Beating Comcast and Cable Fees with the HD HomeRun Prime - Windows Media Center, and Xbox 360
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- Опубликовано: 13 сен 2024
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See my update video here: • HD HomeRun Prime Updat... -- and see the many additional videos I've made here: lon.tv/hdhomerun
I woke up the other day to find that all of the cable channels previously viewable on my television were now scrambled and encrypted. To solve the problem and view the channels I was paying for would cost at least an additional $20-30 a month!
Enter the HD Homerun Prime -- it's a little box that works with a CableCARD and provides a roll-your-own solution without the need for cable boxes. I am using it with the Windows Media Center software to push cable channels to Xbox 360's running the Media Center extender app.
It works fairly well but I still have some issues to resolve. It's certainly not as easy as just turning on a television any longer.
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DISCLOSURE: I purchased this unit with my own funds.
August 2019 Update: We've been using an HDHomerun Prime tuner box since November 2011. It's powered on continuously and it has worked perfectly for almost 7 years for watching and recording TV programs. We've always done the recordings with Wimdows Media Center, first on Windows 7 and later on Windows 8.1. Because it connects directly to your internet router or gateway it gives you the ability to watch live TV on any computer or tablet (maybe even a phone?) in your home that uses wi-fi or a wired ethernet connection. Also, using standard Windows file sharing, we can watch recorded TV shows on any device, too. Back in 2011 we were annoyed when Comcast kept increasing the monthly rental cost of their DVR; it worked great but they just kept jacking up the price. We bought the HDHomerun, and with the savings from cancelling the Comcast DVR the new tuner box paid for itself in about 10 months. Over the years we've saved many hundreds of dollars, and the HDHomerun is still working perfectly.
Wow, a blast from the past!!
Facts
I feel so good I quit Comcast after 40 years ! yes I was a " loyal customer " yeah right Comcast that is why you kept sticking it to me all those years! Well I am sick of paying $200 a month earning just $1100 a month on SS to help pay the Comcast CEO salary of 36 million a year! 36 million a year? Really! F Comcast !
So I take the stinkin SCAM BOX back thinking my bill would go down then this A$$hole walks out with this TV box and forces me to take it! so its either take the fuckin TV box or jack up my internet ! anyway got a law suit goin against those a$$holes ................BUYER BEWARE NOTHING IS FREE! DONOT TRUST THESE TYRANTS!!
They lie on the phone to me all the time, making bogus promises 😠😡
AT&T is also bad but they're alot better than comcast. (or xfinity which is also owned by comcast)
@@stanburdick9708 How's the lawsuit going?
I wish we'd do a big class action suit on all those scammers.
Don't know how they are allowed. It is thievery, plain & simple.
Keep up posted. Good luck.
Everyone should drop Cox like a rock and cut the cable. Stop paying their ever increasing exorbitant prices and get free channels OTA which you can combine with online services like Netflix and Amazon Prime for nominal fees.
We still need Internet and they've caught on, the price is increasing hard and will start hitting home as soon as present contracts expire.
*****
Yeah, there's the catch. And with market monopolization there is little other choice. Love that red tape that makes it impossible for any startup company.
Son37Lumier
Son37Lumiere ✅ done!!
Yea spectrum now charges as much for just internet as they do their current package special.
Been using media center since Win XP first had it. I have 2 HD homerun primes in the house, every tv (3) has its own computer with all of the recorded tv shows being stored on a NAS. Really nice setup once you get it installed and running. And as a plus we can also use our tablets (android) to view tv in places where there is no TV.
Lon - glad to see my science teaching impacted you in a positive tech-geek sort of a way. Great video! I live in VA but have a home in CT as well. In both cases I have thrown cable over the cliff and go with Over the Air (OTA) TV. In Ct, two roof mounted and amplified HD antennas do the trick and I am on low ground and surrounded by trees in Centerbrook. The technology that allowed me to gain a wife acceptable experience (DVR and remote) was "Tablo" paired up with a Nexus Player and soon - Apple TV. 4 (not Roku). Fold all of the major local Ct stations in with Netflix, Hulu, and other apps and you have more TV than you can stand.
Again... Great video!
Cheers,
Dave Clarke (5th grade teacher)
+Lon Seidman Yes it is the same guy... Just a whole lot older.
+Lon Seidman Will do - sometime in February.
Stop drilling holes in your floors! Ive had my WMC for 3 years. I tried everything under the sun and feel I have built the windows media center to the best it can be! If you prep your family for the slight delay on start up they will be fine with it! Plus there is in option to set up the xbox to power on to WMC right away on start up of the Xbox! I built a desktop with parts from tiger direct, I had a brand new Xbox, and bought two used ones on eBay for around $50. The disc trays don't work on them but that was my angle to get the best price because I didn't need the trays to work to stream the media! Don't waste your time with power line adapter, the best can't handle the HD signal! The best option is MoCA adapters! Which stand for "media over coaxial". The brand that I use and is also used for Verizon is called action tech! I know they have a name you've probably never heard of but if they're good enough for Verizon they're good enough for me and they work beautifully! You can pick them up on amazon for about $100 for a pair, I have 2 pairs! You just use your existing coaxial connections, your wife will love you! Email me and I can explain more! Paulerik35@hotmail.com
The best thing is to get is an outdoor directional antenna, and you can get over 60 channels or more depending on where you live, and for movies download kodi. It's time to fix the cable providers.
Someone mentioned DTA's (Digital Adapters) from the cable company. Where I'm located, the first two Standard definition adapters are free and each additional is $1,00 a month. The HD Adapters are all $3.50 a month. Having said, that you would still need the cable company to hook you up at the tap and charge you for using their services ie: Economy package, basic cable or whatever. So, they charge you a flat rate for whatever package you have. The Standard Adapters have an on screen channel guide and can get all the channels a regular cable box gets including HBO etc. A standard adapter is capable of getting the HD channels as well but they won't be in HD because there is no HDMI output on the back of the box, hence you would need an HD adapter to receive the HD channels in HD. Most of the HD channels are just counterparts of the non-HD channels anyway. But if you have a nice TV, you would want an HD adapter to take advantage of the higher resolution and picture quality obviously. I am a cable installer for a major cable company, and 'no', it isn't Comcast or TWC btw.
***** The reason for the 'scrambling' is because that particular cable plant (system) switched from analog to digital. The entire world is switching from analog to digital. Digital give you things like HD and multi room DVRS etc. It's all about frequency ranges. The bigger digital get the smaller analog gets because of the frequency bands. There is a limit to how much you can 'squeeze' into analog. Digital is the future. Analog will eventually become a thing of the past. It is the evolution of electronics basically.
*****
The only person you can't teach is the one who claims to know everything. You are one of those people. And by the way, I get free cable since I work for the cable company. So stick that up your ass. lol
***** No one is forcing or threatening you to purchase cable services, hence there is no 'extortion'. Best of luck to you.
*****
BRAVO!! We are such recipients of the extortion from our cable company that you so speak of. We are surrounded by trees where we live so even satellite isn't an option. They have continued to raise our rates to the point that I'm ready to just do over the air free local stuff, and hack my neighbors wi-fi! just kidding but seriously, I'm wondering if this new FCC open internet law will benefit us at all? In the meantime I had a quick question. You say the cable company provides you this card? What motivates the cable companies to provide us these cards to use to get their channels for free? or am I missing something? Thanks !!
I just installed two of these for Silicon Dust at the Cable Show in LA. They had a problem (TWC, the local cable company) with the channel plan being used at the convention center not being properly recognized by the data bases. After 3 hours of attempting to get the cards paired to the HomeRun"s we installed tuning adapters in front of them and they worked OK.
It should be noted that if you want to watch switched video with the HR primes you will need a tuning adapter.
Buy a TiVo Romeo and get the card from Comcast insert the card into the tivo and if you buy the machine with all in service no monthly fees ever set up the card during guided setup and your up and working with the added feature of being able to record programming.. TiVo also has a device called TiVo Mini that depending on the TiVo Romeo model records either 4 or 6 Chanel's at once. The Mini allows you to control any tuner in the Romeo or TiVo Bolt not presently recording to then use it to watch live tv or anything previously recorded. It has all in service so no monthly charges. I've been using tivo's since 2007 and my XL Premiere machine still runs fine with all in service for 9 of the 10 years of ownership.
I started experiencing issues with my Charter - Motorola cable boxes after purchasing two new LG 6000 Smart TV's last year. Charter insisted the issue was solely related to my TV's, but LG and even Motorola pointed out it was a firmware issue relating to my cable boxes. Charter refused to budge on the issue so after watching your video I purchased a HD HomeRun Prime box. The whole process was an utter disaster. First off my local Charter office refused to provide me with an M Card. After complaining to their corporate office and going back in the local office my local rep told me they were out of M Cards. So, I had to schedule an appointment with a Charter engineer at $59.99 an hour and a $99.00 base charge. It took two hours for the engineer to discover that we needed an M Tuner. After another hour and still no signal the engineer gave up. After reading some posts in multiple forums I discovered that the M Tuner was connected in correctly and after changing the cable configuration and calling Charter's head office again to have them resend a configuration signal to the M Tuner I was finally up and running. 20 minutes later the HD HomeRun Prime Box went down taking the APC fuse in my panel box as well. A quick trip to Home Depot and $49.99 later I had the fuse replaced and I had power back to my main bedroom. All said I am in to this $131.00 for the HD HomeRun Box, $218.98 for Charter Support, another $5.00 a month for the M Card and Tuner ( times 1 month $2.50 for the M Card and $2.50 for the M Tuner. Yes they charged me. I did not receive any credit.) and $49.99 for one APC Fuse and still no TV. Not only that but during the twenty minutes the box was up and running my Smart TV would reboot every time I tried connecting directly to the box; however, my Windows 8.1 Medica Center PC which worked flawless. While I admit I don't know if it was my TV or the Prime box, my two smart TV's connect to several other DNL devices in my house just fine. Also the HomeRun box wound up getting so hot it started melting the back of the unit. Silicon Dust insists the issue was a bad M Card and Charter insists it's a bad HD HomeRun Prime box and both refuse to cover or replace anything. I am holding out hope that B&H, the company I purchased the Prime box from will give me a credit or at least an exchange. No matter what though, I am done with my little experiment which while interesting only proved one thing and that is no one wants to take responsibility for their product or service any more. LG and Costco are now saying that they will replace my TV's if they do not work with Dish or Direct TV. So, I guess I just continue to shovel move cash at the problem and hope for the best.
As for Media center -- if you have WIN8 and forward it will cost you $100 per computer to get WMC. It used to come with WIN 7 and Vista, but Vista is less features such as playing back recordings at faster speed with sound, and sliding against the progress bar to relocate video playback
I have comcast and I did something similar. I use my xbox for live tv but when I got Plex it changed everything. My tv feed goes to WMC ATSC tuner and recorded there. Then Plex pushes the media all over my house and all over the world. Most newer TVs have DLNA which Plex handles but its even better with Chromecast, Chromecast support JUST became free to everyone (used to be only plexpass). Plex is an XBMC fork but is much simpler to setup. I love being able to download media I recorded to my tablet and watch on plane, or when my show airs and Im out of the country, I just connect on wifi and watch via Tablet, Chromecast or Web Browser. Doesnt work for live TV (DVBLink does) but once its done recording, game on.
I use sling TV, it has its issues but its worth it. Sony will have individual channel purchases soon. I only watch 2-3 channels on cable anyway. (All streamed live cable)
I built an HTPC rather than using a laptop for use with my HD Home Run Prime (same model as shown in the video). The HD Home Run Prime requires the use of a SDV (Switched Digital Video) tuner adapter in my area and probably most metropolitan areas. So in addition to the HD Home Run tuner, there is a separate box that connects to the HD Home Run tuner with a USB cable (that's what the USB port on the HD Home Run Prime is for). Getting Charter/Comcast/Time Warner to correctly setup your CableCard is a challenge because they don't have much experience with these devices. Use the digital tuner setup in Windows Media Center and make sure that Charter/Comcast/Time Warner put BOTH the CableCard ID and the Host ID; without the Host ID, the premium channels and any SDV channels won't work.
My kid's XBox 360 worked okay over wireless for the standard definition channels, but not for the HD channels. I don't have any experience with the PS3. My computer in my office is connected via powerline adapters, and that works very well for me even with HD channels.
I'm using the hdhomerun prime with a windows media center htpc in my living room, an Xbox 360 extender in my basement and a Ceton Echo windows media extender in my bedroom. The Echo is small enough to sit on top of my wall mounted lcd tv in my bedroom perfectly. Can't see one wire. All are hard wired using Cat 5e Gigabit ethernet. I also have a NAS device on my network which stores all my movies. I use Media Browser on my htpc to browse and play all my movies. Media Browser also works on the extenders. I love my setup. One location for all tv recordings and movies viewable on any tv. Works great!
Sorry for another addendum , other plus's are that computers can be used ts DVRs and you can program them to record series, and new/replay/ or all programing. in the acquired program guide (from comcast) You can also save these to a NAS and retrieve on another computer/netbook , tablet, notebook. for a smal price you can d/l and app to let you watch the channels on your droid or ios.
Comcast now changes the same price for a cablecard as they do for a box rental($10). Lon, how do you feel about this?
1 cablecard can replace 2 or 3 STBs with the Prime.
That's dope that you can stream live TV channels over DLNA. Why are you running the windows media center extension on the Xbox? You know you can stream things, using DLNA, directly over the network? On the Xbox, just to go the system video player and look for the DLNA device.
Silicondust and Simple TV has a product (Simple TV 2) that suppose to make this process more user friendly. You can also use a Roku and download the Simple TV app and use it as an additional set top box for an additional room.
P.S.
You can stream your content similar to the sling box too.
Hi Lon,
I use HDHomeRun Prime with cablecard and use it with quad core HTPC using windows 7 Media Center. I basically get 3 tuners and all the encrypted channels on my cable through Brighthouse. I stream to several xbox 360's throughout the house via ethernet cable, not wireless. I do not experience any lag. With cablecard tuners however you miss out on the On Demand functionality with your cable company
I can also watch all the channels on my Sony PS3, each channel shows as like a separate folder. Works very well.
I have a 3TB video server, I also run PlayOn server on the htpc and can stream to any device in the house all my movies and tv shows in 720p .wmv format. It works fine for me in that resolution. Every portable device I have (ex iPad, kindle, chromebook, etc) can connect to the URL m.playon.tv in the house and stream media from my video server. PlayOn is a great product now.
In the past, this setup was awesome. Worked great with windows 7 and xbox 360 consoles connected over moca. But since advent of streaming and lack of updating of windows media center to windows 10 and above, this is not a practical approach anymore. I ended up selling my xbox 360's and migrating to youtubetv. Unfortunately, it was a lot of upfront cost for a solution that didn't last a very long time. It was frustrating that only windows media center had drm management that was practical for consumer use.
I'd love to see your take on Tablo TV a competitor HD Home run that is self conatined. You con't need a NAS or file server. Other people have rated it highly.
How many stations are channels do you get with antenna? Thank you very much if you have time to reply happy holidays
I've been using a Ceton InfiniTV-4 for a few years now with great results! It's a card slot on my Windows Media server, so no need for another device.
I almost got one of those, but I don't like having to tie up an entire (fairly high powered computer) to handle all the heavy lifting.
You can link plex to you're recorded shows and watch them anywhere you have wifi... You can always buy a media extender box which is family friendly
Hi, great channel. You helped me learn about the my cloud which ended up making my decision easier.
Quick question on the home run. I currently only pay for internet with my cable provider if i plug the coax line to this will any channels be picked up you think? Or would i have to get a outdoor antenna
Great video. But just a FYI here, many other devices like Sony's PS3 will let you stream video directly from your HD Homerun without any other equipment. Unlike a XBox which requires your PC to also be on, even something like a Raspberry Pi running OpenELEC will stream content directly from your HD Homerun tuner without anything else (assuming you know how to deal with scripts and bought the 2 codecs necessary for the Pi which are about $5).
However, any content you stream to a PS3 (or whatever) will need to be "unprotected". And the good news there is that pretty much everything content-wise on most of your standard cable channels is still unprotected.
I think I should clear up a bit of confusion here since "protected" content is not necessarily talking about channel "encryption." Thanks to the FCC relaxing their 1993 cable act, all cable companies can now encrypt all channels over cable which now includes the very same channels you might otherwise receive for free over the air (using a different tuner, of course). And as you have discovered in this video, that means you will now need to have a compatible tuner which will accept a cable card in order to decrypt each and every channel. But once you cross that hurdle there is still a little matter of the Digital Millennium Copyrights Act (DMCA) which still allows for the very content itself - once it's been decrypted on whatever channel it's on - to remain "protected." Basically, that just means you can't copy content nor even trans code it once you've received it. Think of it sort of like a DVD/CD that you can't rip yet will still play.
So for "protected" content which has the DMCA flag(s) set (which is actually set inside the video stream), you will still need something compatible in order to view it. Basically, that means using whatever your cable company provides or using Microsoft Media Center (MMC) with the PlayReady addon enabled.
It's also important to know that you will need Microsoft Media Center in order to setup your cable card tuner too! I believe you can set it up with something like MythTV but that's a bit too geeky for most people to do mostly because it's Linux but probably even more so because there is absolutely no step-by-step support from any cable company.
About the only advantages MMC has is that it's yours (meaning no more monthly rental of a DVR/box from your cable provider), and that it can let you use an "extender" which is really just another way of saying you can use an XBox 360 as an "extension" to your MMC enabled PC. Of course, you are tied to Microsoft and you may like to know that MMC is no longer free with Windows 8 (like it is with Windows 7).
Looks like a cool tip! I will have to check and see if I can order one of these cards!
Hi Lon, I bought a use windows 7 computer from Micro Center and I picked up the HD homerun prime. I ran the Digital Cable Advisor and I passed on Memory, Processor, but failed on Graphics (it says "we recommend that you update your video card to one that supports hard where acceleration"). Do I need to update a new video card just to have this work with HD Homerun Prime. TIA
hardware.....sorry
Also I receive my lower channels 2-22....my cable company is having a hard time
The Ceton echo is good. But I like the Cisco-Lynksis media extender has been great for me. They are tiny boxes that the wife really likes. They are generally on ebay for 80 bucks.
Yeah the xbox is slow and huge. The cysco boxes are much smaller than a cable box. The take a few seconds to boot but they are as smooth as a computer once they are going and super cheap used on ebay. My wife is now happy.
Keep plugging Lon, saving money is always good!
it would be interesting to see a 2016 update to your full setup (Especially if you focus on the integration of interfaces for content consumption). For comparison I am running the following: Primary Plex Server: Zotac IQ-01, Storage: Synology DS-412+, OTA Live Feed: HDHomerun Connect x2, OTA DVR: Tablo 4 tuner, Client devices: PC/ 2x NVidia Shield/ Nexus Player, Main TV Client App: Google Live Channels
I keep an echo in my guest room. It works well. However, It is far from a perfect family-friendly solution. I use 360s in the other rooms with exception of my main family room. I like the echo because it is small and silent. Perfect if you want a clean wall mouthed solution.
If you have to use a cable card, you still have to pay for cable service. All you save is a couple of bucks. To save money you have to cut the cable period.
would it still work without the coax cable? I was wondering if I could share my comcast subscription with my brother that lives far. Could I just activate it on my home and then just plug it on my brother's home with just the cable card?
Yes, it is possible. All depends if the cable company left his line active or not. You can test it out, just bring a box or a modem there to see.
Hi Lon, I have windows vista. So of course I don't have WMC. I'm really thinking of getting the device. Should I upgrade my vista to Windows 7 to use WMC or is their another way to pull this off an even cheaper way. TIA
mines didn't have it but I do have xbmc on the ouya...but first I guess i'll order the homerun prime...lol
one more question Lon.....have you heard of SAMSUNG SMART MEDIA PLAYER (GX-SM530CF) ....if so is it worth it? it cable card compatible to
I wonder why the lack of an HDMI. I understand being able to use it on multiple devices through DLNA, but with the cable card adapter built in, just seems to defeat it's own purpose . Thanks got the information !
Wow...Almost 10 years I have been running a HD Homerun Prime!!
Just FINALLY got my WD PR4100 back working again! Still a GREAT NAS! 🙂
Although I don't use cable TV, I do use T.W. Cable modem internet, so I can understand where you're coming from. I wasn't thrilled at having to pay $5.99/month for leasing THEIR cable modem and found a number of different DOCSIS 3.0 cable modems that were about the same cost as one year of this leasing fee! If you're willing to spend more, you can get one with WI-Fi, something the leased modem didn't have.
I agree with you're wife there is a lot to be said about just turning it on hassle free.
I'm just wondering if you can use that coax cable wire as an ohm battery for modems and for the PC and other things. they do have ohm batteries now for cars I just didn't know if they could use it now for the PC or for a television set to make it truly wireless.
Good find! Xbox 360s have come down in price, but this product, unfortunately, has not, so it's going to take many months (if not years) before it pays for itself and even longer before it starts saving you money.
I use Ceton Infinitv instead, but same type of thing. Comcast is notorious for insisting that you need a technician visit for a cablecard install. The FCC has mandated that they have to provide one without the technician visit.
Cox here in Las Vegas has a great number of channels on cable that do not work on the SiliconDust Prime box. I have had two technicians here and a third is scheduled for Monday (Tomorrow.) The Supervisor of the technicians is to come out and see what he can do to get my service running. FX Channel-- AMC Channel--Spike Channel and a bunch of others do not come in on the Box. I am running WMC on Win 7 and am missing a bunch of channels. If I can't resolve the problem the Box will go back to Amazon Tomorrow. Reading the Blogs on the SD support provided little help other than to verify hat others are having similar experiences with the box. The tech seem to think that an attachment to the cable system which allows some digital channels to be viewed cannot be used with the Silicon Dust system. I haven't reviewed all the tech stuff yet but, it ain't looking good right now. I also have a Sony Media Box which has the same missing Channels , but does not even show the channels for tuning.
I'm using the Ceton 6 tuner PCI card and it works very well. I haven't had the problem with HBO viewing on my PC, all channels seem to work fine. One thing is you can't use PPV, apparently that's limited to an actual tv box. Ceton media extender works nicely as well, along with XBOX 360. Haven't had problems at all with the Ceton products, although it was a challenge with the cable company at first - ended up having to get another tuning adapter. Apparently the one I had to start with was defective.
Lon. I love your channel. I'm a Spectrum customer and they now have TV Choice, a la carte channels. I can return all my set-top boxes (STB) and stream everything and use Roku, cast to Chromecast, and perhaps my Fire Stick. That leaves recording. Caveat - we never fill the HD built into the STBs. What would you suggest for this scenario?
Thanks
My problem with Comcast in South Jersey isn't so much the monthly box rental fee, as much as the cost of the service. For one box (box rental of $5/month) with my internet and my cable is over $100 a month. The thing that gets me is, almost everyone has an HD tv, why even bother having a non-HD package, with a non-HD box, when the HD box works with conventional TVs. Personally, I bought an HD TV, and I am not going to pay for non HD service for it, so I say screw it and use online services. I still may want to call them on this and see what they charge.
The thing about HBO only working with approved devices is probably to help control piracy. It would be that way to help prevent someone from somehow copying the movie as it plays. Of course DVDs will make it harder because lots of people copy them (although they really should not).
Great video series. Like you, I'm trying to lower my cable bill by first trying to get rid of the rented boxes. Also, my wife needs a VERY simple interface. XBMC will do everything I want, but it's too fragile and flakey. Windows Media Center with HomeRun Prime may work for us, but I don't understand how it works. Is it true that you only need one instance of WMC running that services several TVs with different viewers pushing different buttons on the WMC?
So happy I came across this RUclips video I have been wanting to learn how to do get cable cheaper Its crazy I recently purchased the Xfinity X TV one the new box so far it's okay but it's way too expensive is anyone else having a hard time hooking up to Pandora
Lon Thanks for the great info. I have a question for you. How many of the HDhomerun boxes should I buy still a little confused on that part. I have 5 cable boxes in the home right now and it's costing me.
Great video! thanks. I think now days you can bypass any issues with HBO with an HBOGo app and you can watch it on any device that has that app available.
Thank you for taking the time to produce an excellent informative video. I thought Id suggest that Mac OS users can most likely use Apple TV to Air Drop from their computer.
you can watch any tv, sat channel and any movie, tv show or sporting event on xbmc and linux... I do, and I don't have to put up with window$ or comca$t...
hi, can you show me how you did it and what plugins or extensions or whatever are the best? i tried before and it was gimmecky and buggy and hardly anything worked. when i wanted to watch something it just wouldn't play like 95% of the time. just getting a few episodes or movies to play is nothing to brag about the xbmc system. i want to have wide selection and no errors or freezes or hang-ups. i must have done something wrong when i tried to do it. can you show me how to set it up right with all the needed channels and where to get them (what to type in or click and where)? thanks.
Leo Arce
Did he ever show you? I see this was a long time ago.
Hey I'm a new subscriber and was wondering where I could order the HD home run? Also how much does the cable card cost?
I have been using Beyond TV from snapstream with my HD Homerun, and plan on getting the cable card from the cable company and buying the prime version of the HD Homerun, and use it with Beyond TV when Charter this month goes all digital. Hope this helps!
Yes, they have a software product called BeyondTV Link. Works just like the regular interface but connects thru network to main BTV server computer. I do recommend direct Cat cable instead of Wifi. I have a computer connected to each one of my TV's and like you, upset some family members by drilling and nailing to get network cable through out the house.
I love this stuff im 55 now when I was a kid or teen ager I had a piece of antenna leadin wire with tin foil wrapped around it for signal
Stephen Anderson
The older CRT and rear projection TV's didn't have the coax cable connection. They had the 2 antenna screws to attach the wire and rabbit ears (or outdoor antenna). Then came cable and we needed the 'Y' adapter with cable connector end. Didn't have a local cable company so I hooked up a 6' coax cable to the adapter and it got better OTA TV reception than the rabbit ears did. Later learned that a longer coax cable, snaked through the wall up to the attic could bring in really far away TV stations, without using a roof antenna. It was omni-directional too. I no longer had to adjust the rabbit ears after changing channels -- and no tin foil needed!.
Stephen Anderson I also use the MEDIASONIC HOMEWORX OTA tunerbox... It can pause live tv and record. It is called a PVR. Model HW-150PVR...
Stephen Anderson I'm 55 and miss my dad telling me "give me the pliers to turn the black and white tv channel 🤣 Rip pop. You wouldn't believe the size of my television. lol
I still have the pliers, but it's a whole new world now. From my cellphone I can control my television. I get cable free, I just pay for Modem that's
89.00 a month for every channel and movie there is. can't beat that.
You pay $89.00 a month for a modem?
they work with dishnetwork
Hey Lon!
Just wondering whether on demand works or not? Channel 1. Thanks!
I know with my linux laptop if I have a bluetooth, which you can get a usb bluetooth doggle for a couple bucks, I can, with some installations, use a wii remote and even a ps3 controller for some things and you may be able to just use those controllers as your mouse in general.
Lon you do know the card rental fee is the same as a box now right? although maybe it depends on where you live...chicago land area or midwest in general..your one free box can be one free cable card and as far as additional tvs....9.95 a month for a box or 9.95 a month for a cable card. the only way you end up paying more with the boxes is if you want to record..then you are saving 8 bucks a month if you are using something through your PC to record. plus doing it this way is not only not saving you money, but you can't get any on demand which is like the only reason i personally like comcast tv over other companies...well no with the new x2 interface I wouldn't ever want anything else aside from that...but setting the new cable box interface and features like cloud dvd and stuff aside... just the fact of no on demand and no money savings...why would you still do this? just curious
Forgot to mention the only thing that has eluded me to make my HTPC completely awesome is figuring how to wake my computer from sleep, on my cellphone, over my cellular network.. I used to have a centon turner before a homerun prime. To me the home run prime is superior because the centon would have errors when the computer went into sleep mode and i couldn't get channels. For the computer work correctly it needed to stay on all the time which I don't think anyone likes wasting electricity and shorting the life of their computer.. The home run prime doesn't have this issue because of the way it is designed. The reason I ask is because I used to use the centon app on my cellphone to schedule recordings when I was away from home. It worked great but the trade off was the computer was always one. Now that I have the homerun prime and the computer goes into sleep and when the computer is in sleep I cant schedule recordings. Let me know what you know on this subject. The key for me is waking the computer over my cellular network somehow.
U can use the telephone wire in your home as a cat 5 maybe. You only need 2 to 4 wires internet. 2 wires with an ac to Dc appear.
The HD Home Run hdhr3 cc runs terrible on a wireless connected PS3. It was choppy and constantly cuts in and out along with many times needing to reselect the channel you wanted to watch about every 2 to 10 minutes. I upgraded my wirless router to a ASUS RT-AC66U Dual-Band Wireless-AC1750 Gigabit Router and still this thing was junk for streaming to my PS3 250 GB slim that was 15 ft from the router. After that I bought a wifi extender to send the 5ghz signal to and then wired from that into my PS3 with an ether net cord.(thats the only way to get 5ghz signal to PS3 it only accepts 2.4ghz wirless) It was still slow and choppy regardless of the improved data speeds On top of that I tried streaming to tablets, phones, an old gaming laptop, multiple brands of high end blu-ray players I bought and returned, and 2 android cpu's for a TV. None of these worked well with the wireless streaming cable TV! Not to mention it doesn't work with the Roku at all! I really wanted this thing to be awesome too. I only had success running this with Windows Media Center on my tower PC used in the living room as a media server and TV CPU. That ran and streamed the video really well. But the HD Home Run would sometimes need to be restarted like a router or modem and this usually happened in the middle of something I really wanted to watch. The tablets and phone worked but you had to be within 10 to 5 feet of the router. I was hoping to watch TV on the tablet in my garage but that didnt work at all. 40 ft from router 3 bars of wireless on tablet. I tried running ether net cords to many of the devices and then it would work better but not great but also who wants to look at an ether net cord running through their house. I ended up selling mine through, because the fact is that HD homerun was a huge disappointment for me. The concept is awesome but it needs lots of tweaking and revising to actually be something people should want to buy. The only way this would have worked for me is to have a windows computer connected to every TV in my house. No thanks. I have a friend who is better with home media streaming and he experienced the same results and sold his hd home run as well.
I have a Samsung smart TV and have time warner which luckily it has time warner TV app which u can watch live TV on it way easier than getting that card and don't need a box. I am not sure if Comcast has an app for live TV but you might want to look into yhat .
comcast cable card cost $9.95/MO and renting a box cost $9.95 no savings comcast makes you rent equipment
Those versions would be Vista, and 7, Windows 8 has an a ton of problems, and XP only does the driver dance w/analog cards, which in most areas are pretty much useless unless you are controlling a cable company's STB.
Encription and Scrambling is now Illegal for cable companies to do. All over air broadcasts have to be free to the public!
Not sure where you heard that. It's not illegal and most companies still do it.
Yes indeed they pay you $2.50 for your own equipment, but charge you $200 for the card and then they will charge you $10 a month if you want to get HD channels -- that's even to watch what would be available over the air for free. The only cure to quench ComCast's greed is to put up an antenna. I have 2 of the HD Homeruns, and each will output 3 channels simultaneously. I also have two Samsung set top cable card boxes the same fees apply but you only get to use one tuer - on the other hand you do not need another device such as a computer ,Xbox, PS3, etc. I live alone, but have Tvs in every room -- Tell me how fair it si to charge $1200 a year to watch basicly available for free over the air HD TV broadcasts.Like I want a dozen hispanic and another half dozen shopping channels and them to act like these are value added items-- Oh please let me pay you to advertise to me. LMAO- ( PS working on antenna set up) It isn't so much the exorbitant monthly fees, but the audacity of charging you for each tuner to recieve HD which is already being charged in the monthly package TALK ABOUT DOUBLE DIPPING!! then they wonder why so many people are cutting the cord -- go figure! especially retired folks on fixed incomes. Let me do I give up cable or acquire a taste for cat food??? Hmmm?
lon geniatech has a device called net tv tha does the same thing as hdhomerun.yuo can look in charbax video.i am wandering the price and spec on this devices,but the peoples from geniatech its pretty hard to get on touch with them and get their devices too.so its possible from you to get in touch with them and try to get some information about Net TV.
GOOD JOB in yours review.
Lon- what apps have you found best to stream to that handles DRM channels? so far the ps3 seems to work best with its own media player app...but I have had network errors (dropouts). the hd home run app doesn't like the drm channels
Hi Lon, I have 2 Xbox 360's, 2 computers, 4 tablets 4 cell phones all on my network along with HDHomerun prime. Everything is wireless except 2 computers and 2 Xboxes. The problem is I am getting a error message on the second xbox 360 say low bandwidth. I am running 33.77 Mbps on download and 2.35 on upload. Any suggestions on fixing this issue. TIA
Lon, I hard wired all devices and still having these issue. I may have start all over to see whats pulling the signal
Tenda (S105) 5 port Ethernet Switch 10/100 Mbps.
Hi Lon....After troubleshooting, I found that 2 of my ports on the router was only pushing out 10mbps and the other 2 are pushing out 30mbps. Then I check the speed on the switch and they're all pushing around 30mbps. Thanks again. Im still investing in a gigabyte switch
Thanks for the video, pretty concise. If you figure out a way to make it wife friendly without the xbox please post another video.
Hey Lon, what version of openelec are you running. I have 12.2 and my video stutters while watching hd streams on a raspberry pi
***** I am hardwired into a Gigabit switch. For some reason, the audio is also gets out of syn after a while
Oh wow. You can tune 3 TVs separately off one card to different channels at the same time?
I'm not really defending the company. I'm just asking. Seemed it would be the same price. As far as I knew, you would need 3 cable cards, 1 for each tv. 1 free. The other 2 and 9.95 each and still have to pay the hd tech fee because at least for TiVo, It won't pull hd channels with the cards unless your paying the hd tech fee, that's why I was saying it would be the same price.
Im confused..So you get the hd homerun box, the aircard from comcast. then an xbox 360 for each tv and a computer?? And this replaces the comcast setop box thats $8 a month? Doesnt this just make it like 50 times more expensive and difficult to setup then just having the box?
I did my best to read through these comments to find the answer, but didn't. Comcast has this fun '$9.99 HD Service Fee' to go with their $9.99/mo HD tuner rental. So - it is effectively, ~$20/mo to have HDTV service on one device, not $9.99 like they attempt to make you believe.
My question: Am I able to avoid this service fee in addition to the tuner rental? I'm not a cable pro, but I would imagine that you couldn't differentiate the signals on the wire; HD TV is enabled by having the right tuner, not a different signal, but I am not sure.
Also - agree that these extra costs are anti-consumer. I find it hard to believe that TV (entertainment) service costs (not including internet, which I do consider a utility and would love to see it treated that way) more than my electricity or gas utilities which I would consider mission critical in a sense as they preserve the health of my home and family. Not sure how these cable costs are justified, but benchmarking them against essential services should clearly show how wrong these costs are. Rant over.
Xfinity/Comcast has been sending letters talking about Tivo no longer working with their cablecard, but I'm not sure how HDHR is impacted, if no cablecard will work at a certain date.
HDHR3 outputs in MPEG2 but Roku cannot handle MPEG2 as Roku only handles H264. So I researched and there is an app called Wallop.
Lon Plex announced the HD Home Run support with DVR function.
Am I understanding correctly that the Homerun Prime is just a DLNA device? There is no wired output, I.e. HDMI connector?
Hey Lon thanx for the Reply. I'm a bit confused I believe the Comcast is connected already. The last person living here had it connected. on the home run prime is the picture quality HD in 1080 pi. and when you but the home run prime can Comcast tech support help you set up the device. how difficult is it to connect it. I called Comcast and they told me you just need to get a receiver from us.
We all understand the wife's complaint. For all the time, energy & money spent to figure out...you could have paid the extra $30 for the next 36 months and she would be happy.
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But that would ruin the challenge; good video!!
FYI the Hdhomerun Prime hasn't been available on Amazon.com for a while now and according to this article www.thedigitalmediazone.com/2019/01/08/where-is-the-hdhomerun-prime-6/ is no longer produced. Its six channel replacement was supposed to be released in 2018, but according to the above link is supposed to show up sometime in 2019 though it hasn't yet gone though certification by CableLabs. I am not a happy camper.
is this product still relevant? still thinking about getting one.
have you tried using it with xbmc? your can run it off a rasberryPi with xbmc instlled cheaper than putting a bunch of xbox's to each tv Pi is only about $30
Hmm... This wasn't exactly what I was looking for. This thing seems like a train wreck.
I keep hearing everyone talk about how they want to stop paying monthly rental fees, so they go and buy a box that can do everything their cable box can do, and boom, now they're done with the process...
And yet, none of the articles I've read reference any hardware, how to set it up, etc. And it seems like all this stuff is expensive, too! All I want is to be able to keep my cable subscription, and not be screwed by rental fees every month! But apparently this is some cryptic mystery that I can't seem to solve. Hopefully someone can help me. :(
Wait... what? A credit?! I'm paying TWC $2.50 a month to rent my cable card!
Yes Fran TWC has made the DTA $2.75 now!! So the CableCArd $2.50 + $2.75 = $5.25 for getting rid of the $12 STBox.. meaning the monthly saving is only about $7 for all that effort.
I suggest you get Netflix or Hulu, just pay 7.99 a month. And youtube is free but they are starting to block a lot of films and make you pay for them and make you pay 2.99 to see them, but hey that's much cheaper than going out to the theater. I can remember as a kid going to the local theater on saturdays and it was only 25 cents.
So that said, has technology advanced to the point where I can just buy one box that takes the cable card and has the basic guide menu and compatible remote vs having to spin up a WMC instance and leave it running so I can navigate channels?
I also don't like paying for extra electricity if I can avoid it. I think TiVos can do this but man - the box is pricey service costs are not cool. Plus I have enough streaming devices already so don't need the rest of the bloat that comes with that.
Thanks for the great videos Lon! I am looking to get a HD Homerun to use with plex.
Do you know if this setup will work with directv? I dont care so much about the streaming to tv's.. but will I be able to stream directv through an HD homerun?
Thanks!
+illdill503 it's not compatible with directtv. Sorry!
Lon.TV Ok, thanks for the quick response!
might be worth switching to Comcast, if it will allow me to stream it through plex!
@@LonSeidman I have a question I have 2 HD Homerun Prime 3 devices but I have 1 PC so how do I able to get all 6 lights when I tested to record 6 shows same time but only one of devices with 3 lights but other device doesn't show at all which is my brand new one. I already got both card validation and scanned all the channels even I got nextpvr setup with all exactly same channels list but I can't seems get secondary do anything at all but I am able to see all 6 shows after 2 mins of recording. So how do I get it fixed in order to get both Prime 3 devices working randomly?
My dlna compatible Sony bluray player has close to the operating system as a ps3 I'm sure it would also work.
Home Theater Junky your bluray player has a cable card slot?
Help please! Just received my HDHomeRun prime. Got a cable card from Comcast, setup is complete with that. However the HDHomeRun prime only picks up two channels and won’t display them in Plex. Shows it found 892 channels via Comcast for my area under the EPG Location I have replaced the HDHomeRun prime and the cable card. Thank you.
is this usable today? I am reading teh cable companies charge just about the same or the same for the cable card as they do for a cable box.
Yes very much so - I am still using mine.
It may be different in your area or with your provider, but for Spectrum here in Ohio, they charge roughly $2 for a cable card and $7 for a box per month. This isn't very much of a difference for one tv, but I'm setting it up for 3 PCs (total of 9 tuners), so it can add up pretty quick. I already had the Windows Media Center machines, so that's no extra cost to me to use the DVR. Spectrum charges for DVR, so not only would the cable boxes cost $15-16 more per month for a third less tuners, I would have to pay an additional $10 for their DVR service (without the flexibility that I have with PCs). So, in my case, the yearly savings would be over $300, almost enough to pay for all 3 Homerun boxes.
What is your solution to home entertainment since the passing of the FCC 2015 and new technology? Everything is too expensive or really crappy.
I'm so used to the point and click remote settings of a set top box. Can I just purhcase a Tivo box with lifetime subscription to have similar experience?
Do you have to have service with Comcast for the hd home run prime to work. or can you buy it and use it without purchasing Comcast service.
If I only have basic cable subscription from Comcast, can I use your method to watch all channels, including HD and other unsubscribed channel?
If you already have a dta box from comcast and are paying for basic cable, can you still connect the coax cable to the hd homeRun Prime (without a decryption card) and connect it to a PC. Will it work?
The PS3 is the way to go!! I have one and hooked it up a few months ago. Works great!!