New moto 6412 with HDMI and SATA

I have 2 of these new 6412's from Insight Cable in Indiana. HDMI and SATA, the firmware is 12.18, infact those pics above are of my cable box .

I have a question on this, is the HDMI output clearly nicer than the Component, or can you tell that much of a difference?

Also, any word if any Comcast dealers are getting this?

I see an Orange SPDIF output in the picture is there also an Optical Digital output?

RScottyL,

What is your output device? If you have a digital projector or RPTV, an HDMI or DVI connection will typically provide a superior result as the signal will stay digital the entire time. If you have a CRT projector or RPTV, it can be a toss up which digital to analog converter is better; the one in the TV, or the one in the cable box.

Personally, I have a 26" Samsung CRT and my 6412 hooked up via DVI is superior to component. The difference isn't huge - the most noticable improvement is in menus and screen overlays; DVI makes them much sharper.

So... the obvious next question: have you tried to expand the hard drive capacity using the SATA port, as has already been done successfully with the SA8300HD and its SATA port?

If so, what results? If not, why not???

Both are very similiar, however direct thu my Sony xs is superior. to the moto.

Wow, finally a decent looking box from Moto.

Can you see what rev. of the broadcom chip is in the STB? It might be hidden under a large heat synch.

In fact a digi photo of this thing with the top cover off would be very cool.

Thanks,

Tommba

BCM7038

Ron

Wider shot of the Phase 3 rear panel:



Ron

Walford, there is an optical and coax output on the older 6412s too.

I second the question- Have you tried a SATA drive yet?

Thankx for the updated rear image. I was concerned since I have used both optical and Coax on my older 6412 and I wanted to make sure that they were both still available with the change from DVi to HDMI.

yep we all want to know if sata working on these boxes

Rumor has it only work with them sata II 500GB from hitachi....

http://www.rackmountpro.com/productpage.php?prodid=2323

Unbelievable! A 500gb drive, for $575, and only 8mb cache!

For my SA8300 I went with the Maxtor Maxline III, 300gb, $177, 16mb cache. Good enough for government work.

Nevertheless, I'd still like to know if any other drive than this Hitachi will work with the new DCT6412. I can't see why successful operation would be drive-specific.

I am in NJ (Comcast) does anyone have the new 6412 HDMI box in NJ? Did anyone hear of when they are availiable in NJ?


Rob

Can the USB be used to add on an external hard drive?

No.

Supposedly they were going to allow external Firewire drives, but who knows?

Pre-order price for world first biggest sata II drive is bit crazy. But it's definately not that high when it becomes avalible. Dell has this drive for an option to add on their 9100 system for $400.

I was just joking on the rumor, if that only works with hitachi sata II then i'll pay 4x 250GB for $120 each rather than their monster 500GB. The 250GB is a newly designed with 125GB platter, reported to run fast, quiet and cool. I don't know If Dallas TX will have the latest 6412, i would love to test workabilities on varies drives on this unit.

I remember reading a press release from Maxtor or Seagate months ago that talked about hard drives with built-in HDCP-like copy protection technology. That means that the content could not be read on a "standard" PC. I would not be surprised if we need one of those special drives to expand storage capacity on these boxes... Just a guess.

Why? The boxes now use standard IDE drives. They can enable support for external drives over Firewire- I just don't know why they keep putting it off? Why would SATA be any better?

I also posted this in the "Insight Cable - Indiana - Motorola 6412" thread. Anyone having any issues with the remote from this DVR? I picked mine up on Saturday and have been unable to find a proper code for my Toshiba RPTV (56H80). The remote I had with my previous DVR (DCT6208) worked fine with this TV. The Toshiba code 0156 from the user guide powers the TV on and off and allows volume control but the channel up/down buttons do not respond, nor do any of the numeric keys. When I try the "searching for your codes" option I found one where the channel up key worked (but no channel down), as well as numeric keys 0-3 (but not 4-9). The remote is responding properly when operating the DVR as well as my Toshiba DVD player via the AUX key.

Uhhhh........nevermind. It was a channel lock issue. I located the manual which explained how to unlock it.

Does anyone know if PIP works on the Phase 3?

Did the Motorola Diagnostic pages change at all with the addition of SATA on the Phase 3? In other words, is there now a SATA diag page? If so what does it display?

Thanks

I have a Mitsubishi WS-55515 CRT RPTV

I think I may give it a try. I would not be losing anything over what I have in my old 6412 box, infact, I am getting more options with this new box, namely the HDMI and the Sata capability.

Nobody has a SATA drive to try with this thing?

Exactly!!! who'll be the first on earth to report this to end user??? no taker??

If only i got one of this on hand....

Hard to believe it's been over two weeks since first "sighting" of this new 6412 model, and still nobody lucky enough to have this box has tried the SATA expansion port to determine if it's active or not. Amazing.

I'm also curious about the HDMI connector and associated firmware. I know that with the SA8300 and its approach to HDMI, connecting it via HDMI to a TV (e.g. Sharp Aquos 45") which does not support DD5.1 causes the SA8300 to shut down its optical/coax digital audio output from Dolby Digital 5.1 to PCM 2.0, something which is not very desirable.

The solution for the SA8300 is either (a) to never use the HDTV speakers and instead "force" the SA8300 to put out Dolby Digital audio via Audio Setup, or (b) to use a HDMI-to-DVI connection to the HDTV instead (which avoids the unintended HDMI audio DD5.1->DD2.0 complication back at the SA8300), and also run a separate L/R-stereo audio cable to the HDTV for "ordinary" HDTV watching via HDTV speakers, and also to force digital audio output via Audio Setup to Dolby Digital so that the optical/coax output is indeed DD5.1 to the external theater surround sound system when present.

I'm curious to know if Motorola's implementation of HDMI for this new 6412 is similar.

My local CC was offering this box for $299 with a 2 year commitment to Cox cable. I had to return my 2nd gen 6412 because the firewire output had the copy protection turned on in the latest firmware update. I was then unable to archive to D-VHS. Can anyone confirm that the firewire is working in this box?

I see there's an RF output on this new Moto, has anyone tried it? In my situation I'd connect the HDMI to my Sony DVI, and use the RF to feed the other TV's in my house. Would HD programs be down rezzed over th RF?