accessing native digital content

[samatrix]

Greetings everyone.  This is my first post to DBStalk.  Very nice forum.

I'm interested in accessing the native mpeg2 data on my 501.  Assuming this is legal (wrong assumption or another discussion?)--is there any way to do this?

I know I could convert to analog and back to mpeg compression, but I'd prefer to grab the native data.  What is that serial port on 501 for?

Are there any plans to allow this on future boxes? 

Is anyone out there building PC boxes to handle all their digital media needs?

cheers,

Peter

[Hopper27]

You're not the first, and won't be the last person to ask about this and want this.

For as absurd as it is, the powers that be don't want you to have access to the raw data. It sucks, and is stupid and pointless, but that is how things are.

Jason

[RJS1111111]

It is also very likely that the MPEG-2 decompression and
Nagravision decryption are done together on the same
chip. So, there might possibly be uncompressed digital
video and audio streams accessible just prior to the
(separate?) D/A conversions. But then you're looking
for unencrypted but compressed MPEG-2 streams, right?
Unfortunately, AFAIK, those aren't available for pay TV.
The best you could do is recompress and optimize for
little or no further loss of quality, using your favorite
(MPEG-2/3/4) encoding scheme. This would of course
require some expensive commercial TV equipment,
plus adeptness with a soldering iron. Oh, yes, and it would
void your warranty, possibly violate the provider's
terms of service, and most likely trample copyright laws.

[P Smith]

There is another way to get raw stream - using DVB-S PCI card.

P.S. It was a few years ago, but that PCI card ABA-1020 from BroadLogic was exactly Echostar IRD.

[Mark Lamutt]

samatrix, welcome to DBSTalk. :hi:

Unfortunately, we can't discuss accessing the raw MPEG data on your dish pvr. Hopper27 is exactly correct that the powers that be don't want us to have access to it. The powers that be aren't us, BTW. So, we had to add the statement in our terms of use that disallows this discussion to continue. As such, I have to close the thread. I'm sorry.

[frabman]

I don't necessarily want access to the raw data, what I want is to have some way to save the encrypted data.

I've had my 721 disk go belly-up once already and lost about 40 hours of saved material. :crying: I don't want that to happen again, so I'd like the ability to dump saved shows to a safe(er) media type. I don't care if it's encrypted or whatever, cause I'd only need to play it back on E* PVR equipment.

This would actually make business sense... I'd certainly think twice about switching to DTV if it meant I'd lose access to my library of Good Eats episodes. :cool: Additionally, this would allow me to manage my saved programs in some sort of logical groupings... cooking, Sci-Fi movies/series, Survivor :o, etc...

So, making it clear that I do not want to do anything illegal (repeat, data stays encrypted), is there any way I can do any of the following:
[list=1]
Save the data to (your favorite stand-alone media)
Save the data to a SAN-like appliance or PC
Other options?
[/list=1]
Oh, and it'd be nice if saving/playing back any of the saved material wasn't a 4-hour operation. :rolleyes:

It'd be really cool to be able to save the data to a "media center" PC and stream the data back to the PVR for playback, but having a built-in DVD burner in the PVR would be just as good.

What do you all think?
Frabman

[P Smith]

It's well known fact here ( thanks to Kyoo ) - you could read the disk on Linux+XFS PC. So, practically, copy the ecrypted files to other media not to hard. I can't tell you what's happen after that - nobody claim afterwords.

[TomCat]

About the only way the climate could allow this would be to have some sort of criminally-overpriced proprietary HD or DVD-based external drive from Echostar or Tivo or whoever, that would allow archiving once with no way to access the data directly without continued connection to the parent PVR, which would likely be the only allowed display device. I wouldn't expect to see this at least for a couple years, but if a PVR manufacturer went this route, their device would likely have a decided advantage over other mere PVR's.