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Posted by Frosty on 02/27/06 19:23
Macrovision adds something to the picture signal to upset gain circuits
in recording devices. Clever little video filters can be used to strip
out the rogue signal (more or less). HDCP is a whole other ball game.
HDCP relies on data protection chips recognising each other when you
connect a source to a display. If there's an electronic handshake then
all is well. But if the display is not HDCP enabled then there's no
chip inside for the source to handshake with. Without a handshake the
HDCP chip is the source simply turns off the digital output.
A couple of companies have developed little gizmos to sit between a
HDCP source and a non-HDCP display. They provide a handshake for the
source and pass the digital signal to the display. This sounds great,
and so far they seem to work fine but there's a bit of a black cloud on
the horizon. It's to do with the HDCP licencing and where the HDCP
chips come from.
The HDCP chips that go in to the gizmos come from the same people that
make HDCP chips for sources and displays. Each chip set has a unique
code, so all Denon 1920 DVD players have a chip set with a unique ID,
all Pioneer 403XDE plasmas have a unique ID and so on and so on. This
is where HDCP get's really difficult to defeat. It is possible for the
chip maker to say which HDCP devices can provide a valid handshake. So
it's no longer enough that there's a HDCP handshake, it has to be the
RIGHT handshake.
You can probably see where this is going. New models will come out with
an updated code list of HDCP approved devices. If your little gizmo is
not on the list then the new player won't play ball. What isn't
completely clear at the moment is how older players might also get
updated.
Back to your original question re Sky. First generation Sky HD
receivers will output HD and non HD content, but from the HDMI digital
output all this content will need a HDCP enabled display. The boxes
will also have a HD compatible Component output. This won't have HDCP,
but don't expect the movie channels or PPV sports channels to be
available this way. If the content isn't protected then Sky will be
able to swith off that unsecure output for certain channels.
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