TW Whole House DVR

[mey]

TW has opened this to everyone now. I am considering getting this. Couple of questions to anyone that may have it. Are the units black ? Do both units support picture in picture ? And does it work OK ?

Thanks !!

[csujjhoov]

Yes they deploy new boxes the cisco 8642 host box (DVR) and 4652 I believe. I have the service at home with 1 host and 1 client (so just remote dvr access). Works very good. They install a filter to prevent the MOCA signal from getting back into the cable system. Was easy in my house as all of our lines are home run. If you have any splitters in your house they'll replace them if they don't "comply".

The 8642 does picture in picture as it's the dual tuner dvr. The 4642 is a dumb terminal so to speak so it doesnt. If you have 2 dvr's you have 4 tuners to record and then picture in picture on both boxes.

Only feature that sucks right now is no ability to delete recordings or set up recordings from a dumb terminal, but when both are DVRs you can. This is supposed to be fixed soon with a software update to Navigator.

For me it's worth the extra just to have it. my wife can watch shows upstairs from the dvr while im watching other dvr'd shows. Also each dvr has a 500gig hd in it so storage is awesome. hit or miss with connecting external hard drives for expanded storage. but we don't run close to filling this one compared to our 8300hd

[bspvette86]

How long does it take for these newer boxes to boot up when they are initially powered up? Our old SA4240HDC takes close to 20 minutes and I am curious if the newer gear is any better.

[csujjhoov]

boot up time is about 4-5 minutes approx, depending how good your signal is to your house and how quick they can sync up with the TWC servers. Only downside to the new boxes is the LED display for the time on the front. It's extremely bright. We have to usually put something in front of it before bed as it looks like we have a nightlight on in the room. Other than that pretty good.

[AvedisWolf]

TW has opened this to everyone now. I am considering getting this. Couple of questions to anyone that may have it. Are the units black ? Do both units support picture in picture ? And does it work OK ?

Thanks !!

Yes, They are black, They rolled the Samsung H3272 as the host, and Samsung H3262 as the client.

PIP does NOT work on these. The button is there, but I've read the feature is disabled.

As for if it works... Yes, it seems to work great. Only problems I have is when a power failure comes, and all three boxes boot up, they don't "see" each other too well, I usually unplugh them all, let the Host boot completely, then ;et the clients boot, and all seems well.

The only thing the clients can do is watch something that is recorded. They can not delete a recording, they can not schedule a recording, they cannot pause live tv. Just watch a recorded program, that is it!