I'm thinking of buying the AZBox Premium HD+, but have heard the QAM tuner may not work well. Anyone have the QAM tuner working? Is it fully functional? Appreciate the help.
Anybody using a QAM Tuner on their Premium+
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pipishop list one for $60.00 on their web site under accessories. I "assume" it is QAM, maybe not. I guess I'm not sure. A few weeks ago there was a thread here about the ATSC and QAM tuners, but can't find it now. It talked about them being not 100% compatible with the software. Maybe I 'm way off base in my assumption? Would like to buy the box, but need a cable tuner. Anyone else that saw this thread? Or, has QAM tuner working?
I think those are either DVB-C or ISDB-T intended for the brasilian market , not the Clear QAM neither the ATSC OTA new digital TV we have in NA. DVB-C is the european digital cable standard (we use QAM) and ISDB-T is the Brasilian digital TV standard (we use ATSC) based on the Japanese format. I am not aware yet of a NA dealer selling those tuners designed for our own market.
Well even if they release a cable tuner for NA, it will almost 100% have to be Clear QAM like the ones modern TV's have therefore you will only be able to watch clear QAM programming or in other words just the few channels the cable compnay send in the clear without encryption usually , promo channel , info channel, slate screens and the likes.
Thanks for your help guys. I guess I might as well buy the ULTRA and save some money, and, as Rick noted the power supply on the Premium+ is not reliable, so ULTRA may be best buy.
The new premium plus have a different power supply now and the problem is no longer an issue.
You want to make sure you get the one without the light on the power supply.
I have both the Ultra & the Premium Plus, I can say this much, I would take the Plus anytime over the Ultra.
If you decide to put in a hard drive to record movies you will not like the Ultra.
It does the job but compared to the plus huge difference.
1) Plus has front panel display, when recording on Ultra you are in the dark so to speak knowing if it is doing the job or not. Not so with the plus.
2) Plus is a larger unit and seems to more sturdier.
3) also the plus is set up for wireless internet so doing changes is a snap rather then trying to either hard wire or find the ethernet connection for the Ultra.
For the extra $100 if you have it to spare I'd go with the plus.
I have also been noticing on one channel mux that the Ultra has been changing the pids on the channel automatically and I have not been able to recreate this on the plus receivers.
I'm not downing the Ultra, just saying more bang for the buck with the plus.
You want to make sure you get the one without the light on the power supply.
I have both the Ultra & the Premium Plus, I can say this much, I would take the Plus anytime over the Ultra.
If you decide to put in a hard drive to record movies you will not like the Ultra.
It does the job but compared to the plus huge difference.
1) Plus has front panel display, when recording on Ultra you are in the dark so to speak knowing if it is doing the job or not. Not so with the plus.
2) Plus is a larger unit and seems to more sturdier.
3) also the plus is set up for wireless internet so doing changes is a snap rather then trying to either hard wire or find the ethernet connection for the Ultra.
For the extra $100 if you have it to spare I'd go with the plus.
I have also been noticing on one channel mux that the Ultra has been changing the pids on the channel automatically and I have not been able to recreate this on the plus receivers.
I'm not downing the Ultra, just saying more bang for the buck with the plus.
I think that this is the other thread that you referenced: http://www.satelliteguys.us/azbox-discussion/224375-atsc-qam-tuner-azbox-premium-plus.html
I have the ATSC/QAM tuner for the AZBox premium (not the plus - but a plus version is available). I haven't done too much much testing with QAM because of the issues I had with ATSC firmware performance.
I did scan in the QAM cable channels selecting FTA only. This scanned in everything. The FTA (Clear QAM) filter did not work. I had over a hundred scrambled channels (black screen) and a few Clear QAM channels. The Clear QAM channels were there, but the channel numbering was incorrect. I didn't try to make any recordings.
I plan on retesting ATSC and QAM with more recent firmware, but I need to do some rewiring first. (Cable, ATSC, and satellite feeds are all in different rooms) So Far, I haven't seen anything in the firmware release notes that suggest that ATSC/QAM fixes have been made. It's unfortunate that the firmware developers are in Portugal with no source of ATSC or QAM signals.
DVB-C tuners may also work with US digital Cable. I think that the early Scientific digital cable Set Top Boxes were based on DVB-C. Can anybody verify this?
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Again, thanks to both of you guys. I have ordered the Premium Plus from Rick. It does seem to be a more sturdy receiver with more options then the Ultra. I will get a DVB-C tuner and experiment with it to see if it see clear QAM channels, and let you guys know the results.
