On Monday 14 February 2005 12:19, Tom E. Craddock, Jr. wrote: > Joseph A. Caputo wrote: > > >Kind of ironic, but I have to say it's quite possible that Microsoft > >might actually be a help in this... for Windows MCE to suceed in the > >long-term, it's going to need to be able to record & play back > >digital > >cable content. Tivo has already announced a CableCard Tivo box. > >Microsoft will need to have a PCI card that can tune QAM *and* > >decrypt > >the stream (probably via CableCard) if they want to compete. With > >Microsoft support, you can bet such a card will eventually be > >developed. Then it's just a question of obtaining one (they might > >only > >be OEM) and reverse-engineering a driver (you can bet the > >manufacturer > >won't release specs on the card without a license and/or NDA). > > > >Of course, even the idea of having a PCI card that works in a > >standard > >PC goes against parts of the FCC's broadcast flag mandate, because it > >would be too easy to hack. I'm interested to see how Microsoft > >addresses this challenge, but they most certainly will address it. > >Of > >course, it will probably involve industry collusion, proprietary DRM > >and possibly a 'trusted computing' platform, but the important first > >step is to get a card that fits in a slot! > > > >-JAC > > > > > > > Well, why does it have to be a PCI card? Whose to say it wont be some > other proprietary device, or even a combo of both, fit PCI card into > PC, > then connect wire(s) in some new interface. You have to hook your > cable > or cable box to the 'other' device.
Well, you're right; I only meant to use PCI as an example. The main point is that *some* way of recording the digital stream and playing it back on a computer. It might be PCI (or PCI-Express), PCMCIA, USB or FireWire. An external device or breakout box that plugs in to a PCI card would still qualify as a PCI device for purposes of this discussion, since that's the interface that would be presented to the computer. > > If they did use PCI, and all the above happened as you said, wouldnt > this then trigger the FCCs robustness rule for the broadcast flag(my > shorthand)? Wouldnt that be seen as defeat of the broadcast flag > which > would mean that it triggers a reissuing of the broadcast flag > 'keys/pairs' etc.? Which I pointed out in my previous message (just forgot the actual terminology). The 'robustness rule' would seem to preclude *any* implementation on an 'open' hardware platform like a standard PC. Tivo can do it because their devices are ostensibly locked down (let's not argue about the hackability of the Tivo). > Only way I can see any sort of device every working > in a consumer level hardware made after July 05 for Linux is if the > broadcast flag is declared illegal/invalidated. Or if it's made to work only in conjunction with some kind of 'trusted computing' (i.e., Palladium) platform and/or proprietary DRM scheme. Basically, because of the robustness clause, it seems that software (or even firmware?) can't be part of the authorization chain, because *all* software can be hacked/reverse engineered. Again, I see this as a problem that Microsoft *must* solve if they are going to continue to market MCE. It's really just a question of whether we (the homebrew PVR community) will be able to leverage their solution. Obviously the best scenario would be for Microsoft to shift their weight against the broadcast flag. I doubt that would happen, but then again maybe MS thinks it's a big enough juggernaut to thumb their nose at Hollywood on this. > Im just afraid that > from here on out, its just going to get harder for this issue and > Linux. No doubt. -JAC _______________________________________________ mythtv-users mailing list [email protected] http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
