811 and Copy Protection

redline65

SatelliteGuys Family
Original poster
Jan 29, 2004
114
0
Little Elm, TX
I just ordered a DVD recorder w/hard drive and I'm wondering if any 811 owners have problems recording shows off HBO/Cinemax/Showtime to the hard drive, and then recording the show to DVD. I was reading about copy protection flags that prevent multiple copies from being made and I'm just wondering if I'll have problems. I was planning on recording shows from OTA as well. If I won't be able to do this I may end up sending the DVD recorder back. Thanks for the input. By the way the DVD recorder is the Panasonic DMR-E95HS, and I'll be using the 811's S-video outputs for recording.
 
svideo does not have any copy protection mechanism in it. Technically it is feasible. In terms of legality, Well I will leave that to a copy protection lawyer.
 
That's true about any form of digital copy protection, but...

Svideo (and any NTSC output) may have analog Macrovision protection encoding, and some of the latest flavors of Macrovision can wreak havoc with DVD recorders. I also believe that Dish IRDs are capable of adding it upon command. But the good news is that I have never heard of it being activated on any channels, including HBO, PPVs, etc.
 
Thanks, it sounds like this isn't really an issue for 811 owners based on the responses here. I was reading about it in another forum and they mentioned things like CGMS-A (Content Generation Management System for Analog) and the broadcast flag so it got me wondering. It sounds like broadcasters have the ability to prevent copying, even over an analog S-video connection. I don't care about recording Pay-Per-View (because I never buy them), but I wouldn't be happy if I was unable to record movies or OTA programming. I saw this link in another forum and it got me worried:

http://www.hbo.com/corpinfo/faq/cgmsfaq.shtml
 
Oh yeah. CGMS-A is different than Macrovision. Since CGMS-A is relatively new, it may or may not be implemented in analog recording devices. I would guess that almost all VHS recorders out there would ignore it. But newer DVD recorders may not. In any event, both Macrovision and CGMS-A are weak, feeble attempts to implement copy protection at the consumer level. The true pirates laugh at it, and there are probably lots of "black boxes" available to remove these measures from analog video streams [no hack talk please!].
 
i have a pioneer dvr 520h and have not had any problems and i record a lot of movies from hbo, cinemax, sho, starz, etc. the panasonic is a good dvd recorder but you might want to look into the pioneer if you havent ordered yet, the sole reason being that it works with the 811's vcr timer. also watching sd programming looks great. i have s video running from the 811 to the recorder and component running from the recorder to the tv. when i set the recorder to interlaced for some reason my sd programming looked about 200% better than it did on my dvi output from the 811, starz almost looks like hd. i'm finally no longer embarrased to have people over to watch something that is in sd , hope this helps

good luck
 
noremac said:
I would guess that almost all VHS recorders out there would ignore it. But newer DVD recorders may not.
After receiving my Panasonic E95 DVD recorder and reading through the manual a few times, it looks like it definitely enforces copy protection. It says you can record copy-protected shows to the hard drive, but you cannot record them to DVD-R. You can however record them to DVD-RAM so long as the disc is CGMS-compliant, but when you do so it will remove the show from the hard drive! I guess the real question is whether or not the 811 passes the CGMS protection over the S-video outputs to my DVD recorder. I'm planning to record some movies off Cinemax and HBO and burn them to DVD-R soon, so I guess I'll find out...
 
redline65 said:
I guess the real question is whether or not the 811 passes the CGMS protection over the S-video outputs...
Yes, it does. The CGMS signal is contained in the VBI. Read more about it from the fine folks at HBO: <link>
 
[QUOTE=mathius8]i have a pioneer dvr 520h and have not had any problems and i record a lot of movies from hbo, cinemax, sho, starz, etc. the panasonic is a good dvd recorder but you might want to look into the pioneer if you haven't ordered yet, the sole reason being that it works with the 811's vcr timer. [/QUOTE]

I also have the 811 and the pioneer dvr 520h, but I've never used the 811's vcr timer feature. Can you tell me what code you used to allow the 811 to control the pioneer dvr?
Thanks in advance...
 
if you have the 811 owners manual just start trying the pioneer vcr codes, i believe it's about the third one down. if this dosent help let me know and ill get the code for you, i dont have access to my tv now im at work. if you have any more questions about the 811 used with the 520 just let me know.
 

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