I agree with @snowcat - Wait until the standard is made. Kind of like the old BetaMax and VHS. Though BetaMax was better, VHS won out because of licensing fees. Kind of like PC vs Mac. Macs cost more because there are no mac compatable.
ATSC 2.0 is backward compatible with ATSC 1.0. ATSC 3.0 isn’t. The standard will probably be finalized by the end of 2015. The FCC hopes for roll out end of 2016 to 2017. The government isn’t going to fund convertors. They are just now trying to determine what if any migration situations can be accommodated.
The government is also encouraging channel repacking so the upper UHF can be sold off. Repacking could force some sub-channels to be eliminated until the the full ATSC 3.0 roll out frees up space within frequency.
While a tablo would be the way preserve your current investment in pre-ATSC 3.0 tuner TV’s, I haven’t heard of a plan for pre-ATSC 3.0 tablo units.
This would be a great idea because of services coming out such as Cox Flex Watch and also SlingTV. With Cox, they give you an actual cable box with local channels plus some HBO, Starz and Encore so would be great to be able to dvr those. I currently have a four tuner so would be awesome to figure out how to replace that device once this comes out. Love the tablo and don’t want to have to buy a TIVO just for this.
Cable DVRs cost extra. HD costs extra. Multiple TVs cost extra. With a cable card enabled Tablo, you likely avoid all three of those extra costs (though I don't know if you can get around the HD cost or not).
I believe it is according to how your cable company markets their packages and writes their contracts. One local cable company around Columbus markets the HD channels in the package but if you’re using their equipment you have to rent the HD equipment HD receiver or HD-DVR receiver (at higher costs) to access them. In that case when I had my HDHR Prime tuner on WMC I got the HD channels without paying any additional fee, though it was a pain to get them to flip the switch to allow HD through to me. Alternatively, we have another local cable company who markets their packages listing a $10 fee for HD and with them I would have to pay the additional fee. Basically if HD is in the package you pay for per their marketing/contract then they have to give it to you on cablecard at no cost but not if they actually list it as an additional tier of channels at an addtional cost. That’s per the FCC Rule 76.1205(b). http://www.fcc.gov/guides/cablecard-know-your-rights
Sorry @shira - We won't be ready with this before the end of February.
Got an update guys. We’re WELL back end of February (and end of March) at this point.
Good news PLEASE !
@jeremymc7 - Shira was asking if we would be ready with this before the end of February because he needed to make his decision by then.
I unfortunately don’t have any updates on this integration. As per my previous posts, this work needs to be undertaken by one of our specialized engineers and he’s unfortunately busy with other more pressing matters.
We would love a Tablo with Cable Card support. I hate being tied to the cable company any more than necessary, so if I could purchase my own DVR and just record directly from my cable company’s cheapest package, that would be great. It would be nice to avoid paying $12 per month from the cable company and own a DVR outright. Please keep us updated!
Any update to this one Tablo ???
@TabloTV This is a great idea. If you make this, please include a port for OTA as well so u could have the best of both worlds. This would be a great move to compete against Tivo and be able to serve both sets of customers.
“To create the proof-of-concept for Tablo cable card support, we worked with our friends at SiliconDust to connect their HDHomeRun PRIME product, which supports cable cards, to Tablo via Ethernet.”
The Tablo either dual tuner or quad tuner would still have a coaxial input for OTA TV. The Cable TV would be served to the Tablo via your network (HDHomeRun to router, then router to Tablo). So you would enjoy the best of both worlds.
From the discussions on this topic previously, this feature is likely far away. As well, with the new HDHomeRun coming out to direct compete with the Tablo for OTA DVRs a venture like this may never materialize. I am only speculating though.
Both us and HDHomeRun have some other more pressing irons in the fire so we haven’t really had time to go further down this road.
Never say never, but it’s not something we’re actively working on at the moment.
If I was to purchase a HDHomeRun Prime today and hook it up to my Tablo would, this work right now?
Unfortunately no.
I live in Orange County, just to the south of Los Angeles, but about 50 miles away from the broadcast towers. I’m only able to clearly and regularly receive 2 of the primary OTA broadcast stations (NBC and Fox).
I’ve tried about 8 different antennas (all powered), including two high powered models that were placed in the my attic.
Long story short, I would absolutely pay for Tablo support to use the SD HDHOMERUN Prime as a tuner. In fact, I own one with a cable card installed and have service through Cox (which is still providing OTA QAMs in this market). I’ve paid for SiliconDust’s DVR Kickstarter, but frankly, I don’t have much faith that they will deliver a quality DVR solution outside of their tuner element. Software in general and recording features just really aren’t their strengths.
Whereas, my Tablo does just about everything that I want it to, and does it near perfectly at that. Quality is exceptional. Results are automatic. Software is highly evolved and stable.
The two features that would make Tablo indispensable to me are:
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Export/Download of non DRM recorded content (ideally as an .mp4, but I could work with any container - much like TiVo allows a download of a compiled show in choice of two different container formats)
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External antenna source (ideally in conjunction with SiliconDust as a network tuner)
While I completely understand that the cord cutter movement is all about saving money, I’m not opposed to paying some additional amount to offset development costs for adding really great features.
Keep up the good work!
Marc
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Through two different research paths I arrived at Tablo and at HDHomeRun Prime. So I Googled both of them together to see if there was a fan community that attempted combining them, and wow, here you are.
I highly encourage Tablo release an SDK, and these unstable alpha releases for those of us that like breaking things at home.
Personally, I wouldn’t. The driver to go to Tablo was cutting the cord because of all the additional fees with cable. Given you can rent a DVR from your cable company for ~$10/month, the break-even point is longer than those who don’t subscribe to cable at all.
So where are we on this.
Adding SD support (QAM) to Tablo is no well over a year of duscussions with nothing really shown.
Is this still coming. Is there some other table product that builds in or third party supports QAM for those of us that love Tablo but need QAM.
Please give us an update !
Most of us don’t have cable, so working on this should be at the bottom of the list. Dolby, LPW, ending the pairing and having username/password are my top three that should be worked on, not in any order. The LPW seems to be improving. I am aware that the sound problem has to wait until you talk to the chip provider to see if there is anything that can be done, but WHEN will you be talking with them?
Most Tablo members don’t have cable because the Tablo currently doesn’t support QAM. If it did support QAM there would be a lot more members. Only a small percent of the country is capable of receiver any or all of the broadcast channels. Even in dense population areas like Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago the only choices are streaming (I.E. Hulu, Netflix, etc) or cable. Channels like CBS are not covered by Hulu and for the cost of subscribing to CBS alone, let alone CBS and Hulu together.
Adding cable support would add a large additional source of revenue for Tablo as opposed to sinking more money into additional features for additional customers for the same revenue stream.
New features, improvements, and stability needs to be done to keep “some” current customers. But there are also additional customers that could provide additional revenue to fund even more features and improvements.
Cable companies are now encrypting all their HD feeds having gotten this right from the FCC last year. QAM now requires a paid subscription to a cable company for decryption (some SD feeds are not encrypted for local channels). Most users here are using OTA to avoid paying cable companies anything. Don’t know how relevant QAM is any longer for OTA folk.