Does NextPVR support DRM?

[rosede]

Came home from work only to discover that I can now only get local channels.   After troubleshooting and digging into things, I discovered Cox made a change and the majority of the channels that I get from them are now labeled "DRM".   

Before I pull the plug on Cox and switch to another service, I have to ask;  Can NPVR do DRM?  I'll be really unhappy if I have to drop NPVR and switch to a streaming service, but this is something that I may have to do.

Thanks

Daryl

[mvallevand]

No.

Martin

[rosede]

That's what I thought.  I'm sorry to say, but most likely this will be goodbye.  It's been a good run, and I've been really happy with NextPVR, but if Cox is forcing these changes on me and others in my area, then I have no other choice but to drop Cox and find a new solution.

Daryl

[BrettB]

Before I pull the plug on Cox and switch to another service, I have to ask;  Can NPVR do DRM?  I'll be really unhappy if I have to drop NPVR and switch to a streaming service, but this is something that I may have to do.

Before doing that, you should probably try contacting Cox. It may have been a mistake. In the past, we have seen frequent reports of cable technicians "accidentally" switching the CCI flags for channels. If you can get to the right support person who actually knows what CCI flags are, you might be able to get them to fix it if it was indeed a mistake rather than an intentional change.

[pkscout]

In the US, once your local cable monopoly does that kind of switch (assuming, as someone else said, it wasn't a mistake), you can still use NextPVR, but it is much more complicated. It really will boil down to if you want to spend some time setting up and maintaining some other options. Here are two I've done over the years:

1- get an analog encoder of some sort with an IR blaster and hook it to a cable box. Then you can record anything your cable box can get.
2- Use ChannelsDVR (yes, it's another piece of software to manage and pay for) as a source tuner for NextPVR. Channels supports cable channels via TV Everywhere, so you can record the stream of the live channel just like a regular channel. You won't get every single channel on your cable package, but you will get most.

I've been doing #2 for about 6 weeks now, and it's an acceptable solution for me. I've been meaning to post the steps in the hardware section of the forum.

[rosede]

2- Use ChannelsDVR (yes, it's another piece of software to manage and pay for) as a source tuner for NextPVR. Channels supports cable channels via TV Everywhere, so you can record the stream of the live channel just like a regular channel. You won't get every single channel on your cable package, but you will get most.

W

What is ChannelsDVR?  Please provide more information.

Thank you.

Daryl

[mvallevand]

What is ChannelsDVR?  Please provide more information.

Are all the Internet search engines down?

Martin

[rosede]

What is ChannelsDVR?  Please provide more information.

Are all the Internet search engines down?

Martin

Martin, I may miss using NPVR, but not as much as your wit and charm.

Daryl

[pcostanza]

Before I pull the plug on Cox and switch to another service, I have to ask;  Can NPVR do DRM?  I'll be really unhappy if I have to drop NPVR and switch to a streaming service, but this is something that I may have to do.

Before doing that, you should probably try contacting Cox. It may have been a mistake. In the past, we have seen frequent reports of cable technicians "accidentally" switching the CCI flags for channels. If you can get to the right support person who actually knows what CCI flags are, you might be able to get them to fix it if it was indeed a mistake rather than an intentional change.

This same thing happened to me 2 days ago. Cox has gone DRM and in my area, they said they would 2 years ago but for some reason, they waited.  Probably to try and get us to buy some streaming equipment. 
The people I spoke to at Cox know nothing or pretend to.  Most don't even know what cable cards are.  I don't see them reversing this decision as it's been in place in parts of the US for years.

[jbhall56]

I just have to ask since I went through the hassle of buying two Silicon Dust cable devices and upgrading to v5 only to find out that the "Premium" channels are verboten.

I do NOT want to record them, just be able to view them. If Microsoft could do it with Media Center, it's obviously not totally illegal, so I'm trying to understand the rationale of not even allowing the viewing of such channels. I have investigated things and apparently NextPVR could allow viewing and disallow recording, so if recording is the problem because of DRM that is not an issue. Besides, if the CableCARD enables the channel (regardless of the DRM setting), then the user has the right to view the station in question because the cable company has enabled it. Therefore NextPVR would not be out of line to at least allow the viewing of the channel and disallowing recording due to DRM.

Why is it that NextPVR cannot at least allow viewing of these DRM channels? Silicon Dust allows it through their Home Run software (so it is possible) but their interface and station directory leaves a LOT to be desired.

I'm not trying to cause a fight here, I am just trying to understand what the thought process was that emasculated NextPVR (and every other open source solution available). Because there has to be a reason that I have yet to find using Google/Bing/etc. for not supporting such channels.