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Computer dvr

11 years ago

I know you cannot download any Hbo movie onto ur computer. Copyright stuff. But if u have a cable co dvr/ tuner u can save movies on ur dvr forever? So if I want to put a copy of a movie on my computer I cannot legally do that? Cable co says thats so I don't get crazy and try and burn a DVD of movie. I do not have a cable co dvr though. So maybe u can't save Hbo movies on the dvr?

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Comments (5)

DA_Mccoy
11 years ago
Let's see if I get this right. You want guidance in how to infringe on a copypright. Hmmm! Sorry no help from me.

DA
mike_kaiser_gw
11 years ago
I'm not an expert but I believe it's perfectly legal to record a broadcast show for your personal, non-commercial use. You can record, say, The Wizard of Oz, and watch it to your heart's content and invite your friends over to watch until the cows come home. One runs afoul of the law when you charge your friends to watch it or make copies and distribute them (free or not).

Back in the magnetic media days, a copy required one to play the original and each play resulted in a slight degradation in the quality of the "master" and the nature of the medium resulted in a copy that was slightly lower in quality than the master. The problem with digital recordings is that it makes it too easy an unscrupulous person to make an infinite number of 100% accurate copies.

That's not to say there aren't ways to around the protection schemes. Certainly people rip (I think that's the right word) DVDs to hard drives for their home entertainment systems. Someone has probably figured out how to get data off of the drives of cable/teleco/satellite DVR's but doing so probably violates the service agreement making one liable for the cost of the DVR and a suspension of service.
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stoveguyy
Original Author
11 years ago
Comcast does offer a service to watch live programs on your iPad now. But I am not sure if you can watch content from your dvr on your iPad? I want to integrate my iPad/notebook to access my cable box/dvr and watch any program on any device in my house. I have no interest in burning DVDs. I actually own none.
kudzu9
11 years ago
cavell-
I'll preface this by saying I am not an expert on this. However, I think it is unlikely that you can integrate your devices to pull content from the DVR, particularly wirelessly. You can in some instances transfer programs from the dvr to a device, but I doubt you can just easily access the DVR, browse, and watch whatever is on there.

In my case I have one DVR, and two slave tuners in other rooms that can't record, but can access the content on the DVR and play it on the tvs they are hooked up to. I suspect that the cable companies would not want to engineer their DVRs to allow easy access that they can't control and get revenue from.

If you just want to transfer an occasional recorded program, the link below may be of help, but it seems like too much trouble to me.

Here is a link that might be useful: Connect computer to Comcast DVR

This post was edited by kudzu9 on Sat, Jan 26, 13 at 21:45
acraftylady
11 years ago
I know if you pay for HBO as part of your cable package you can go to hbo.com and register and watch stuff. There is also an hbo go app. I use it on my kindle to watch some hbo stuff but again you have to be paying for hbo with your provider to have access to the online stuff so maybe that would work for you on your computer. Mary

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