[pkacz]

This is more along the lines of the Monty Python sketch, "How To Do It" where one is taught to play the flute by "Blowing in here and moving your fingers up and down here" or some such like.


But in searching through the myriad forums here it is clear there is a tremendous desire to record hi def programming and make it portable, i.e. unencrypted and not tied to one machine. Although a capture card with component inputs is one possibility, the signal is no longer digital.


With HDMI, the signal is all digital, but encrypted end to end. But what about the end? What if, instead of, or in addition to, it turning on and off pixels in a flat screen, the decrypted data stream were captured? Would it not be possible to use that record to make the pixels turn on and off exactly as they would have with the live feed?


In other words, put a sniffer in between the flat panel's internal connector and the ribbon cable (if there is one) from the chip in the TV that has decrypted the signal. Isn't that data, which is creating the picture pixel by pixel, identical to the program data before it was encrypted by the cable company?


And if it is, might there not be a way to intercept that data as the signal is fed to the screen?


So, unless there's something of which I am unaware, here's how to do it: just intercept the signal as it's fed to the panel and record it on your hard drive.


Next we learn how to split an atom, how to construct a box girder bridge, how to irrigate the Sahara Desert and make vast new areas of land cultivatable, but first, here's Jackie to tell you all how to rid the world of all known diseases.


Paul

 

[qz3fwd]

Dont waste your time with uncompressed capture.

Get a stb and use the firewire ports.

 

[JerryW]

Or get an r5000 modification for your STB. Google it for more details.

 

[aemeeich]

Both of the responses so far only work if you have one of the specific STB that is able to be modified, or a cable box with a working Firewire port (not too many of those anymore).


Currently the only (somewhat) easy method to record HD in the clear from any STB is the Hauppage HDPVR for around $200. This is a box that has component video / optical audio input that will output a H.264 transport stream to you PC over USB in real-time. Once on the computer you can burn an AVCHD disk which will play in HD / 5.1 in a Blu-ray player, stream data file to a PS3, or watch on your computer. You can fit an hour of HD video on a standard 4.7GB DVD.


There is a long thread in this forum about the device. I have had one since July and it has been working very well for me, but some people have had some issues getting it set up and working in various versions of Windows.


Michael

 

[captain_video]

One other option is to get a Tivo HD or S3 Tivo and hack it. This involves removing the surface mounted EEPROM and replacing it with a socketed EEPROM that has been reprogrammed. You would also need to modify the kernel to allow modifications to the software. Once this has been done, you can then patch the tivoapp file to disable encryption. Install some binary files and add an rc.sysinit.author file to enable ftp and a few other apps at bootup and you're pretty much all set. In addition, you'd need to install some sort of program that would allow you to transfer shows from the Tivo to your PC. All of the info can be found at dealdatabase.com.

 

[miimura]

If you only want to extract certain programs, you don't need to hack your HD Tivo. Tivo Desktop is able to transfer all (non downloaded like TivoCast) programs from my S3 - even the HD Cable channels like Discovery-HD and ESPN-HD. Using VideoRedo, you can strip the Tivo protection and then do almost anything with it after that.


- Mike

 

[pkacz]

Actually, what I had been thinking might be a possibility is something that merely plugs into the cable that feeds the panel so that all information that passes to the individual pixels can be captured and recorded.


Sure, it would require opening up the flat panel but there are plenty of cheap 1080P LCD's around. Hell, I wonder if it might not be possible to take the guts out of a cheap panel and put it in the same box as the rest of the HTPC.


OTOH, it would be preferable to not have to buy a sacrificial panel but something tells me that few are going to want to open up their 60" Kuro and mess around with its wiring.


At this point, I'd just like to know if this is a viable option.


Paul

 

[ChrisL01]

Unless you looking to spend $10,000 before you have something that could be considered "working," I'd vote for not viable (even then I don't think your panel option is viable).


If your interested in spending large amounts of money, just buy a Component capture card and record the uncompressed video, no real reason to try and reinvent the wheel. Remember that you will need a hefty RAID setup and several TBs of hard drive space to record more than 3 hours.


Or better yet get an HD PVR that encodes on the fly, or an STB with IEEE1394, or a modded R5000 box and be done with it.


Chris

 

[pkacz]

Yeah, but think how cool it would be if you could just plug in a cable and record decrypted DIGITAL signals - cable, Blu-Ray, whatever.


The only thing that even makes me want this is losing all the movies I saved on my cable box's hard drive when it had to be replaced.


How good is the quality of signals recorded through component?


Paul

Quote:
Originally Posted by ChrisL01 /forum/post/15425401


Unless you looking to spend $10,000 before you have something that could be considered "working," I'd vote for not viable (even then I don't think your panel option is viable).


If your interested in spending large amounts of money, just buy a Component capture card and record the uncompressed video, no real reason to try and reinvent the wheel. Remember that you will need a hefty RAID setup and several TBs of hard drive space to record more than 3 hours.


Or better yet get an HD PVR that encodes on the fly, or an STB with IEEE1394, or a modded R5000 box and be done with it.


Chris

 

[ChrisL01]

I'll reply to that by quoting something you typed in your first post.

Quote:
Originally Posted by pkacz /forum/post/15394689


Isn't that data, which is creating the picture pixel by pixel, identical to the program data before it was encrypted by the cable company?

No. Your cable provider is sending you compressed video, generally in MPEG-2. Your display doesn't decode video, thus the video isn't in compressed form when it reaches the display. It is uncompressed, or rather in a raw format. The quality is the same, because it is just being decompressed (the quality loss happened before you saw the video).

Quote:
Originally Posted by pkacz /forum/post/15394689


How good is the quality of signals recorded through component?

If you are recording the raw compressed video it has the exact same quality as what you see on your display. At that point it really just matters how much, or rather, what you use to compress it. Uncompressed 1080 video will be about 400-650GB/hour (depends on various factors). You can use a lossless codec to compress it and not lose any quality, or a lossy codec to compress and lose quality. Depending on your capture method you would have to compress this using software, meaning you are going to be waiting several hours for the video to encode to get it down to a reasonable file size.


If you are talking about Component video via the HD PVR, which takes an uncompressed Component signal and compresses to H.264 on-the-fly, your file size gets much smaller. You can find samples of the video quality online (big thread here on AVS about it). I'd rate it the quality very good, but it will never be "as good" as the source.

 

[Zagor]

There is already a card on the marked that captures raw HDMI video. It is called the Blackmagic Design Intensity Pro found here: http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/


The problem, as ChrisL01 already pointed out, is the shear amount of data that you must write to your hard drive 400 to 650 GigaBytes per hour, that's a lot of data.

 

[pkacz]

The Blackmagic card won't allow anyone to capture video if it has been encrypted by the cable or satellite company.


What I'm talking about is using the connector inside the LCD or plasma display that sends the decrypted data to the pixels. Like if you've ever opened up your laptop there's a cable that connect the screen to the motherboard. If instead of connecting it to the LCD panel you connected it to a digital recorder/HTPC, you should be able to capture clean digital video data. I expect software would have to be written to translate the pixel data into individual frames and such, but since it is unencrypted that shouldn't be insurmountable.


As for being overwhelmed with data, it should be up to the user to determine what, if any, compression is used. The main difference with this method over component video capture is that the data remains digital. So I'm wondering if there are any people who know whether this is feasible and what it would take to develop it.


Paul

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zagor /forum/post/15426603


There is already a card on the marked that captures raw HDMI video. It is called the Blackmagic Design Intensity Pro found here: http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/


The problem, as ChrisL01 already pointed out, is the shear amount of data that you must write to your hard drive 400 to 650 GigaBytes per hour, that's a lot of data.

 

[kapone]



Quote:
Originally Posted by pkacz /forum/post/15460265


The Blackmagic card won't allow anyone to capture video if it has been encrypted by the cable or satellite company.


What I'm talking about is using the connector inside the LCD or plasma display that sends the decrypted data to the pixels. Like if you've ever opened up your laptop there's a cable that connect the screen to the motherboard. If instead of connecting it to the LCD panel you connected it to a digital recorder/HTPC, you should be able to capture clean digital video data. I expect software would have to be written to translate the pixel data into individual frames and such, but since it is unencrypted that shouldn't be insurmountable.


As for being overwhelmed with data, it should be up to the user to determine what, if any, compression is used. The main difference with this method over component video capture is that the data remains digital. So I'm wondering if there are any people who know whether this is feasible and what it would take to develop it.


Paul

Yes it will. By the time data is at the HDMI connector, it is no longer "encrypted" in the traditional sense. i.e. there's no AACS, CSS etc type of protection/encryption on it at that point. What it does have is the HDCP handshake protocol. The HDMI PHY will not transmit the data over the physcial cable if it does not receive an HDCP handshake signal from the device on the other end of that cable. The Blackmagic card will certainly provide that handshake.


The connector that you are referring to, (inside the LCD screen, laptop screen etc) is typically an LVDS (Low Voltage Differential Signaling) connector that directly drives the voltage circuitry that in turn turns the pixels off/on, colors etc. By the time the data is at the LVDS connector, it is not even bits anymore, it's just voltage signals, that drive the actual circuitry. The same thing happens on the DVI port from your Video card to your LCD monitor's DVI port. Once the data enters the DVI port of the LCD monitor, the driver circuitry converts that signal into an LVDS feed that actually drives the pixels on the physical LCD.


Your best bet in terms of capturing "digital" data is at the HDMI/DVI output port of your device, not the LVDS connector inside the display.


And if you wanna do that, you're gonna need some serious hardware, since you're talking uncompressed digital signals. You're gonna need some serious CPU power and a blazingly fast storage array to handle the flow of data. Remember, the data flow is unidirectional, whatever's coming out of the DVI/HDMI port will keep on coming, you have no way to control the flow, you either capture it, or it's lost.

 

[pkacz]

Wow, thank you for such an excellent reply. I find it very difficult to believe that if I connect the Blackmagic card to my cable box that I will be able to capture programs to my HTPC. But you are saying this is exactly what that card will do? I thought the whole point of HDCP was to prevent this. If the card can do this, wouldn't it be blacklisted so that it no longer gives a valid handshake? Or am I getting my copy protection schemes confused?


Not trying to challenge you. It's just that with so many people asking how to capture QAM, and most responses going along the lines of, "Get the Hauppauge HDPVR and use component OR get a cablecard HTPC and deal with all its limitations," I assumed that, since the Blackmagic card is never mentioned, it is because it can't do it.


Thanks for the explanation of the LVDS. Very understandable.


Paul

Quote:
Originally Posted by kapone /forum/post/15460369


Yes it will. By the time data is at the HDMI connector, it is no longer "encrypted" in the traditional sense. i.e. there's no AACS, CSS etc type of protection/encryption on it at that point. What it does have is the HDCP handshake protocol. The HDMI PHY will not transmit the data over the physcial cable if it does not receive an HDCP handshake signal from the device on the other end of that cable. The Blackmagic card will certainly provide that handshake.


The connector that you are referring to, (inside the LCD screen, laptop screen etc) is typically an LVDS (Low Voltage Differential Signaling) connector that directly drives the voltage circuitry that in turn turns the pixels off/on, colors etc. By the time the data is at the LVDS connector, it is not even bits anymore, it's just voltage signals, that drive the actual circuitry. The same thing happens on the DVI port from your Video card to your LCD monitor's DVI port. Once the data enters the DVI port of the LCD monitor, the driver circuitry converts that signal into an LVDS feed that actually drives the pixels on the physical LCD.


Your best bet in terms of capturing "digital" data is at the HDMI/DVI output port of your device, not the LVDS connector inside the display.


And if you wanna do that, you're gonna need some serious hardware, since you're talking uncompressed digital signals. You're gonna need some serious CPU power and a blazingly fast storage array to handle the flow of data. Remember, the data flow is unidirectional, whatever's coming out of the DVI/HDMI port will keep on coming, you have no way to control the flow, you either capture it, or it's lost.

 

[pkacz]

Okay, did a bunch of research and thought I'd post what I learned for others who may be confused, as I was, about recording digital cable and satellite programs on an HTPC (and I am only referring to DIGITAL signals, not the analog signals from component or "video" outputs).


Yes, the Blackmagic Intensity card can record signals from your cable or satellite box BUT not if they are protected. There was a time when many channels were unprotected (or "clear") but now it seems that in most places even basic channels are, indeed, protected. This means that you cannot record them - the Blackmagic card simply will not do it.


However, you can use an HDCP stripper to remove the protection and then, YES, you can record the digital signal with the Blackmagic card. Whether the signal remains digital throughout depends entirely on which stripper you use. Some convert the digital signal from the set top box into analog, thereby stripping the HDCP, before reconverting back to digital. A few don't, and one may imagine that a signal that remains all digital should be of higher quality, not to mention beg the question, "If it doesn't keep the signal digital, why not just use an analog capture card?"


Not all strippers are named as such. A "repeater" is one euphemism. If you have a pre-2005 HD television, you probably won't be able to watch protected content (including Bluray disks) via its digital input because it doesn't contain a digital key that's required for the set top box or Bluray player to send out a high definition signal. Either no picture will be displayed at all or it will be standard definition. If you use a stripper, this will no longer be a problem as the STB or player gets a key from the stripper which then passes on the hi def signal to the TV.


However, keys can be revoked. So if the powers that be are made aware of a particular stripper, they can revoke its key and render it unusable. Some strippers are re-programmable so, conceivably, a new key could be issued to enable them to function again. This sounds rather similar to the days of big satellite dishes when some owners bought receivers capable of decoding every channel without paying the satellite company for them ("Hey, if they don't like it they should keep their signal from falling on my property"). The sat companies eventually countered this with magic "bullets" that would knock out the bootleg satellite boxes which would then have to be fixed or replaced. Basically, they wanted to make it so onerous that bootleggers would just give up.


The Blackmagic card captures raw data at 119 MB/sec but it can compress on the fly to 12 MB/sec using some form of motion JPEG (they call it "Online JPEG"). That translates into 7.14 GBytes/minute (or 428 GBytes/hour of raw HD, so you'll need a serious RAID) or 720 MBytes/minute compressed (or 43 GB/hour so you probably won't need RAID, just one BIG, fast drive). Then you'll probably want to compress it further so that your 1 terabyte drive can hold more than 20 hours of programming .


As for audio, it seems the Blackmagic card will capture only 2 channels. This means, obviously, you'll lose all the nifty effects in 5.1 unless you use a separate card that is capable of capturing 5.1 channels. Then you'll have to put the audio and video back together, and this can introduce problems with the audio and video going out of sync. Apparently, there are ways to correct this or keep it from happening, but I'll leave that to other threads.


Now, all this does seem like a big pain in the ass just to record something on TV. And if hard drives didn't die and set top boxes would last forever, one might not feel the need to go beyond the cable/satellite company's DVR. But hard drives do, and STBs don't. As for circumventing copy protection, to paraphrase Chris Rock, I'm not saying it's right. But I understand.

 

[stanger89]

So what's wrong with the HD PVR?

 

[mjfink]

Yeah, that's exactly what I am thinking.


The "best" way to do this (if you can) currently is via FireWire from your cable box. This gives you the "raw" signal that the cable-co is sending, no loss of quality, no re-encoding... It's "perfect" in that it's the same digital signal that the cable-co sent you. IMHO, nothing is going to give a better result.


The next best way (only because it's more expensive and difficult) is a hacked TiVo. I don't know much about this (I'm learning, I think I might want to move from my SA8300 to a hacked TiVo) but, basically, from what I understand, a hacked TiVo is perfect for moving content around in a compressed high quality format. The path is fully digital; which is always going to both be easier (no re-encoding) and provide a potentially better output (no signal loss).


The last way (but this will always work) is with a HD-PVR (like the Happague). This doesn't require anything but an HD cable box with component out; but does do D/A and then A/D conversions (which could be lossy). Again, this is a good solution if none of the others will work for you; if they will, I would do them first.

Quote:
Originally Posted by stanger89 /forum/post/15494222


So what's wrong with the HD PVR?

 

[stanger89]



Quote:
Originally Posted by mjfink /forum/post/15494335


Yeah, that's exactly what I am thinking.


The "best" way to do this (if you can) currently is via FireWire from your cable box. This gives you the "raw" signal that the cable-co is sending, no loss of quality, no re-encoding... It's "perfect" in that it's the same digital signal that the cable-co sent you. IMHO, nothing is going to give a better result.

I'd say that's the best way "in fact", at least quality wise. The R5000 option is equal in quality.

Quote:
The last way (but this will always work) is with a HD-PVR (like the Happague). This doesn't require anything but an HD cable box with component out; but does do D/A and then A/D conversions (which could be lossy). Again, this is a good solution if none of the others will work for you; if they will, I would do them first.

The only thing is what's meant by "best". The Tivo sounds like a good option if your purpose is archiving movies or something like that, where the "downtime" to extract the content is not a problem. But the Tivo option is far inferior to the HD PVR if your purpose is to build your own (whole-house) DVR system.

 

[pkacz]

Good points about Firewire and Tivo. The hacked Tivo is probably the more accessible method since any cable company would have to be sleeping to provide boxes with an active Firewire port without encryption or some form of content protection.


I still can't believe the hoops one has to jump through simply to watch a lousy episode of I LOVE LUCY on a schedule other than the cable company's. It's not that I want to pirate the movies shown all day long on cable. I just want them to survive longer than the DVR they're recorded on. And for those who say, "Just buy the DVD", well then what's the point of paying for premium channels?

Quote:
Originally Posted by mjfink /forum/post/15494335


Yeah, that's exactly what I am thinking.


The "best" way to do this (if you can) currently is via FireWire from your cable box. This gives you the "raw" signal that the cable-co is sending, no loss of quality, no re-encoding... It's "perfect" in that it's the same digital signal that the cable-co sent you. IMHO, nothing is going to give a better result.


The next best way (only because it's more expensive and difficult) is a hacked TiVo. I don't know much about this (I'm learning, I think I might want to move from my SA8300 to a hacked TiVo) but, basically, from what I understand, a hacked TiVo is perfect for moving content around in a compressed high quality format. The path is fully digital; which is always going to both be easier (no re-encoding) and provide a potentially better output (no signal loss).


The last way (but this will always work) is with a HD-PVR (like the Happague). This doesn't require anything but an HD cable box with component out; but does do D/A and then A/D conversions (which could be lossy). Again, this is a good solution if none of the others will work for you; if they will, I would do them first.