Moving protected recordings to a NAS

[CZ Eddie]

Sorry if this has already been discussed. I've got ~40 hours of beating my head against the wall and running into roadblocks.
Too tired to try or research right now.

If I use my WMC7 with cablecard to make recordings of protected content to my local drives, I can watch them without issue.
If I use a script or something to then transfer those recordings to a NAS, will I still be able to watch them?
Or will WMC say it is not allowed to watch them because they are no longer on local drives?

[jachin99]

No. The only way to watch protected content is on an extender. There are threads about saving and restoring playready keys after hardware changes and things like that but you cannot view them after they have been moved to a NAS

[Scallica]

As long as you are still using the original WMC system to play back the protected the files, the files should play without error. You cannot watch protected files on another PC.

[Space]

No. The only way to watch protected content is on an extender. There are threads about saving and restoring playready keys after hardware changes and things like that but you cannot view them after they have been moved to a NAS

It is true that you cannot watch protected content on a system that did not record that protected content.

However, as long as you use the same PC (or an extender of that PC) that recorded the video, you can watch protected videos no matter what medium the video is stored on. You can keep it on the local HD, or you can copy/move it to a remote NAS, a portable USB HD or a flash drive. It should play fine no matter what storage system you move it to, as long as you use the original PC to watch it.

[CZ Eddie]

Thanks, folks.

I'm in the middle of setting up the hardware now and will report back tomorrow with my results.
Sounds like it'll be fine though.

Yes, I want to use the original MCE7 PC to play back the files that will eventually be moved to a NAS.

Already found out that another PC cannot play them back.
And was freaking heartbroken. lol

I can't wait till SiliconDust eventually figures out their DVR software with protected content and are able to give us more "sharing" capabilities.

EDIT:
The original WMC7 PC, not MCE7.
I'm so out of date.

[Alan G]

As long as you are still using the original WMC system to play back the protected the files, the files should play without error. You cannot watch protected files on another PC.

I thought so as well but found the opposite to be true. I built a new Sky Lake HTPC and just moved the HDD that had some protected shows on it (recorded on an older Ivy Bridge build) and they flashed a can not play screen. I closed the file, rebooted and they played fine. Strange behavior but it did happen.

[Scallica]

As long as you are still using the original WMC system to play back the protected the files, the files should play without error. You cannot watch protected files on another PC.

I thought so as well but found the opposite to be true. I built a new Sky Lake HTPC and just moved the HDD that had some protected shows on it (recorded on an older Ivy Bridge build) and they flashed a can not play screen. I closed the file, rebooted and they played fine. Strange behavior but it did happen.

If you didn't do a clean install of Windows, and just transplanted the hard drive, the PlayReady DRM keys were preserved. I think you are allowed to change "a few" hardware components before DRM totally breaks. The fact that you changed the motherboard and CPU and it still works is a miracle. In some rare cases, people have changed only one component in their system and it broke DRM.

[Alan G]

If you didn't do a clean install of Windows, and just transplanted the hard drive, the PlayReady DRM keys were preserved. I think you are allowed to change "a few" hardware components before DRM totally breaks. The fact that you changed the motherboard and CPU and it still works is a miracle. In some rare cases, people have changed only one component in their system and it broke DRM.

It was a fresh install + a brand new mother board. I think there were only four recordings that were DRM protected but they all played. Go Figure

[CZ Eddie]

Sorry if this has already been discussed. I've got ~40 hours of beating my head against the wall and running into roadblocks.
Too tired to try or research right now.

If I use my WMC7 with cablecard to make recordings of protected content to my local drives, I can watch them without issue.
If I use a script or something to then transfer those recordings to a NAS, will I still be able to watch them?
Or will WMC say it is not allowed to watch them because they are no longer on local drives?

Okay, I created a 2k12 R2 domain with DC & file server roles.
Added my WMC box to the domain.
Made some test recordings of copy protected movies.
Then moved the movies to the file server and shared the folder out.
Connected to the file share from my WMC box and was able to play back the recordings!

Tomorrow I'll add my first xbox 360 extender and test it's capability to play the files.