The Analog Hole and Recording HDMI with HDCP

I wrote a little while ago on recording HD using what is called the "analog hole" in my previous post. Since this article has been popular I wanted to revisit it and update it for 2009.

One of my main reasons for building a MythTV was so that I could record HD and SD programming and then do anything I wanted with it. No DRM, no expiration dates, and no hassles. At the time I was also worried about the broadcast flag and I wanted a system that would totally ignore anything similar down the road. I have succeeded in building a system that records HD over cable with QAM and records SD from basic cable. The current trend is to have a set top box or DVR provide the premium HD content that I currently don't have the ability to record. This set me searching for a solution that allows me to record the premium HD content and have the same freedom I have with my current recordings. I also don't want to go buy a special computer with altered bios in order to support cable card recording with Windows Vista Media Center such as Dell and others provide.

Recording Component HD using the Analog Hole

This was the reason that I got excited about the HD-PVR made by Hauppauge. This device is designed specifically to record the analog component HD signal from a cable box or DVR which cannot ever have any copy protection.

The cable company's only recourse would be to turn off or degrade the component HD which would render all HD TV's that were not HDMI with HDCP pretty worthless. I will not put it past them but it would take time to do without alienating customers. Look at the long drawn out analog TV cutoff that may be extended yet again by Obama.

There are very early drivers for the HD-PVR to work with MythTV but I am waiting for these to mature into a beta release before I go down this road. SageTV and BeyondTV both offer support for this and I have read the results are excellent.

Recording HDMI with HDCP

That leaves one thinking of a fool-proof method of recording HDMI with HDCP which is explicitly what the HDCP encryption guards against. There is one solution that I first read about at the MythTV wiki. One can accomplish recording any HDMI source with HDCP including a Blueray or cable box by the use of two products. The updated HD Fury II that can be bought here connected to the Hauppauge HD-PVR.

The HD Fury 2 is designed to allow older TV's, projectors, monitors display HD content from an HDMI source protected with HDCP which these devices can not display. The Fury works by communicating with the HDMI source one would like to record and does the handoff to satisfy the HDCP encryption. Instead of immediately displaying this decoded stream like a TV would the Fury outputs this now analog stream to component or VGA. Once this stream is converted from HDMI to Component then it is analog and has no encryption. One would then connect the component cables to the HD-PVR to record this digital stream at a very high quality.

This solution works with Windows, Mac, and Linux

As of right now the HD-PVR can be used with Windows with the included software, SageTV, and a beta version of BeyondTV. For the Mac, Elagato has a beta version of eyetv that supports the HD-PVR. Linux can use the alpha drivers that allow this solution to work with MythTV.

At the time of this post HD Fury II costs 250 dollars and the HD-PVR is around 200 dollars bring the total cost to 550 dollars. This is a hefty price tag but may be worth it for people like me that want to record premium content in HD but want to have control of the hardware and the recording.