Thursday, December 12, 2013

Can I use a digital tv converter box with basic cable?

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Erika


I know this question has been asked a million times but my situation is slightly different, I think.
Well, I have an HDTV from 2013 and an old HD compatible TV monitor thing from 2004 or so. Basically, I get about 100 channels from the Basic Cable package that I have from Time Warner Cable on my HDTV and on the older TV, I get about 20 of those clear channels and the rest are either gone or all blurry. I think its something wrong with the older TV's tuner, or the lack thereof.
Anyway, I bought a digital TV converter box that has a QAM tuner and some other stuff, it also has an HDMI output which I like. I am wondering, can I use this converter box somehow with my basic cable? The basic cable is just my coax cable connected to the wall and to my TV. Can I somehow use the converter box in between these two to get me the missing channels? Or what do I need to purchase to do that? Thank you.



Answer
No, digital converter boxes are only for antenna signals. Cable box signals are different, which is why TV's have the option to switch between Cable/Antenna input via the coax.
One option you CAN do however...

Use the video output of the cable box and put it into the AV1 input, and then just put the digital converter box on the coax part so you can get channels from there. You still have to switch between the 2 sets of inputs though.

If your Time Warner is giving you blurry channels call your cable company, it may be a problem on their end.

What will come after the Xbox360, Wii, PS3?




Sam Yi


I only own a regular Xbox, and am planning to buy a new console.

My question is this: Am I too late in buying gaming console? Should I wait until something else comes out? WILL something come out in the near future?
Anyone have any information or opinions?



Answer
Nobody knows what the next generation will look like or when it will be released. Anyone who says they know is a big fat LIAR cause they haven't even been designed.

In fact, the technology doesn't even exist yet to make them. Look at the number of cores in xbox360 and ps3: 3 and 8. Each on a 3.2ghz clock cycle. The last couple years have seen the death of Moore's law, which predicted the number of transistors on an IC would double every 18 months. They can't do it anymore because there's a heat barrier, so they had to resort to making multiple cores and pretending it was one "chip." It is hard to make software for and generates even more total heat than it would if they had just stuck with single core without making it any faster. But they can't do that, because the industry expects Moore-compliant products.

Look at any pc on the market today, are there any cpu's clocked faster than 4 ghz yet? No, and they don't even sell them that fast, you have to overclock them. Every new pc is at least a dual nowadays, up to 4 and it looks like they'll be going 8 soon. About to finally catch up with the ps3 except their multithreading still isn't as advanced as the Cell's is, or as good for running 3d game engines either.

So what will they make a ps4 out of? A new Cell with 16 cores? Don't bet on developers lining up to make games for that. It would also overheat like crazy. Circuit width tech is down to 45nm now, but it took three years, since the original ps3's on 90nm. That's not a very fast increase, it would never make a 16-core console realistic. Likewise if Microsoft wanted to take xbox to the next level they'd have to release some kind of 8-core goliath, it would make the red ring of death look like an ice cream social at the south pole. The tech is not there; there is no design. Not even a concept.

Now, the Wii can and probably will upgrade, but that's not gonna make it the first of the next generation. It will make it the last of the current generation, just as Wii is the last of the last generation. The only next gen part of Wii is the controller, and that is an accessory. The console is a 700mhz single-core putz. It is no more powerful than your original xbox. It can't output HD, it has no web browser, it is limited in a zillion ways. If they redesign it to have a dual-core at the standard 2 to 3ghz, then it will outperform the old wii by leaps and bounds. But it will only be a current-gen console. I don't expect them to upgrade the cpu though, only the graphics chip to make it HD capable. Because Nintendo has long feared the US digital transition when suddenly zillions of people will have new HDTV's and realize standard def really kind of sucks.

The console that will last the longest is the ps3, because it has the most advanced cpu and also the best gpu of the bunch. (400gflops compared to 240gflops for xbox's gpu). They're wasting their time on motion sensing right now, which the ps3 has done since it was released and also with the playstation eye, and xbox knows it can't make a better console yet either so it's trying to get your grandmother to play too. Motion sensing control is a joke.

There will not be any real current gen consoles released before the year 2013. Only portables.




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