Yes, and I'm sure someone mentioned they couldn't transfer the encrypted files OFF the box

Just wondering if the original drive is physically removed from the box and plugged in via USB if it would be possible to copy the files back ON to the machine (with a new drive inside it) - making it possible to upgrade the hard drive and keep all existing recordings...

I think the HDR only allows an SD version of an HD recording to be copied onto a USB drive. Regarding what you can do to with the HD recordings if you take the HDD out of the box I don't think anyone has tried this yet.

jzee,

No, the box does no downscaling for copies, it is not possible for such a device to do that.

Bob

Thanks Bob, I got a little mixed up there- can you confirm that it can save all SD broadcasts to an external USB drive, also whether the HDR will allow uploading (and playing) of videos? If it is possible to upload videos can you confirm what filetypes and codecs are playable?

Any programme that is not signalled as "Content Management Protected" can be archived, at present I am only aware of HD content being protected and I don't believe that broadcasters are concerned about SD archiving. As was explained by Nigel elseware the BBC have said they do aim to make this a less blanket ban, but they need systems in place to individually identify which content they (the BBC) have the right to permit to be copied. I presume in the long term, co-productions with other companies and premium content such as US TV series are likely to be protected, but home grown content is not.

At present the box does not support the uploading of external content, when developing the HDR we did fine some inconsistency potential for a great deal of consumer difficulty with this feature. It may appear next year, but as that is by no means certain I would not sell a product on that. The box will probably only ever play MPEG4 H.264 and MPEG2 video; other types of MP4 support are too varied to license them all and these products do not have software codecs.

Bob

Thats quite an important point. So its not a blanket ban on all BBC stuff then.? That sounds far better and I'll probably get a Humax box on top off my Vantage (that lets me copy what I want)

Hmm. The fact that the content management protection works by preventing files being copied off implies to me that they're not actually encrypted - presumably just a flag being set to say don't copy. (We know the broadcast .ts isn't encrypted and if the box were encrypting the transmission it wouldn't hurt to let it be copied off - it wouldn't play back elsewhere).

That would certainly be the simplest implementation.

The specification requires us to both encrypt upon reception and to honor the "do not copy" flag, it was not a difficult implementation to do this.

And does that means you are encrypting all of BBC HD or just selected programmes?

That which coincides with the "do not copy" flag, which at present is all of BBC HD, however should BBC become more granular in it's broadcasts the box will follow the signalling (turning off the encryption as required).

Interestingly if you set a manual timer record that overlaps with a 'protected' event the entire stream will be secured (a limitation of the recording design) from beginning to end.

The holy grail for me would be to stream video off the FOXSAT-HDR over my home network, as 75% of my TV are really Laptops. just like I do with my Topfield 5810+NSLU2, if the Humax could ever stream over the ethernet..perfect..I already have a mini 5 port ethernet hub under the TV with a port waiting and ready for Humax.
Everybody is tied up in knots with copyright, I just want to look and store what I want, where I want and when I want.

Cheers

Hear hear!

Thanks very much for clarifying the situation with HD transfer and uploading of videos Bob_Cat! Hopefully these will be possible in the future with updates/BBC sorting things out. I assume ITV also have the copy protect flag on all ITV HD content?

The potential lock up of normal SD material with a manual record clash vs HD recording would also seem something pretty important to bear in mind for users. I take it it won't be possible to fix this 'bug' with updates?

jzee,

Any broadcaster could use the flag if they had the mechanisms, but I doubt many will.

I am afraid I don't understand your second paragraph. It isn't about clashes, it is about a timer record over a single channel (not multiple channels or services).

Does it honour the 'do not copy' flag to copy ON to the box?

The reason I ask is I'm sure I'll want to upgrade the hard drive in the future, and would like to keep any recordings I have at that time (a few will undoubtedly be BBC HD)

Should I be able to remove the drive, put a new one in, put the old one in a SATA to USB caddy, plug it in and copy all the recordings - including the encrytped ones - back ?

dat,

I think that would confuse the poor thing. It might be possible to manually transfer using a PC between the two drives (two USB-SATA or by attaching them to your machine directly). However I can't confirm if the device would detect them, because this is an unsupported action and not desired by the design. If one were to upgrade (not recommended) I would think it would be best to do it before starting to use the product as the OP seems to have done.

Bob

Has anyone answered this yet?

I haven't yet tried this myself but will try and take a look over the weekend.

Yes. Just a bit late for that now...

Guess as long as I watch all the BBC HD stuff I can just copy the rest off via USB and back again afterwards.

Don't select "Default Settings/Format", it will set the box back to factory settings and delete all your recordings.

I know that this is a hidden 'engineer' menu, but it would have been nice if the box prompted for confirmation BEFORE it deleted all my recordings

The dangers of using a menu which is not intended for public consumption. Sorry!

Bob

Ha! Did you not read the OP's warning?! (Some manufacturers would state, by going into the engineer's menu, you automatically invalidate the device's warranty - that's how dangerous some menu are!)

An engineer does not need a warning!!

Exactly - that's because we never read the manual

What manual?

I'm a computer system engineer. I'm fully qualified to break things with, or with reading a manual

Not too bothered about warranty, I've been modifying PVRs since I added a larger HD, more RAM and a network card to my TiVo in 2000.

Dead link!