STB to MacBookPro

[tb582]

Hello, I'm looking to take the video coming from my Comcast 'X1' STB and have it play out on my computer. Will HDMI out of the STB to the thunderbolt on the MBP work? ie thunderbolt to HDMI and then the HDMI cable from the STB plugs into that?

[Cornucopia]

Unless things have greatly changed for the better recently, I can confidently say, "NO".

This is Comcast we're talking about here. Their STBs are closed systems. HDMI out would ALWAYS be HDCP encryption protected. Older CC STBs had a Firewire out that you could maybe find old 32bit WinXP drivers for to do non-scrambled (and realtime, live) transfers with, but even that avenue has dried up. I don't think they make new STBs with the Firewire connector anymore (please correct me if I'm wrong here) and AFAIK, there has NOT been a 64bit driver version for Firewire capping of non-scrambled live program streams (which rules out Win7+ and modern OSX). This is not the same thing as a DV/HDV transfer, either (which is still available, though getting rarer).
Maybe you can still cheat by going (lower quality) analog out, but with the analog sunset, even that avenue will be shortlived.

Time to think of another viewing paradigm...

Scott

[jman98]

AFAIK, there has NOT been a 64bit driver version for Firewire capping of non-scrambled live program streams (which rules out Win7+ and modern OSX).

This is correct. The original writer of the 32 bit capture driver (which by the way was reported by several users to work fine under 32 bit Win 7) has stated that he is not interested at all in writing a 64 bit version. Nor apparently in helping anyone else to do it either. Several truly desperate people have turned to programmer for hire websites and paid programmers to write such drivers. EVERY one of them was abandoned by the programmer in failure.