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On Tue, 2008-11-25 at 21:29 -0500, Tom Metro wrote: > Jarod Wilson wrote: > > Tom Metro wrote: > >> The whole Firewire interface to STBs seems real rickety and > >> unreliable right now, but maybe it'll get better. > > > > Part of the frailty I'm seeing is on the part of the firewire > > interface on the cable box. If you poke it in a way it doesn't like, > > it disappears off the bus, and requires a full power off to restore > > functionality... > > That's the aspect I was referring to. Even if the Linux side of things > works perfectly, we're still dependent on the firmware in the STB > working correctly, and a while ago when I was looking at the MythTV > user's list there seemed to be a lot of people complaining about flaky > STB behavior. > > What makes me skeptical that this situation will improve is that there > isn't a mainstream use for the Firewire port on STBs. So the firmware > doesn't get adequately debugged, and the cable companies don't have > motivation to get it working reliably. > > Contrast that with the potential for clear QAM. Any consumer who buys a > modern TV with a tuner becomes a potential advocate for clear QAM once > they discover that their brand new wall mounted TV needs to have a cable > company STB dangling off of it, and another IR remote. Excellent point. I'm actually looking at wall-mounting my own set Real Soon Now. Of course, I have a ton of stuff in addition to a set top box to hook up to it anyway, so what I'd really like to do is get a new amp that does hdmi switching and up-conversion of other input types as well, and only have to run a single video cable to my TV... -- Jarod Wilson jarod-ajLrJawYSntWk0Htik3J/w at public.gmane.org
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