Axxlog

Right. My TiVo manqué, a Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8000, was delivered on Friday, 2004.02.06, by an actual Rogers Cable installer. (So much better than the contractors. Insist.) The installer was an Italian-Canadian in his early 50s. We had quite a nice chat about how tricky it can be to “do media calls.” (Mine aren’t that tricky.)

Since I already had an Explorer 3200 digital cable box (my second – the first was broken, a fact the frontline Rogers reps refused to believe), the installer simply moved all the cables, including power, to the new machine and turned it on. Rogers intallers have a fascinating ruggedized miniature Wintel laptop that wirelessly authorizes your boxen for you. (The serial-number type is very hard to read, though, and the serial numbers are letters, not actual numbers. Is that a D, an O, or a Q?)

The 8000 now sits on my stack of two VHS and two Beta VCRs and a laserdisc player. (My DVD changer is on another shelf.)

[You can also look at the official beauty shots – small or large (5.3 MB).]

The 8000’s back-panel ports are deceptive. I haven’t tried the FireWire out, but I doubt it works, and of the RF connections, only Out 1 (TV) is active. You can attach a VCR to the Out 2 (VCR) connectors, but it won’t get a signal. (I found this out the hard way when I tried to tape a music video off the PVR and simply believed the port labels.) I don’t have enough of a hacker interest to round up a FireWire cable and try out that connector. I don’t even have the thing hooked up to my television using S-Video. I guess I’m middlebrow all the way when it comes to connectors.

The PVR logged on to the Rogers network (first one-way, then two-way) much faster than the installer expected. Programming the universal remote for a stock Sony TV took a while because, as the user manual itself warns, timing and delay of keypresses is important and easy to flub.

We checked various channels to see if they worked, and even though the Wintuition was hollering quite loudly “Better check PrideVision. If any channel is gonna go wrong, it’s PrideVision. Better check PrideVision,” in fact we did not. PrideVision, to which I have subscribed since its first month, is on a tier by itself with Rogers (and has been treated with out right discrimination by other cable companies) in that it’s a digital specialty channel with a separate monthly fee. It’s not a movie channel, basic or premium cable, or an ethnic station. It’s sui generis. And it was unauthorized on the PVR for the entire weekend, finally reappearing on Monday after two phone messages.

And now the fun began.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 13th, 2004 at 16:49 and is filed under Digital TV, PVR. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.