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Re: PVR on HDMI

Cross-posted to 2 groups.

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Don Phillipson wrote:
> Before the Personal Video Recorder is replaced, I should like to
> copy to DVD some old TV programmes on its hard drive.  If I just connect
> the PVR to the Win7 laptop via HDMI, will I see the PVR hard drive
> on the laptop?
> 

A laptop does not have HDMI input. It has HDMI output.
You would be connecting two outputs together ("logical smoke!").

*******

Ways to get stuff from a PVR:

1) Output to component, composite, S-Video, HDMI, at least
    as long as there is no Macrovison, Do_Not_Copy bit and so on.
    Use a capture card on a desktop computer, to capture the video output.
    Connect the sound output of PVR, to computer sound input.
    Recording rate is 1X and will take forever. (200 hours for
    200 hours PVR.)

2) On old PVRs, you could pull the hard drive, slave to a computer
    and read off the files. The file system might be a bit odd, but
    the files were not encrypted on the first PVRs. The odds of this
    happening with modern equipment is basically... zero. Transfer rate
    would be very fast compared to (1).

3) Modern PVRs use encryption to protect the content recorded
    on the disk. For each incoming channel marked with Do Not Copy
    or similar protections, the recorder keeps track of the status.
    The recorder is willing to decrypt and play the content from its
    hard drive, on the component, composite, S-Video or HDMI video outputs.
    The recorder is not generally willing to give digital copies.

Now, to the particular question you have. You have a PVR with
an HDMI video output. These can be up to 1080p60 HD say. There
are HDMI "recording cards" available, that will do 1080i60 (interleaved)
or 1080p30 (progressive, half frame rate), which will not record
just any HDMI signal. The top HD resolution is not supported.
In addition, HDMI recording cards do not have HDCP keys, and
cannot record a video signal from any device, which uses HDCP
protection. HDCP means the digital bits on the HDMI cable are
encrypted, and the key scheme allows a qualified receiving device
to decrypt the digital stream on the HDMI. If a recording card
supports that, that is a violation of DMCA (attempt to circumvent
the equivalent of Do No Copy). The existence of DMCA legislation,
is what prevents advances in hardware recording technology, which
could easily record just about anything given half a chance.

Even the HDMI capture cards are disappearing from Newegg. They're
touted as "Streaming Devices" now, rather than as simple recording
devices. I don't know what is driving this change in design objective.

A couple year old "capture" card $90 ... something to capture the PVR ...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815100049

to be replaced by this "streaming" card for $190 - silly.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815100100

The first HDMI capture card was this one, but it's a bit cranky
when it comes to capturing. The price has come down since initial
release.

Blackmagic Design Intensity Pro $190
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815710002

Read the customer reviews to see if the home-brew MJPEG
compressor was replaced, might be advisable. There were more
reviews for this card in the past, and there are only two
reviews in the current Newegg entry.

http://images17.newegg.com/is/image/newegg/15-710-002-Z03?$S640W$

The Intensity Pro has a breakout cable, and that's how you
connect the YPbPr cables.

http://images17.newegg.com/is/image/newegg/15-710-002-Z05?$S640W$

None of the cards will break resolution limits. One of the cards,
there was a trick for defeating some equivalent of Do Not Copy.
I think the "good days" of these cards are just about done.
However, if you have component YPbPr, perhaps you can still
do a decent job of capture that way. The picture quality is
probably still good enough that way. Capture speed 1X, so
it'll take 200 hours to transfer 200 hours of content.

If your PVR uses HDCP, then those capture cards will see "snow".
If your PVR has component YPbPr, about the only thing they could
use on that, would be some flavor of MacroVision (sync trick ?).
I don't know if there is a Do Not Copy feature in component signaling
or not. There should be. And if the capture card only treats it in
software, sometimes a bypass is offered.

The problems all start at the TV station. Many times, protection
bits are asserted for content where it isn't justified, so the
content is "overprotected". And a modern PVR is duty-bound by
DMCA legislation, to continue to protect the "overprotected" content.
For example, you might even find the local nightly news, has the
bit asserted. Which is silly, in terms of the value of the content (zero).

*******

If you absolutely *had* to use a laptop to do this capture,
you'd want the Intensity Shuttle. And this would only work
if the laptop had the "real, high performance" version of USB3.
How this used to work, is the installed software would
do a "performance test" and reject any computer that only
does the "half rate" flavor of USB3. Half rate USB3 happens
when USB3 chips are connected to 250MB/sec PCI Express x1 lanes,
instead of to a 500MB/sec PCI Express x1 lane. You need
reasonably modern equipment for all the ingredients to be
there and working. Older equipment, the 250MB/sec PCI Express
lane prevents the Shuttle from capturing properly at the highest
resolution settings.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815710009

    Paul

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Thread

PVR on HDMI "Don Phillipson" <e925@SPAMBLOCK.ncf.ca> - 2013-10-04 13:11 -0400
  Re: PVR on HDMI Paul <nospam@needed.com> - 2013-10-04 14:12 -0400
    Re: PVR on HDMI "G. Ross" <gwr95@comwest.net> - 2013-10-04 14:41 -0400
      Re: PVR on HDMI Paul <nospam@needed.com> - 2013-10-04 16:09 -0400
  Re: PVR on HDMI "Gene E. Bloch" <not-me@other.invalid> - 2013-10-04 12:07 -0700
  Re: PVR on HDMI charlie <cdknospam@msn.com> - 2013-10-04 14:16 -0400
  Re: PVR on HDMI "J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@soft255.demon.co.uk> - 2013-10-04 22:31 +0100
    Re: PVR on HDMI Wolf K <wekirch@sympatico.ca> - 2013-10-04 19:32 -0400
      Re: PVR on HDMI "Don Phillipson" <e925@SPAMBLOCK.ncf.ca> - 2013-10-12 19:05 -0400
      Re: PVR on HDMI john.bartley@gmail.com - 2014-01-29 13:02 -0800

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