC and go "digital"...But, keep in mind that WMC is NOT a part of MS current plans (NOT in Windows 10), so looking at the alternatives may make sense.

Either way, trying to kludge together a solution with what you have is just asking for trouble!!!

[bigsid05]

The HDHR just tunes the signal, replacing your current tuners and cable box. Everything is still done in WMC, with all recordings stored on your PC.

Honestly, I would ditch it all together and just go with the CableCo DVR or a TiVo. WMC with digital tuners can be a huge pain to maintain (not always, but often) and if you're not familiar with the technology it's going to be way more time/effort than it's worth.

[ala1970]

Couple of things...

"analog" over a cable channel is what you have been using, since all the RF stuff is technically "analog"...but they use that to send "information" to you. So what you are talking about is the analog TV signal information...don't get too deep into the actual mechanics... Your TV (and tuner cards) know how to tune (and use) that information, and while the signal is sent over cable, it is the analog equivalent - at this point, there is no MPEG formatting or "digital" involved. i.e. this is the "good old days" of TV transmission...

Right now, you have tuner cards that know how to "tune this", and then decode the TV signal, AND turn it into something that WMC stores on the PC and that can be played back by WMC. So the tuner card is doing the work to convert the "analog" content to "digital" form.

To reclaim that "space" on the cable network, you cable company is going to eliminate the "analog" ones... [Note: AGAGIN, don't get hung up on exactly how they do all the "magic" - but just like over the air transmission, they are converting to a process that sends the digital information, and not the older "analog" format] Tis is because one "analog" channel needs a lot more of the RF bandwidth on the cable and they can fit a lot more "digital" channels into the same space used by the "analog" channels.

To put it a different way, today, you have a process where the cable company takes the now digital information it gets from a digital broadcaster (your local broadcaster), turns it back into the OLD "analog" format, and then sends it over the cable to be picked up by your tuner (which was told by WMC to "tune" to that cable channel. The tuner then converts that information back into digital (MPEG2) for WMC to store on disk. WMC knows how to tell each and every tuner what to do to "tune" the channel it wants to record.

So, the question now is how to get WMC to talk to the new DTA boxes that you can get from the cable company, and how do they talk to the tuners, etc. My GUESS is that each DTA can tune ONE digital "channel" and convert it back to ONE analog channel. Think back to the really old days before cable tuners were built into all the TVs. You had a VCR, and you told it record channel 102, and it could tune to that channel on cable. But to watch it, you set the TV to channel 3 or 4, and that was that.

Think of the DTA like that. It has the information from the cable going IN, and a signal that goes OUT to your TV. WMC would tell the specific DTA to "tune" the channel, and the "tuner" would be set to record the output (ch3/4) and it would go into WMC...I'm guessing the DTA box outputs a signal on Ch3/4. *IF* that is the case, you would need one DTA for each tuner input, and it could only go to ONE channel at a time, so you would need to somehow hook two separate DTA's into the "tuner" and set one turner for Ch3 and the other for Ch4...My guess is that wouldn't work, so you would only be able to record ONE channel for each tuner...

This is why almost all of us here say - just ditch it. Bite the bullet and go digital - Either ditch WMC, and go with the Cable Co solution for a DVR, go Tivo (which uses a cable card to "tune" the digital cable signals, or go HDHR Prime.

To your other questions...Think of the HRDR as a 3 channel at a time "tuner" that sits out on the network. It uses the cable card (and possible a second box to do something called Switched digital - but lets skip that for now) to "tune" the requested channel. The system knows how to work with WMC so WMC sees 3 separate tuners, and it can send any tuner the command to "tune" to the requested channel - just like now. The HDHR decodes (i.e. pulls off the digital information for the channel) and sends it back to the PC to be stored on disk.

So with one HDHR, you can decode 3 signals at the same time (record OR watch live). and as mentioned above, if you need more, buy a second box. Sounds like you have two WMC boxes today, and the HDHR can be shared between them (so you could have one box recording off 4 and the other off the other 2 all at the same time (assuming you have two boxes)...

This is probably the BEST way to keep WMC and go "digital"...But, keep in mind that WMC is NOT a part of MS current plans (NOT in Windows 10), so looking at the alternatives may make sense.

Either way, trying to kludge together a solution with what you have is just asking for trouble!!!

Thanks for all this information. I think the Homerun is probably my best bet right now. I have looked at Tivo, but it is VERY expensive and I don't want to pay the ongoing subscription, and the lifetime subscription adds another $500. Eventually, I will have to do that, because as you mentioned, MS is doing away with WMC. By "two WMC boxes" I am assuming you mean 2 Windows 7 PCs, which is what I have, so it sounds as though 2 Homerun units should give me a total of 6 tuners to use between the 2 PCs.

I have another question if it's not too much trouble. The tuners I have are Hauppauge HVR-2250 and they say analog/digital tuners (now replaced by the newer version 2255 on Amazon). Do you think that after the switch it is possible I will still be able to plug the cable directly into them and just set them up again with the "all-Digital" signal? Thanks again.

[jaimeknapp]

No.

[stuartm]

No.

Actually, the Hauppauge 2250 would work if the Digital signal is clear QAM. if it's encrypted, then no.

[DavidinCT]

No.

Actually, the Hauppauge 2250 would work if the Digital signal is clear QAM. if it's encrypted, then no.

And when the company finally moves over to all Digital, they normally take the Clear QAM channels with them. I had 6 Clear QAM tuners that do nothing now...just sit around, I could use them for OTA but, I don't get anything worthy in my area (Thanks Comcast !). Going the IR blaster route is a mess, and not always 100% reliable (IR blasters can fall off, or having cableBOX issues) never mind the space a few extra boxes takes up (then you have the cablebox overlays that can show up in WMC)

Go on ebay, do a search for a HDR, or Ceton Infinity 4 or 6. The Ceton 4 cards (USB or internal PCIe) are cheap now days, I have seen them used under $40 on ebay. The 4 offers 4 tuners, the 6 offers 6 tuners off one cable card. If your trying to stay in the budget as low as possible, looking at the used market is your best route, a lot of people have moved from WMC and there is a bunch available. If your going a 4, stick with the internal card, on the 6, external or internal is no problems. The first cablecard is normally free or less than $3 a month (rental fees)

I have a Ceton 6 and what a great card, I have had HDhomerun products in the past and also great stuff. They both have been out long enough to have solid drivers.