I nearly bought the RCA dvr with the 80gig drive (with plans to put in a much larger drive), when I remembered something about tv stations planning to broadcast their signals digitally only in 2009 or so....I'm guessing if you only intend to record OTA, like me, it's probably not a wise investment at this time?

I don't know the specifics, but you can still use it with a separate converter box.
And I really would like to know the specifics.

I nearly bought the RCA dvr with the 80gig drive (with plans to put in a much larger drive), when I remembered something about tv stations planning to broadcast their signals digitally only in 2009 or so....I'm guessing if you only intend to record OTA, like me, it's probably not a wise investment at this time?

If you get one at a great price, go ahead and buy it.

When the US converts to ASTC (digital) in 2009, there should be Hi Def tuners available for to convert the digital signals to analog which your DVR can then record.

Remember the current DVR's can not record Hi Def anyway.



Also, as of March of this year, US mandated that all DVR include a digital (ASTC) tuner if a tuner is included. What we have recently seen is not much DVR's with HDDs. So, get it while you can (especially on the cheap).

I'd say that's correct. It's not a wise investment at this time... unless, it's really cheap and you're OK with throwing it in the trash in February of 09. To each his own.

I understand newer dvd recorders with hard drives should start hitting the shelves at Wal-Mart some time this month in the <$400 range.

Why would you have to throw it in the trash? It can still be used, but you just have to use a separate tuner for it.

true, but you'd either need a programmable tuner or you'd only be able to program it to record from a single channel.

The other possibility is that if you subscribe to analog cable, it would continue to work fine until such time as the cable co. discontinued analog service.

I don't know what they're called or where to get one, but I think there are IR adapters that can be programmed to change the channel somehow at certain times.

I don't know what they're called or where to get one, but I think there are IR adapters that can be programmed to change the channel somehow at certain times.

Not only that, but a lot of Cable Boxes can be programmed these days to change their own channels at set times.

I don't think any current DVD/HDD Recorders...even with NTSC tuners...are obsolete at all, you will just have to go a different way about using them. Also as far as transferring any VHS Tapes or Camcorder footage to DVD they will always be able to be used for that (using the word always loosely).

I don't know the specifics, but you can still use it with a separate converter box.
And I really would like to know the specifics.


that makes sense, otoh I want to avoid all extra pieces of equipment if possible...dvr > tv...nice 'n simple, with no extraneous codes to juggle with my universal remotes/extra button pushing steps,etc.....I wonder if Wal-Mart is aware of the upcoming diminished useabilitty of the RCA DVR they sell as well as the $289 Philips with the 160 gig drive....What is the current state of things for a newer DVR WITH a hard drive? I can't understand why these types are so scarce, versus ATSC ones that record to disc only....recording to a hard drive is incredibly convenient, browsable, easy, your recorded collection is all in one place, etc,etc,etc....

I don't know what they're called or where to get one, but I think there are IR adapters that can be programmed to change the channel somehow at certain times.The recording unit itself has to contain the programmable code for your specific tuner to be able to control it (change channels, basically). The IR blaster itself can be interchanged with any unit.

(Just wanted to make that clear.)

I can't understand why these types are so scarce, versus ATSC ones that record to disc only....recording to a hard drive is incredibly convenient, browsable, easy, your recorded collection is all in one place, etc,etc,etc....
I don't know for sure, but I think cable companies and subscription-based DVR services like TiVo are to blame. They don't want non-subscription-based DVRs in stores because then some people would abandon their services.

I don't know for sure, but I think cable companies and subscription-based DVR services like TiVo are to blame.

I agree with this.

They don't want non-subscription-based DVRs in stores because then some people would abandon their services.

No, I think the real problem is that most people would rather pay a relatively small monthly fee to their cable company or to TiVo, no matter for how long, than pay a lot of money up front for a device that doesn't require a subscription. With a cable DVR there's the added advantage that if it goes kaput, they don't have to pay to get it fixed, just swap it for a functioning unit.

I agree with this.



No, I think the real problem is that most people would rather pay a relatively small monthly fee to their cable company or to TiVo, no matter for how long, than pay a lot of money up front for a device that doesn't require a subscription. With a cable DVR there's the added advantage that if it goes kaput, they don't have to pay to get it fixed, just swap it for a functioning unit.

Actually, I think the more realistic explanation is that J6P has no clue what a DVD recorder with a hard drive is capable of doing. He has Tivo or the cable co. dvr because that's what his friends have or it was offered to him with his service.

No, I think the real problem is that most people would rather pay a relatively small monthly fee to their cable company or to TiVo, no matter for how long, than pay a lot of money up front for a device that doesn't require a subscription. With a cable DVR there's the added advantage that if it goes kaput, they don't have to pay to get it fixed, just swap it for a functioning unit.What you say is fine for a cable co or sat co DVR, but how do you fit that in with the poopularity of Tivo where you pay both a monthly fee and a fairly stiff upfront cost for the box -- which is a paperweight without the subscription. Isn't it true that if your Tivo goes kaput, that is your problem not theirs as far as fixing it goes.

I'll admit I haven't checked prices on TiVo units lately, but my impression was that at least for SD models they aren't all that high, with the subscription fees in effect subsidizing part of the initial hardware cost. Or is that more like DirecTV?

The new TiVo Series 3 that does HD is definitely expensive, but I think it's come down somewhat since it launched last fall.

The recording unit itself has to contain the programmable code for your specific tuner to be able to control it (change channels, basically). The IR blaster itself can be interchanged with any unit.

(Just wanted to make that clear.)

Not necessarily......
The plug types on IR blasters can vary from manufacturer to manufacturer and sometimes from model to model. They are not always interchangeable!

For OTA folks all analog only tuner equipment is paperweight in two years. The cost of adding a tuner in front of any such equipment to make them usable does not make sense - either financially (the digital tuner premium is very low compared to an STB - 0 for the Phillips 3575, around $40 or less for most) or technically (the integrated unit will probably be a better overall solution). At this point when digital tuner equipment is starting to show up in many places it no longer makes sense to buy any analog only stuff. And the longer you can wait, the better the selection and prices will become.

For OTA folks all analog only tuner equipment is paperweight in two years. The cost of adding a tuner in front of any such equipment to make them usable does not make sense - either financially (the digital tuner premium is very low compared to an STB - 0 for the Phillips 3575, around $40 or less for most) or technically (the integrated unit will probably be a better overall solution). At this point when digital tuner equipment is starting to show up in many places it no longer makes sense to buy any analog only stuff. And the longer you can wait, the better the selection and prices will become.

Are the tunerless 2007 DVD recorders already obsolete?

I believe it is important to recognize the fact that the huge majority of the population does not need or require an OTA ATSC digital tuner.

Are the tunerless 2007 DVD recorders already obsolete?

I believe it is important to recognize the fact that the huge majority of the population does not need or require an OTA ATSC digital tuner.

No, but I too use OTA only. I could see use for a tunerless (basically how I treat my Panny DMR-E80H) and use it for just input recording (in my case from my HD DVR, but you could also use any digital tuner). So I guess with that logic the analog only recorders are not obsolete, but just a bit more challenging to use for those of us with OTA only in 2 years :)

There is no one solution for everyone, I personally do not use the tuner of my DVD/HDD recorder so until it dies It will be useful to me!!

Not necessarily......
The plug types on IR blasters can vary from manufacturer to manufacturer and sometimes from model to model. They are not always interchangeable!Guess I just assumed that, as I've interchanged the ones on my Panny and Sony DVR's, and generally Sony and Panasonic NEVER seem to want to play ball as far as compatibility issues (with codes and such).

Cable companies will continue to provide unscrambled signals to cable-ready NTSC tuners for a long time to come, so any recorder with that type tuner is fine for years IMO. Even those with OTA only sources will be able to buy digital decoders for their analog TVs and analog tuners (VCR, DVD recorders) with help of free vouchers (at least 2) from Uncle Sam.

Cable companies will continue to provide unscrambled signals to cable-ready NTSC tuners for a long time to come, so any recorder with that type tuner is fine for years IMO.Yes, but the selection of channels they broadcast in analog may continue to dwindle to the point of disinterest in analog.

Cable companies will continue to provide unscrambled signals to cable-ready NTSC tuners for a long time to come, so any recorder with that type tuner is fine for years IMO.

I would have agreed with you until I saw this article yesterday, about a cable company that converted completely to digital during a few months last year:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10208705&&#post10208705

I would have agreed with you until I saw this article yesterday, about a cable company that converted completely to digital during a few months last year:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10208705&&#post10208705

All cable companies will be converting to full digital because of great bandwidth savings. But they will have to continue converting to analog for the majority of customers still using NTSC TVs for a long time to come.

But they will have to continue converting to analog for the majority of customers still using NTSC TVs for a long time to come.

"have to" is it a law somewhere....a long time to come (50 years, 100 years, 10 years, 3 years??).

What they need to do is determine what percentage of customers they will run away by forcing them to use a cable box. What if they stop charging for the cable box? Would less people flee? Can they get enough cable boxes in house to meet demand?

I think that the analog channels will disappear (I.e. move to digital only) a couple at a time until only the basic (cheapest, mainly local channels) are left on analog and that will be cut off all at once...just my theory, but I could be completely wrong. I've seen some of the channels disappearing already (I.e. National Geographic, etc...while the shopping channels remain)

I would have agreed with you until I saw this article yesterday, about a cable company that converted completely to digital during a few months last year:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10208705&&#post10208705

That example was in Puerto Rico. Closer to "home" for most people here, Comcast is about to do the same thing in Chicago:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=830402

This is probably a prelude to similar changes in other areas served by Comcast.

[correction: basic "lifeline" service may still be in analog, i.e. the local broadcast stations plus maybe a few others.]

I'm in the Chi. 'burbs, and I believe that Comcast gives us Discovery and TBS with Ltd. basic (C-Span I & II, also - whoopee-do). So it might be similar for them. Unless they alter that when they do the cutoff.

(We also used to get "E" and VH1 on our headend until they cut them out a couple of years back.)

If I buy, say a panny ES15 and use it like a VCR...say program 8 shows a week connected to my analog cable line...no cable box, it should work until 2009 right? At that point, if there is some 'new' box that allows the Panny to get an ATSC signal....will the unit be able to record it or not. In other words, it one thing to need to stick a box between the cable coming out of the wall and the dvd recorder (and yes, the issues that go along with that), its another if the sucker flat out can not record ATSC signals thru any means starting in 2009.

Can someone explain all this in simple terms?


If you get one at a great price, go ahead and buy it.

When the US converts to ASTC (digital) in 2009, there should be Hi Def tuners available for to convert the digital signals to analog which your DVR can then record.

Remember the current DVR's can not record Hi Def anyway.



Also, as of March of this year, US mandated that all DVR include a digital (ASTC) tuner if a tuner is included. What we have recently seen is not much DVR's with HDDs. So, get it while you can (especially on the cheap).

If I buy, say a panny ES15 and use it like a VCR...say program 8 shows a week connected to my analog cable line...no cable box, it should work until 2009 right? At that point, if there is some 'new' box that allows the Panny to get an ATSC signal....will the unit be able to record it or not. In other words, it one thing to need to stick a box between the cable coming out of the wall and the dvd recorder (and yes, the issues that go along with that), its another if the sucker flat out can not record ATSC signals thru any means starting in 2009.

Can someone explain all this in simple terms?In simple terms:
You now have cable so ATSC is meaningless to you since ATSC is OTA only.
If you buy an ES15 and hook it to your cable, you will be able to record analog cable using the ES15's analog CATV tuner for as long as your cable co transmits analog - assume 2 years (give or take).
When the day comes that your cable co stops analog broadcasts and goes all digital the ES15 by itself is a paperweight.

To make it a non-paperweight, you can then rent a digital STB from your cable co just for the ES15 and use the ir blaster that comes with the ES15 to control it and record the analog signal that will come out of the STB. Another option at this time would be to dispose of the ES15 and buy a new model that has a QAM tuner in it. This will allow you to record, using the recorders QAM tuner, the few channels (the locals) your cable co has to broadcast as an unencrypted signal (clear QAM). If you want to record most of the other channels you are paying for you will still need to rent an STB for the new recorder, so you might as well keep the ES15 for as long as it works.

well isn't this interesting....I went to Wal-mart and noticed the display tags for the RCA and Philips analog dvr's with HD's are gone!...in their place , were two tags , 1 for a Polaroid divr WITH digital tuner AND a 160 gig drive!, $258...and a Samsung digital tuner dvr , but only to discs...all sold out. Guess wal-mart finally read the writing on the wall....

well isn't this interesting....I went to Wal-mart and noticed the display tags for the RCA and Philips analog dvr's with HD's are gone!...in their place , were two tags , 1 for a Polaroid divr WITH digital tuner AND a 160 gig drive!, $258...and a Samsung digital tuner dvr , but only to discs...all sold out. Guess wal-mart finally read the writing on the wall....
Welcome to last week - my Walmart has had the units for a few days but have yet to put any of them on display or even make up tags for them.

In simple terms:
You now have cable so ATSC is meaningless to you since ATSC is OTA only.
If you buy an ES15 and hook it to your cable, you will be able to record analog cable using the ES15's analog CATV tuner for as long as your cable co transmits analog - assume 2 years (give or take).
When the day comes that your cable co stops analog broadcasts and goes all digital the ES15 by itself is a paperweight.

To make it a non-paperweight, you can then rent a digital STB from your cable co just for the ES15 and use the ir blaster that comes with the ES15 to control it and record the analog signal that will come out of the STB. Another option at this time would be to dispose of the ES15 and buy a new model that has a QAM tuner in it. This will allow you to record, using the recorders QAM tuner, the few channels (the locals) your cable co has to broadcast as an unencrypted signal (clear QAM). If you want to record most of the other channels you are paying for you will still need to rent an STB for the new recorder, so you might as well keep the ES15 for as long as it works.
Is there a way I can buy a QAM STB (with no DVD recorder or anything special, unless it's a VCR)? And for a reasonable price of under $100? It doesn't need to have any Hi-Def capabilities as the TV isn't HD... in fact, if it doesn't have HD, then it should be cheaper anyway (which is what I want).
I don't want to rent anything from the cable company cause I don't pay the bill.

Is there a way I can buy a QAM STB (with no DVD recorder or anything special, unless it's a VCR)? And for a reasonable price of under $100? It doesn't need to have any Hi-Def capabilities as the TV isn't HD... in fact, if it doesn't have HD, then it should be cheaper anyway (which is what I want).
I don't want to rent anything from the cable company cause I don't pay the bill.No, not new for under 100 bucks. Maybe a used, older model HD tuner which has QAM, from somewhere like e-bay.

You'll get much more information in the HDTV Hardware area.

This unit has ATSC OTA and QAM. It only outputs 480. It sells for under $100. Be cautious on this as it got a large percentage of low customer ratings on Newegg.

RJ Tech STB (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16882107049)

But I don't want or need HDTV capability... can't use it. I just want a QAM tuner in a box. :( So is that still a good place to post about this?
Also, thanks for showing me that. Though it seems some people are saying the QAM tuner doesn't work. :(

QAM on the RJ box works for me, but the box runs really hot and its a little quirky (e.g., locks up if you run past the last digital channel you have stored using the channel up/down buttons) - for a cheap box to receive non-HD digital (ATSC/QAM) it does the trick. First one I received from the retailer was defective - replacement has worked fine. So it defintely is YMMV.

Can't I just buy a motorola box (maybe something like my cable company uses... or something similar by another company) and use it to watch unscrambled channels? I understand I won't see any of the scrambled channels.
Or are TONS of people really expected to pay a monthly fee for digital cable boxes just because the cable companies won't be offering analog cable anymore?

Can't I just buy a motorola box....and use it to watch unscrambled channels?No.

What's wrong with the RJ box mentioned above? It sounds like exactly what you're looking for. It has QAM and puts out a standard definition signal, and is under $100.00. Isn't that what you asked for?

Or are TONS of people really expected to pay a monthly fee for digital cable boxes just because the cable companies won't be offering analog cable anymore?
Cable cos are already banking on that - it is up to you to go along with them. :cool:

Awhile back, I read about a couple who were still renting their AT&T(?) phone. I believe they continued to pay it on their bill for 20 years and, in total, paid $2000 for a phone that they could have bought for $15 at Walmart. Things like this got me thinking, so back to the cable company went their cable modem, STB-DVR, and off the bill came the HD charge. In total, saving $25/month and now I just pay for internet, basic, and expanded basic.

It seems a shame to have an HD capable TV without HD, so I bought the Samsung H260F and get 14 QAM Channels with four HD channels. Perhaps TWC will expand on this line-up, perhaps not. Next, the old VCR just wasn't getting the job done and the image quality was too bad, so I bought the RCA DRC8030N at Walmart last week. They were in the electronics blow-out section and they gave me $20 off.

Set up was simple, cable in and out to the H260F, cable in and out to the RCA, and cable in to the Olyvia Syntax. Also, composite out from the H260F to the RCA and component out from the RCA to the Syntax. This way, I get analog through the cable to the Syntax, digital from the H260F, and I can record both to hard drive or disk with the RCA.

As a truly unexpected bonus, I hooked the VCR to the RCA with the composite. This got me thinking, I have all these old VCR tapes from when the kids were little and I have always been concerned with the tapes breaking or deteriorating and losing all those precious memories. Guess what, I am able to transfer all those VCR tapes to DVD using the RCA. Not what I had in mind when I bought it, but it really made the equipment well worth the price.

Everything works fine, so far so good. Equipment payback time is about when analog cut-off is. So we will see.

i would spring for polaroid at $258 if my walmart had them, but i was there wed and they didn't have any, not even the tag

No.

What's wrong with the RJ box mentioned above? It sounds like exactly what you're looking for. It has QAM and puts out a standard definition signal, and is under $100.00. Isn't that what you asked for?

It's just that some people are saying the QAM tuner doesn't work, plus the bad reviews. But besides that, it does seem to be what I'm looking for. I'm just trying to see if there are better options and I'm surprised that there are so few products to choose from in the first place.