USB Functionality

[bmclark]

My Comcast DVR with TiVo (Motorola DCT3412) was installed today. I have been a series2 user for nearly 8 years. I chose the comcast DVR over the series3 *for now* because I wanted a dual tuner DVR but don't want to give up OnDemand or continue to juggle watching the cable box through my TiVo

I must say that the DVR is VERY slick.. the comcast box integrates the cable box and on-demand functionality with the Tivo pretty well. So far so good.

BEST FEATURES.....
-THE CLASSIC TIVO REMOTE with added buttons for Comcast functionality
-Integration of Tivo and OnDemand
-Channels you don't get (or want) can still be filtered out of guide and search

HERE IS MY REAL QUESTION....
I have never had a comcast DVR.. only my series2 TiVO. Can the USB port be used to add an external hard drive for more memory?? If not will it ever?? What other functions does or will the USB port on the Motorola DVR have??

[Eric90gt]

USB isnt enabled on these boxes, but 1394 (firewire) and eSata should work. So, you were just installed today ? or was it yesterday.

[BlackBetty]

So, you were just installed today ? or was it yesterday.

considering he posted his message at 1:42am, I'd say yesterday. Unless of course comcast is making truck rolls these days between midnight and 1am. :D

[Eric90gt]

considering he posted his message at 1:42am, I'd say yesterday. Unless of course comcast is making truck rolls these days between midnight and 1am. :D


lol, timestamp was messed up for me because i wasnt registered yet and didnt realize how early it was. :o

[miricle]

USB isnt enabled on these boxes, but 1394 (firewire) and eSata should work. So, you were just installed today ? or was it yesterday.

From everything I've read, eSata isn't enabled on any of the Motorola boxes. Firewire may be there for live TV, but maybe not DVR playback.

Check out:
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/How_to_use_a_Motorola_DVR/Firewire

[Eric90gt]

From everything I've read, eSata isn't enabled on any of the Motorola boxes. Firewire may be there for live TV, but maybe not DVR playback.

Check out:
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/How_to_use_a_Motorola_DVR/Firewire

Ive been told that it works, but is not supported, never tried it though

[cypherstream]

Firewire only works on 5C dtcp compliant devices. Trying to play back 5C protected content to a computer will result in garbage data. Some channels do not use the 5C=1 flag, so a PC would be able to display the audio/video of whatever is currently playing. It's a direct uncompressed MPEG2 A/V stream from the decoder BEFORE all on screen graphics are generated. Great for archiving stuff without on screen graphics to dtcp compliant DVDR and DVHS recorders.

USB is not utilized in the software at all. My firmware detects a device on this but there is no code to do anything with USB at this point. The ports provide +5VDC I believe so you can use it for power, perhaps a laptop cooling fan kit which get's power from a USB cable, or a USB cell phone charger or a USB powered light (which could be useful when reading DVD covers in a dark home theater).

eSATA as far as I know is being worked on. Expandable hard drive storage only works on Scientific Atlanta and Pace cable boxes. If you are lucky enough to have an SA or Pace box, then you are most likely not on this forum as the Tivo has not yet been ported to those boxes. Last I heard Motorola was trying to resolve a DRM issue, so once an external hard drive is connected to the eSATA port, the drive is "married" to that DVR. Therefore if you move the external drive to a DVR at a friends house, he or she cannot copy programs from your drive onto theirs. Thank the big studios for all of the nasty DRM holdup. Pace and SA got it right, but for some reason Motorola has some difficulty with the drive paring process. I heard this should be resolved "soon", but that was last summer.