Time Warner HD Box only

[SugarRay]

Does anybody know if Time Warner will/would rent me their HD box only (without getting digital cable).  I guess I don't care much about the digital cable, just HDTV.

Hopefully the new and improved boxes will come in soon.

[Tom Snyder]

Even if they would, I don't believe that that box will pick and decode an over the air broadcast signal.

[SugarRay]

Tom - I am of the understanding that in the near future (June 02), that TW is going to have new boxes out along with a new lineup of HD broadcasts.  Hopefully the new boxes/new lineup will include the ability to receive local stations.

[Tom Snyder]

First of all, TW will have to pass thru the locals in HD for TW customers to receive them. WTMJ has had their digital signal up for well over a year, and they haven't negotiated a deal to pass that thru. We'll find out from Jim Hall tonight if they have negotiated anything with Time Warner. I'll be suprised if they have. The other local HD stations aren't even on the air yet, and as we discovered this morning in another post several have, in fact, submitted waivers to the FCC for permission to miss the May deadline.

Second, what "new lineup of HD broadcasts" could there be? They already have HBO and Showtime, and will not ever have HDNet. There are no others.

So be careful about believing what TW says. I have been battling the ignorance at TW for two years, and have been conditioned not to believe a thing I hear from any of their CSR's.

[RickNeff]

Additionally, the "new boxes" have nothing to do with the actual HD content.  If TWC were to get the local NBC and CBS HD content, there would be no reason why they couldn't be added to the existing lineup with the current equipment.

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Richard Neff
Proud Toshiba 56x81 owner!

[SugarRay]

I did speak with somebody in Time Warners main office the other day (I agree - their CSA's are bad).   This person at TW indicated that their current HDTV boxes are not 100% compatiable.See this link for the info regarding that was relayed to me. http://www.milwaukeehdtv.org/ubb/Forum1/HTML/000030.html

[RickNeff]

I'm not sure what you (or the TWC person) mean by "100% compatible" since as far as I know, it's an all-or-nothing thing.  (It used to be that some couldn't handle 1080i)  But, the existing box seems to have no problems with the HD feeds.

Again, the only area that I've seen people complain about here are poor non-HD channels.  I haven't had any problems with mine in this aspect (although a large TV still shows how bad the non-HD channels really are.)  I do subscribe to HBO, so I do get HBO HD, plus the PBS demo/occational program HD channel.  So far, the quality of these has been everything I expected from HDTV.

Also, I have noticed that the HD channels have a lower volume if I run them through my set.  Fortunately, I ran the coax digital out to my receiver and have been enjoying the occational HBO HD program with DD 5.1.  Via the digital out, the volume level is about the same as my DVD player.

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Richard Neff
Proud Toshiba 56x81 owner!