Can someone verify the correct cable connections for HomeRun Prime on Cox

[Billr9]

I have had the Prime box connected to Cox for a number of years with this configuration. The cable line goes to a 2 port splitter. One line from the splitter goes to the Prime, the other goes the the Vecima Tuning Resolver. There is a USB cable connecting the Prime to the Resolver.

A couple of weeks ago when I was out of town, the second light from the left side of the Prime started flashing. I rebooted the equipment but got the same result.

Had Cox come out and they reconfigured things so that the splitter was removed and the cable went into the tuning adapter and another cable line connected the tuning adapter to the Prime unit. The USB cable is still connected between the turning resolver and the Prime unit. The light on the front panel stopped flashing.

I have the HD HomeRun app installed on both a Windows 11 machine and a Nvidia Shield device.

Both apps play local channels but give a DRM error on non-local channels. I am aware the the certificate issue that originally affected both devices, but it is my understanding the issue should be resolved of the Windows device.

Everything looks good when looking at the Prime Main Menu. I'd post screen shots, but can't seem to figure out how to do it.


Status
Card Authentication success
Card OOB Lock success
Card Validation success
Tuning Resolver ready

Tuning Resolver Status
Authentication success
Downstream success
Upstream success
Operational Status ready
User Inactivity 51 minutes

CableCARD Status
Card Manufacturer Technicolor/Cisco
Card Authentication success
Card Validation success
3DES encryption supported
OOB Frequency 110.250 MHz
OOB Lock 1.544 Mbps
Signal Strength 93% (-4.6 dBmV)
Signal Quality 100% (42.1 dB)
Channel List tuning-resolver



Questions
1. Any idea why the Prime box would stop working under the original configuration?
2 Does it matter which cable configuration is used, because if I switch it back to the old configuration, the green indicator on the front of the Prime starts flashing again.
3. Does just having the Shield device up and running without having the HomeRun App running in any way effect the Windows App with respect to DRM?
4. Are DRM permissions determined when running a channel scan or just when the HDHomeRun app is launched.

Thanks in advance for any assistance you can provide.

[signcarver]

The main purpose of the vecima is to be a hsc, this requires coax connection to the prime because once high split happens there is no oob the cablecard can find on its own thus the high split converter to provide oob... yes it also serves as a ta (which is the usb connection) but doing it the way you originally described you wouldn't have needed the hsc and a regular ta would suffice many still ran such up until their area was upgraded with high split..

If the scan picks up the drm channels properly marking them as drm, the prime is properly configured. So all you have to do is get the windows app working as it will probably be quite some time for android to work again. First step I would do is make sure display is set to 1080p as anything higher can have some hdcp errors that aren't always easy to troubleshoot. Double check the channels are properly marked as drm with the prime as if you have a record engine running, it may take a few hours before it realizes they are drm and then the app would use the record engine when it has to use the prime directly . With a Cisco card make sure it is ready and not not staged.

[Billr9]

So I'm guessing maybe my area was upgraded with high split while I was out of town, and that is what caused the blinking light on the front panel. With the new configuration of coax cable -> vecima -> coax cable -> Prime, does the USB cable still need to connect the TA to the Prime?

On the Channel Lineup tabs when connected to the Prime unit using the browser, all of channels I should be getting are marked DRM. Is there any difference in running a channel scan when directly connected to the Prime as opposed to running it in the HDHomeRun app?

Since the NVidia Shield will not work right now, should it be power off. In other words, if left powered on could it cause issues with the Prime since the Prime had connected to it previously?

I'm not sure what you mean in "Double check the channels are properly marked as DRM with the prime

-> as if you have a record engine running, <-

it may take a few hours before it realizes they are drm and then the app would use the record engine when it has to use the prime directly"

Can you be more specific on how to do this?

Thanks again.

[signcarver]

The purpose of the USB cable is for communication with a TA which is required for SDV channels. The purpose of the coax daisy chaining through the HSC is to do the HSC part and provide OOB. As you previously pointed out, your OOB frequency is 110MHZ... A high split essentially makes everything on the coax from the cable company up to 204MHz dedicated for upstream for your cable modem thus OOB cannot be provided by the cable company from the cable below 204 MHz but a cablecard requires OOB frequency under around 130MHz, though I have never seen one above 120. The HSC provides such proper OOB to the device (only exists on that coax between HSC and cablecard device).

I always prefer scanning the channels directly on the device rather than through any app or tool as the lineup must exist on the device but the scan from the app should suffice... (I don't believe in the scan from setup as there have been versions of that which the device didn't really do the scan for its own lineup).

No problem with the shield being on but it may try to tie up a tuner (or more) if you try to watch a DRM channel on it.

The way the system works for DRM requires that DRM is actually detected by the scan. So if it is a DRM channel make sure it states such in the lineup. The DVR engine can take up to 2 hours to notice such lineup changes from the scan (it should do such about every hour or so). If for some reason a channel was not marked as DRM until after you did a scan, it can take the two hours before the engine gets that info. The engine will try to tune the channel without the DTCP information and just fail. When the app tries to play any channel and detects a DVR engine, it first tries to play the channel through the DVR engine. Since the DVR engine can't handle DRM such playing will fail but if it knows the failure was caused by DRM, it essentially tells the app to get it from the prime directly. The way SD does the scan can produce some non-SDV channels as not having DRM but when connected to a TA the TA chooses the channel that has DRM so it may not properly be marked causing issues for some channels.

You can try without the USB connected but if that works where with the usb doesn't, I would probably unplug the TA for awhile and then plug it back in and see if it comes back up correctly... but most likely it is just getting the windows machine ready for DRM. Also make sure the app is on the latest version (I have heard of some having issues with win 11 recently but not all). If you have a TV that supports DLNA, it may also support DTCP-IP and be able to use the prime directly but h.264 with DRM occasionally trips that up as well.

Unfortunately I can't test DRM issues any longer as cox dropped my neighborhood from cablecard and moved us to iptv... the neighborhoods around me can use the HSC's and still use cablecard.

You may wish to post prime firmware and app version as those both should be latest.

[Billr9]

Prime firmware is :

HDHomeRun PRIME
System Menu
System Log
System Status
Hardware Model HDHR3-CC
Firmware Version 20230713
DTCP1 1.7-SD20200724
WMDRM-NDT 10-SD20171110
Memory Report 64 MB SDRAM, 2 MB Flash
Power Status Standby
Boot Status Booted
Device ID 13249B65
MAC Address 00:18:DD:32:49:B6
IP Address 172.29.180.228
Subnet Mask 255.255.255.0

HDHomeRun app on Windows is :

20240209 (App) / 20250408a (UI)

[Billr9]

Another quick question. I am getting the following when I launch the HDHomeRun app on windows:

Version 20250408a
Using Async Platform API
Probing 2 device(s)
HDHomeRun RECORD
13249B65 HDHomeRun PRIME
Found 2 devices
13249B65 HDHomeRun PRIME

Is this normal?

and are the two devices the PRIME unit itself (1) and the RECORD option (2)

[Billr9]

OK, the issue has been resolved.

The version of the HDHomeRun app installed on the Windows machine was one I had downloaded from SiliconDust a long time ago. It was updating, but something must have gone south.

I downloaded the version from the Microsoft store on another Windows 11 machine, and it worked perfectly. So I uninstalled the app from the machine that was having issues, and reinstalled from the Microsoft store and now everything is working fine.