US Cable Support > Charter Internet/TV > [Other] Would Charter sell used DVR to existing customer?

[Other] Would Charter sell used DVR to existing customer?

I would bet against them selling it back to you. But you never know what Charter might say. Does your DVR have a USB connection on the back of it? If so this might allow an external drive to be connected to it. You might be able to see the drive and copy the data over to the external. Most likely Charter has locked down access to USB ports so you can view it in the menu options. Just throwing things out there.

I don't remember checking what it has, but had always read that Charter had that ability to copy off blocked. I'll look at it sometime just for kicks... or look it up online.

I just looked it up online... it says it has a 2.0 USB Host Type A port... whatever that is.

reply to msmisfit
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say there's 0% chance of you being able to purchase that DVR from them. That also goes for archiving/transferring the stored content digitally, UNLESS it has active Firewire ports and you're able to capture the data as the content is being played back. Anything beyond that, and I'm no lawyer, would probably violate the DMCA or copyright law.

You could also transfer content via an analog connection and re-encode digitally.

reply to msmisfit
I don't think the Moto boxes currently have external storage capability, and if they did, the content stored on the external drive would be encrypted, requiring playback on the original DVR that it came from.

Thanks... I never had any hope of transferring the shows, that's why I had this ridiculous idea that maybe I could buy this one from them.

Take the hard drive out and put it in an enclosure. Copy it however you please, then put it back and call charter. It's not new tech, the encryption can be broken.