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is there a pci card that you can buy that you just connect to the cable that the decoder normally plugs in to?
cant seem to find anything, as if i have another box from virgin i have to pay for it and i think 10 quid a month for having two boxes.
or are there no PC TV cards that work with virgin or sky
I don't know of any and I'm sure it would be against the terms and conditions of Virgin cable TV.
well if they did make one that i could buy from virgin id be more than happy to pay 60-70 quid for it:)
Technically, what you need is a DVB-C card, they aren't that difficult to find, but not as easy at DVB-T (Terresctial) or DVB-S (Satellite).
The problem is the encryption that Virgin use and reading the subscription card. I don't know a lot about Virgin in this regard as I've never been in a cable area, but I know they have adverts warning you against using non-Virgin decoder boxes, so the encryption must have been broken and you can use the decoder card on DVB-C cards with a CI and the appropriate CAM (CI being the PCMCIA like slot you get for some TV cards, the CAM - Conditional Access Module - being the PCMCIA like card that takes the subscription card that normally goes in the Virgin box).
Have a proper Google on the subject, I'm sure there are sites that specialise in this kind of information, but I suspect further talk on this here would be frowned upon as you are breaching the Virgin Ts and Cs.
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Originally Posted by Funkstar
I thought you would know :) I didn't know there were devices that could do the encryption for the cable TV tuner cards.
As an example, look here: http://www.digital-everywhere.com/en...sid=1190057723
This card has a CI slot built in, but many have additional boards for the CAM interface.
Hauppauge used to have a separate board for their DVB-S cards, but now they just have a USB smart card reader that you can use with most of their digital TV cards.
Using a CI and the appropriate CAM in itself is perfectly acceptable, there are many TV stations around the world that allow you to use your own equipment (or don't even provide any equipment themselves). These services are based on standard encryption systems or will provide the correct CAM to work with their service (TopUP TV for example used to provide a CAM and smart card for use with their channels on Freeview, these went in the CI on set top boxes on in the side of TVs).
However, the two main premium TV services in the UK, Sky and Virgin, both use propitiatory encryption systems and mandate you use their hardware to watch the TV you are paying a subscription for. There are CAMs that reportedly can decrypt Sky, but only with the old blue smart cards, the new white ones don't work with these CAMs. As I said before, I don't know the specifics about Virgin, but I suspect you can get CAMs for whatever they use.
Thinking about this, I seem to remember Nebula did a card reader for their devices.
I wished I'd bought a Hauppauge card instead of the Nebula now. As they lasted as long as a Chinese motorcycle before going into liquidation.
I don't know anything about the technicalities of the VM encryption, but I know they re-issued all their smart cards recently. Which I assume is at least in part to try and reduce the amount of their service that is being stolen.
That is very interesting, I've never seen such a device before.Quote:
Originally Posted by Funkstar