Motorola / Cisco see Tuning Adapters certified

by Ben Drawbaugh posted Jul 18th 2008 at 12:09PM

July is over half way over and if you were starting to worry that the Tuning Adapters that would save your TiVo from uselessness, you can rest a little easier. Sure, you can't rest as easy as you could if you actually had one of these little guys from Motorola or Cisco making your TiVo HD or Series3 SDV compatible, but it can't be long now. In the long line of red tape that is required to bring any cable device to market, the tuning adapters have finally made it through one of the last hurdles by being certified by the all mighty CableLabs. This means that it is only a matter of time before you can expect to see a letter from either TiVo or your cable co -- assuming they are using SDV -- informing you of your HD savior. And in case you're wondering, yes the latest TiVo update -- that's right, the same one that enabled YouTube -- does include the necessary fixins to make this all work, so stay tuned while we all wait to see how things finally shake out.

Filed under: DVRs, Other hardware, Cable

Tags: CableCARD, CableLabs, Cisco, motorola, MTR700, SDV, Series3, STA1520, Switched Digital Video, SwitchedDigitalVideo, TiVo, TiVo HD, TivoHd, Tuning Adapter, Tuning Resolver, TuningAdapter, TuningResolver

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Neutral

Chip Douglas @ Jul 18th 2008 3:05PM

So I don't get it? Will I need an adapter box with my Tivo HD or Series 3 box or not? I thought it supported CableCards?

Neutral

unsub1 @ Jul 18th 2008 3:16PM

You will need the adapter if your cable provider is implementing Switched Digital Video. If they are, you may not be able to receive many popular channels. More and more cable providers are switching to SDV so check into it.

Neutral

DIIIIIIIIIIIRTTTTTTT @ Jul 18th 2008 5:28PM

If you order HD service through your cable company and use Cablecards for access, you may need one of these tuner adapters to properly tune in some HD stations. They should know whether you need one or not. Not too many cable companies have gone SDV, but it looks like it really helps them cram more HD stations in, so expect it to be almost mandatory in the future.

Thankfully it seems the cable companies that DO require SDV tuners, are just tossing in the equipment at no additional rental cost. I think if they did, the FCC would come down on them since they're mandated to offer Cablecard access to all their stations and SDV "broke" that and this is their way of keeping out of hot water and being fined to death.

Neutral

tmd @ Jul 18th 2008 11:40PM

Yay - free adapter box from Cox Phoenix soon...

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