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jig
join:2001-01-05
Hacienda Heights, CA

jig

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[CATV] HDHomeRun Prime, cable card, Samsung TV, DRM

So, before christmas, I purchased an HDHomeRun Prime, got the cable card from Spectrum (ex-TWC), and played around with being able to view channels through that system. It worked well, but I didn't set aside time to get it wife-ready. I could see all channels I paid for (with a tuning adapter).

Fast forward to a week or so ago, and now there is a new (drm) listed after almost every channel above 30, which includes all cable sports channels, all premium channels, and pretty much any channel other than FreeForm. That switch (might have happened from the beginning of the new year), has put a wrench in my plans.

I have a few Raspberry Pis set up at TVs to stream video and to tune one of the three available tuners in the HDHomeRun to whatever the viewer wants to watch. I am not DVR-ing anything. But, now I can't even tune anything with the RPis because of the DRM tags on most of the channels.

Interestingly, my Samsung TV sees the HDHomeRun on the network and can tune all the channels (well, up to 300 or so, then it seems to give up), regardless of their DRM status. This would be a fine work around, except that there's no guide, and no way to type in a specific channel to tune to... the nice thing about the RPis is that they run a minimal guide that's just good enough to keep the wife happy. Anyway, the other issue is that the Samsung TV, while able to bypass the DRM, can't tune channels above 300. Some weird and arbitrary limitation.

From what I can gather, I could possibly use something relative expensive like an xbox one as a set top box... but that kind of defeats the purpose of having inexpensive extenders (RPis) for live viewing, and it doesn't work at all if I want to set up a scratch-built DVR. The NVidia shield TV would be perhaps a happy medium, but apparently Android TV doesn't cut through the newly enabled DRM. I haven't double checked capability to make sure it works with the DRM tag, but I guess I could try TiVo, but that's $$$$.

So, either I cancel all premium cable channels (which would suck, cause I like watching hockey and college FB now and again), or I use the Charter-provided STBs.

I'd probably bite the bullet and take the Charter-provided STBs (upgrade from the current Motorola DCT3200 I've kept for channel access for now), but this sucks. The HDHomeRun tuner and RPi extender route typically produces picture quality that is visibly better than that offered by the STBs - this is probably just because the RPi extender allows me to tweak video settings that aren't available (to me) in the STBs, but I swear it looks like STBs introduce their own compression artifacts (at least, the DCT3200 seems to).

The big question: why did Charter enable the DRM tags this year? Is there any chance a group of customers can successfully lobby them to at least drop that tag from everything but the premium channels? It seems to completely defeat the purpose of providing for the cable cards... Has anyone else been hit with this, just now at the beginning of 2017?

Anyway. Now I'm hoping that either Samsung provides (or re-enables) a way to tune to the HDHomeRun in a wife-friendly manner, that NVidia gets something working with their Shield TV, or that SiliconDust figures out a work around. I would be fine if all that was offered was a minimal guide and live viewing... maybe there's some way SD can provide the app to work with Kodi/AndroidTV/similar in a way that makes the DRM jackasses happy. I call them jackasses because the only thing this DRM does is make it harder for regular customers to enjoy Charter's services. Pirates use other means to cap and up the exact same content (or, for that matter, stream live tv).

Thoughts? Work arounds?
ghostrider56
join:2010-12-29
Independence, OH

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Really the Nvidia Shield TV 2017 doesn't support DRM channels? I was told it does because my MiBox works. I have TWC in Ohio and all my channels are DRM expect locals.

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Your only option at the moment for recording DRM channels is Windows Media Center. And you need to be running Windows 7 or 8. 10 won't work. You can then use an Xbox 360 (not Xbox One) as an extender to watch on other TVs.

You could use a NVidia Shield to watch DRM channels live (no recording though) if you have an older model that has not been upgraded to the latest OS, which is based on Android Nougat (the new models come with Nougat, and I don't know if they can be downgraded), using the HDHomeRun "Green" App (I think you have to sideload it, but I don't have a Shield so I'm not 100% sure, though). The HDHomeRun DVR App (aka the "Grey" App) will not play back DRM channels.

DRM will likely never work in Kodi, at least not without Kodi launching an external player. And will never work on the Pi (apparently their HDMI chipset has the HDCP functionality disabled in hardware, so there's no way to provide a secure path for DRM content).
said by jig:

The big question: why did Charter enable the DRM tags this year? Is there any chance a group of customers can successfully lobby them to at least drop that tag from everything but the premium channels? It seems to completely defeat the purpose of providing for the cable cards... Has anyone else been hit with this, just now at the beginning of 2017?

TWC has always set the copy-once flag on pretty much every channel other than the broadcast networks (which causes them to be DRM). And Hacienda Heights seems to have been a TWC territory before the Charter takeover? ( If you are in a legacy Charter area, then I guess that just means that Charter is now adopting TWC's stance on DRM channels) So if you were getting stuff before it was a mistake with their configuration and they fixed it.

And people have been complaining to TWC to change their policy for ages. There was even a petition made at one point in time that I remember signing. But they don't have any incentive to make the change. So I doubt it'll ever happen.
rocketr
join:2003-10-09
Pinckney, MI

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The Amazon FireTV will also run the Green App for Live DRM channels

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said by rocketr:

The Amazon FireTV will also run the Green App for Live DRM channels

I've heard that the FireTV doesn't handle deinterlacing 1080i MPEG-2 very well. The Xiaomi Mi Box reportedly has the same problem too. They do alright with 720p content, though.

jig
join:2001-01-05
Hacienda Heights, CA

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said by Suit Up:

TWC has always set the copy-once flag on pretty much every channel other than the broadcast networks (which causes them to be DRM). And Hacienda Heights seems to have been a TWC territory before the Charter takeover? ( If you are in a legacy Charter area, then I guess that just means that Charter is now adopting TWC's stance on DRM channels) So if you were getting stuff before it was a mistake with their configuration and they fixed it.

And people have been complaining to TWC to change their policy for ages. There was even a petition made at one point in time that I remember signing. But they don't have any incentive to make the change. So I doubt it'll ever happen.

our area is used-to-be-TWC.

the change was definitely recent - i was able to watch cable sports channels using the RPi with the SiliconDust View add-on in December.

the DRM tag appears to be different from what you're describing, at least how it has been implemented out here. there were channels broadcast in the clear, meaning no need for a cable card at all, for a long time. then, they clamped down on almost all channels (I think only the first 13 and a few spanish channels were left clear), which required the cable card to deencrypt.

I only got the cable card and the HDHR Prime a few months ago, and was generally just playing with it to set myself up for success with the wife and to remove the STBs. 100%, I could watch ESPN, HBO, and similar using HDHR Prime and Libreelec (Kodi) on an RPi using the HDHR add-on, as late as December.

This past MLK weekend, I started playing again and noticed, for the first time "[drm]" next to most of the channels above 30, including ESPN and HBO.

From what I can tell, this is related to the copyonce and copyfreely tags, not the encryption chain, and I don't think HDCP is required for copyonce, so I don't think the hardware limitations of the RPi are a deal breaker. It appears those particular drm tags are being used for the first time in our ex-TWC area. So, from my viewpoint, it looks more like Charter forcing their stance on DRM onto TWC... interesting that it's been the reverse elsewhere.

Still, based on your comments, I have to wonder if Charter would be more approachable. It appears they don't charge for base STB rentals (TWC charged a ton), so it wouldn't hurt their bottom line. I think regardless of what plan you're on, you still need to pay the $3 extra a month for the cable card, so it would actually present an extra revenue stream for them. TWC had no incentive because it would have replaced a $30-$45/month revenue stream with a $3 one.

The Shield looks like a viable alternative, once they work out its drm issues, though I'd still rather just use an RPi. Boooo.

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said by jig:

our area is used-to-be-TWC.

the change was definitely recent - i was able to watch cable sports channels using the RPi with the SiliconDust View add-on in December.

Then it's definitely a mistake that they fixed.
said by jig:

the DRM tag appears to be different from what you're describing, at least how it has been implemented out here.

No. The DRM tag is just a sign that the channel is not copy-freely (it will be set to copy-once or copy-never). Copy-freely does not mean it is clear/unencrypted. It means that your Prime can decrypt it (using the CableCard) and output it without DRM protections. If it is copy-once or copy-never it can not be outputted from the tuner without DRM protection. So the Prime has to output it with Microsoft PlayReady DRM applied (for Windows Media Center) or DTCP-IP applied (this is what your Samsung TV supports, as well as the HDHomeRun Green app, and PlayStation 3s).
said by jig:

I only got the cable card and the HDHR Prime a few months ago, and was generally just playing with it to set myself up for success with the wife and to remove the STBs. 100%, I could watch ESPN, HBO, and similar using HDHR Prime and Libreelec (Kodi) on an RPi using the HDHR add-on, as late as December.

Again, then it was definitely a mistake in the configuration. Trust me, that sort of thing has happened (where they incorrectly set channels to copy-freely), and TWC isn't always so quick to fix it because the number of CableCard users is very low, so they might not notice for a long long time.
said by jig:

From what I can tell, this is related to the copyonce and copyfreely tags, not the encryption chain, and I don't think HDCP is required for copyonce, so I don't think the hardware limitations of the RPi are a deal breaker.

Yes it's related to those settings as I stated above. But you are incorrect that the encryption chain does not matter. Content that is copy-once must be protected by DRM at all times (well, except via the analog loophole, so it can output to composite or component with no DRM because they are not digital). That means from the tuner to being outputted to HDMI it must be protected. So for HDMI, it must have HDCP enabled.
said by jig:

Still, based on your comments, I have to wonder if Charter would be more approachable.

The problem with Charter is that they don't really have a unified approach to their CCI Flags (what sets the copy-freely, copy-once, or copy-never). So some markets have a similar setup to TWC's, others have a similar setup to Comcast's (where only Premiums are copy-once). So it could go either way with this merger.
ghostrider56
join:2010-12-29
Independence, OH

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On Reddit/AndroidTV people are saying the HDHR Green App works with the Shield 2017 for DRM Channels?

jig
join:2001-01-05
Hacienda Heights, CA

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Thanks - i may check with the local office to see if they can push for copy freely on all but the premium. Apply some kind of pressure the other way.

I'm always suspicious when there's a switch that gets thrown at a coincidental time, but maybe this was a year-end audit and they caught the issue then, or there was some other issue that held up the switch until the new year.

I've been looking into the Tivo Bolt as a complete replacement, but I haven't confirmed that it'll work with a Mini in a different room with copy-once enabled, or if it'll work to stream to any iOS device on the local network. It's a solid competitor to the Shield, but without at least the Mini access to recordings working, the Bolt would not be an upgrade from what we have now. Some of those DRM tags are scary (copy never, etc.), and if they were enabled, I'm not sure how well the Tivo would keep pace.

Green App - I think as long as you aren't in the most recent Android build, the Green App will still work. Unclear if you can downgrade if your purchase of a new Shield already has the new Android build installed, but signs point to yes.

I'm considering trying out some Intel Compute Sticks I have lying around. They should be able to run the live viewing app and view DRM channels, and there's an iOS app that you can use as a remote (unclear if CEC will work). It would be relatively clunky, but it would allow me to leverage the HDHR without having to buy into Tivo.

I might be able to futz with the built in Samsung viewing a bit - the 300 channel limitation might just be a max-items limit, and maybe I can get around that by blocking some of the early channels so they don't get pushed to the Samsung. Still no guide though. SiliconDust could provide an app to Samsung...

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said by ghostrider56:

On Reddit/AndroidTV people are saying the HDHR Green App works with the Shield 2017 for DRM Channels?

That's not what was posted in this thread: »forum.silicondust.com/fo ··· #p284947
aguen
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join:2003-07-16
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said by jig:

Thanks - i may check with the local office to see if they can push for copy freely on all but the premium. Apply some kind of pressure the other way.

I wouldn't hold my breath whilst waiting for any real change. It's the content owners that determine what CCI/DRM attribute is set.

The only solution that will handle all of the contingencies is a Windows PC running Win 7 Pro or Ultimate or Win 8.1. Either of these would also need the HDHR Prime software installed.
dfwguy
join:2013-10-24

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Tivo Minis can play copy-protected content and their documents say the Stream works with protected channels too. FCC rules only permit the use of copy-never on PPV and VOD content, and even then, most providers just stick with copy once on PPV stuff.

You should be able to star channels on the HDHomeRun's lineup webpage and then use the favorites list to only see the channels you care about to get around the 300 channel limit.

SiliconDust did have a Samsung app at one point but Samsung got their panties in a knot and wouldn't approve updated versions of the app so it was abandoned. Samsung's hardware was kind of shit anyway and tended to drift out of sync after 20 or 30 minutes.
rocketr
join:2003-10-09
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said by Suit Up:

I've heard that the FireTV doesn't handle deinterlacing 1080i MPEG-2 very well. The Xiaomi Mi Box reportedly has the same problem too. They do alright with 720p content, though.

This is true... its OK but not great at all for 1080i
I'd love to test another box that runs the Green App, Does 1080i, Runs Kodi, Netflix, HBO Go etc... Fire TV is closest for now.

Wish Charter would upgrade to MPEG4. That would solve lots of issues.
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said by dfwguy:

Tivo Minis can play copy-protected content and their documents say the Stream works with protected channels too. FCC rules only permit the use of copy-never on PPV and VOD content, and even then, most providers just stick with copy once on PPV stuff.

You should be able to star channels on the HDHomeRun's lineup webpage and then use the favorites list to only see the channels you care about to get around the 300 channel limit.

SiliconDust did have a Samsung app at one point but Samsung got their panties in a knot and wouldn't approve updated versions of the app so it was abandoned. Samsung's hardware was kind of shit anyway and tended to drift out of sync after 20 or 30 minutes.

Problem with the Tivo Mini is no Kodi support... if it ran Kodi it would be perfect.
dfwguy
join:2013-10-24

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said by rocketr:

Wish Charter would upgrade to MPEG4. That would solve lots of issues.

Not really. The biggest problem is that the ARM SOCs everyone uses either don't have hardware-accelerated deinterlacing or don't expose it as an option for app developers to use. They're all designed for use with streaming video which is always progressive. Deinterlacing requires a lot of processing power and can't really be multithreaded. The ARM architecture isn't particularly powerful (it does much less work per clock cycle than x86/x64 processors in normal PCs) and relies on multiple cores and multithreaded programs to make up for that.

jig
join:2001-01-05
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said by rocketr:

Problem with the Tivo Mini is no Kodi support... if it ran Kodi it would be perfect.

at least with MoCa, that's one less wired network jack at the TVs. I would absolutely love just having one input device that did it all... and cheap like the RPi so that there's not a huge hit when the standards change. the tivo stuff isn't too bad, but there's still a risk of compatibility, and the charge for the guide isn't small...
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said by dfwguy:

said by rocketr:

Wish Charter would upgrade to MPEG4. That would solve lots of issues.

Not really. The biggest problem is that the ARM SOCs everyone uses either don't have hardware-accelerated deinterlacing or don't expose it as an option for app developers to use. They're all designed for use with streaming video which is always progressive. Deinterlacing requires a lot of processing power and can't really be multithreaded. The ARM architecture isn't particularly powerful (it does much less work per clock cycle than x86/x64 processors in normal PCs) and relies on multiple cores and multithreaded programs to make up for that.

the video would look better, though. and the RPi does mpeg deinterlacing just fine if you've paid for the mpeg2 license...

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said by dfwguy:

said by rocketr:

Wish Charter would upgrade to MPEG4. That would solve lots of issues.

Not really. The biggest problem is that the ARM SOCs everyone uses either don't have hardware-accelerated deinterlacing or don't expose it as an option for app developers to use.

Might not be what rocketr meant, but Comcast also started re-encoding most 1080i channels to 720p60 along with the change to MPEG-4. So if Charter did the same thing, it would help.
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said by jig:

the video would look better, though. and the RPi does mpeg deinterlacing just fine if you've paid for the mpeg2 license...

One of the few platforms that does, although AIUI it's limited to bob deinterlacing on HD content, which is pretty terrible compared to what any real system will do. Not sure if it's even available when running Android on it either, or just regular Linux.
said by Suit Up:

Might not be what rocketr meant, but Comcast also started re-encoding most 1080i channels to 720p60 along with the change to MPEG-4. So if Charter did the same thing, it would help.

That's disgusting. Comcast should be ashamed of themselves. Leave the poor video alone, it's already being beat to death by too many levels of compression, it doesn't need a resolution change to make it suck even more.