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Comcast DVR -- getting things off it

R

Raffles

macrumors member
Original poster
May 30, 2007
36
0
USA
I have a Motorola Comcast DVR, and I have some stuff on it that I really would like to have on my mac so I could watch it on my mac, iPod, DVD, etc. I remember talking to a guy from Comcast on the phone about it and he wasn't very helpful. I've noticed FW400 ports on the back of it as well as USB. Can I use those to get stuff off it, or is there another technique to get it off?

Thanks!
 
Thanks! That looks really easy. Now, the only problem is figuring out how to lug my iMac G5 into the basement and connect the short FW cord to the inexpedient box. :eek:
 
my comcast scientific atlanta box, all ports are disabled, it's impossible to get anything off of it because the hard drive is formatted in some weird proprietary format that, at the time i took it apart, there were no tools for reading or converting to something a computer can recognize. good luck!
 
I've been able to record video off my SA 8300HD via FireWire to my Mac using iRecord. Only issue is that I can only record video that I've already recorded to my DVR. I can't do "live" video, or rather video that is on TV currently. I believe this is because of the 5c copy protection instituted by Comcast (others do it too). My guess is that once it is recorded to the DVR, the 5c encryption is no longer there. If only there was a way to get around this, because iRecord offers scheduling, and this would make recording to my Mac very easy. Here's a tutorial though, for those trying to get started with iRecord

1. Connect STB (Set Top Box) to Mac via FireWire
2. Download iRecord
3. Start playback of content (in my experience, this can only be recorded video from DVR, but some people can apparently record live if the content is not encrypted with 5c)
4. Use New Event (or New Immediate Event) in iRecord to record video
5. Use VLC or Quicktime with MPEG2 Codec (Costs $20 from Apple) to playback or convert to other files

If only there were a way to copy the actual files from the STB, life would be great. Or at least if I could figure out how to record live TV with iRecord.
 
Fortunately for me my cable company doesn't protect any of it's channels, so I get all my HD channels directly from my cable box live ;)
 
I think the Motorola boxes Comcast has doesn't have any protection/the ports are open. I think it's the Scientific Atlantic ones that seem to have those problems.
 
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