You want to go with the Grex from Dimax. The Red pro does not support broadcast flags. There is a question whether the Sima is available and whether it supports all the latest versions of macrovision. The shipping of the Grex is a little unnerving. According to this thread, (and my experience) shipping times are lengthy but reliable. Best of luck. P.S. I have no experience with the Sima, just what I've read. The Grex works flawlessly, though.
OK, I'm ordering the Grex, mainly because it seems that it will work with new recorders and handle broadcasts that the Sima can't. However, I did find the Sima on Heartlandamerica.com for $82 shipped.
Just curious about the cable company's ability here...
Most HFC networks I can tell use both upstream and downstream, obviously, but does anyone know with any certainty if the cable company can detect via some sort of upstream signal that the macrovision is/has or attempting to be altered, say through Grex or similar?
If you consider the mechanism of how PPV works, where it's not through a timer, but moreso an upstream connection, when connected, could they also detect a void, whole or gap caused by this?
There is no conflict with the signal from or going back to, your cable provider. The grex does not connect in the coaxial line to your set top box. The Grex will connect between the output of your cable box and your recorder. At this point the set top box has already performed any communications with your cable provider. The Grex simply sits in the video output stream from the box, either s-video or composite video. In other words, the cable box is clueless to the presence of the Grex and will have no issues with PPV or VOD services.
Thanks to this forum I ordered the GREX and LOVE IT! I am able to copy HBO movies to my SonyDVD recorder WITHOUT signal loss. I had a problem with putting the GREX on my Phillips DVD recorder because I I couldn't figure out how to avoid not using the coax cable from the DISH to DVD R for the auto turner (channel)function- perhaps I simply need to adjust my DVD R settings but I am not that bright. So I purchased a SONY DVD R that only had RCA input/output jacks (no coax cable out) GREX WORKS PERFECTLY.
No need to mess with modes on GREX and it only took 7 days for me to receive the unit.
