Posted by bill_nielsen_99 on 11/01/05 06:56

I forgot to mention that I replaced the DVR with a standard digital
cable box to avoid the copy once problem you mentioned. I got the same
result with no copy capability on the HBO/Cinemax channel. Given that I
followed all the rules, its hard to figure where the source of the
problem is, with the DVDR, the cable company or HBO.

--Bill

Biz wrote:
> <bill_nielsen_99@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:1130807568.853017.208080@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
> > Thanks for all who responded.
> >
> > The problem happens with recording HBO/Cinemax from digital cable, but
> > not the other premium services (e.g., Starz, Showtime or standard cable
> > channels). HBO has a CGMS-A FAQ
> > (http://www.hbo.com/corpinfo/cgmsafaq.shtml/) that indicates that they
> > now encode their signals with CGMS-A copy protection. For linear
> > (scheduled) programming" they allow Copy Once. I used disks formatted
> > for DVD-RW VR, which is the only recording format that supposedly
> > supports Copy Once, but this didn't work. Unfortunately, my Sony is
> > treating HBO/Cinemax signals as Copy Never and I can't make the one
> > copy that I am entitled to make.
> >
> > Neither Sony or Cox tech support had any suggestions that helped
> > recording directly to DVD. Cox suggested copying first to VHS (which
> > does work OK) then dubbing VHS to DVD. This wasn't the solution I was
> > looking for as I would see a noticable degradation in quality.
>
> You will not be able copy a CGMS-A signal from a DVR onto any other digital
> device that respects the copy once signal...you already did copy it once, to
> your DVR just like I wrote above...So until your cable company comes out
> with a digital box or DVR with a built-in DVD recorder(meaning never) you
> will not be able to do what you want.

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