Ceton announces new 6-tuner outboard whole-house DVR system - Page 2

Apples and oranges, I believe.

DRM is concerned strictly with the 100% original bit-for-bit digital duplicate of the content, as delivered from the content provider in digital form. This is in the neighborhood of 4-9GB for an hour of program time, depending on the effect of MPEG-2 compression used. Could be 13GB for a 2-hour show, for example. This is what gets offloaded from DVR to DVHS tape via firewire in a 5C-allowed environment. But you can't offload the same exact program from DVR to PC (which is not 5C-compliant).

It is this digital duplicate that DRM is concerned protecting. If you choose to take the S-video equivalent, or a high-quality analog re-compress, or tape it to your VHS VCR... the suits couldn't care less. Fine. Do it.

They only want to prevent you from making your own digital duplicate of "Jurassic Park" so that you can sell the perfect quality counterfeit in China.

What gets sent to your smart phone is not 13GB of HDTV digital content. It's been recompressed and resized, for obviously practical and available bandwidth necessity.



Again... they don't care if you work with anything less than a 100% digital duplicate of the original. And neither phone-suitable or Sling-suitable content is that 13GB digital duplicate. It's resized and highly recompressed from the original, although its still is acceptable and usable... on your phone, or Sling.

What is ths method? I'm not familiar with it?

I AM familiar with the "skip multiplier" method in WMC, where you enter a number using the remote keypad (although perhaps if I typed that number on the computer's keyboard it would also be equivalent) and then quickly push the "skip forward 30-seconds" button. WMC performs a skip forward that is measured by that (number * 30-seconds) in duration, i.e. "N 30-second skips".

So if you enter 6 and then quickly push "skip 30-seconds", you will skip 6 * 30 seconds = 3 minutes, etc.

The reason I say "then quickly push" after entering the first number is because entering a number by itself is also how you tell WMC to change to that channel number. So if you wait too long before pushing the "30-second skip" button WMC will misinterpet your first number as a request to change to that channel, rather than the "number of 30-second skips" you really mean it to be.

So these are the only two WMC meanings for entering a number while watching a recording that I am familiar with. Yet you say there is apparently a third usage... to go DIRECTLY to "that number of minutes" in the program. I don't see how entering say "85" and sitting there waiting could be understood as a request to "go to minute 85 in the show", rather than "change to channel 85".

So... what's this third method for use of a typed/entered number?

MoCA is a nifty solution if you don't have or can't run CAT5/6 to your destination.

I had that problem in my own home, where I wanted to plant a media center extender (Linksys DMA2100) in my family room where there was an existing old RG59 coax run for cable. The physical nature of the walls and ceilings was such that I simply could not pull an ethernet cable.

So I bought a pair of these Gefen "ethernet over coax" adapter boxes, attaching them to each end of the RG59 cable. These gizmos gave 4x100Mb/s wired Internet connectivity at the extender end, one of which was required and the other three are simply still available.

This "ethernet over coax" solution can support a 1000' coax, and 4x100Mb/s wired ethernet over that distance.

I understand that Ceton's Echo extender has a simple plug-in MoCA adapter module (don't know what's at the other end of the coax), which I'm guessing is effectively the same solution as my Gefen boxes (for the exact same problem and need) but actually hard-connected directly to the Echo.

Sounds like a great option, providing still more flexibility for the user.

As was already answered, it's only intended for cable service:

Four QAM 64/256 tuners

No 8VSB tuners.

For this you can get a Silicon Dust HDHomeRun, which is based on 3 network-attached 8VSB tuners to feed WMC on your HTPC. This makes a higher demand on bandwith your home LAN network infrastructure than does the internal PCIe or external USB Ceton cablecard-enabled version.

Incidentally, Silicon Dust also has HDHomeRun Prime version, which is cablecard enabled like the Ceton but with 3 tuners. Same network-attached tuners feeding WMC on your HTPC.