# Roamio with basic cable channels



## az1097 (Apr 3, 2013)

I'm looking to buy a new Roamio and would like to make sure I'd be able to get my basic cable channels from Time Warner Cable when directly connecting the Tivo to the cable outlet WITHOUT tunning adapter or cable card. Thanks.


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## ncbill (Sep 1, 2007)

The Roamio models tune only digital, not analog cable.

You'd need a Premiere or Series 3 unit for analog cable.


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## TimA (Feb 9, 2013)

ncbill said:


> The Roamio models tune only digital, not analog cable.
> 
> You'd need a Premiere or Series 3 unit for analog cable.


Depends if you provider provides basic cable in analog or digital. Comcast in my area went digital only over a year ago.

For basic digital cable you need to determine if your basic channels are in ClearQAM (no CableCard) or Encrypted (require CableCard). Unfortunately the trend with many providers, including Comcast, is to phase out ClearQAM channels.


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## tatergator1 (Mar 27, 2008)

I'm fairly confident all TWC markets simulcast analog and digital for the basic channels. The problem is you need the CableCard to map the digital simulcast to the regular analog channel number and to decrypt everything other than broadcast locals. TWC provides local broadcast signals via Clear QAM, so you could do a channel scan for those with a Roamio, but it's unlikely they would properly map to the Tivo guide, so you'd be stuck with a dumb digital recorder. 

As mentioned, you want a Premiere.


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

az1097 said:


> I'm looking to buy a new Roamio and would like to make sure I'd be able to get my basic cable channels from Time Warner Cable when directly connecting the Tivo to the cable outlet WITHOUT tunning adapter or cable card. Thanks.


Can you get them? possibly, will they have guide data without a CableCARD? nope, so is that worth it for you? it wouldn't be for me, I'd spend the $3 a month for the card.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

Or I've heard you can get the proper cablecard from eBay and even if not authorized and setup by your cable co, it will at least remap the channels to their proper places.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

You need a CableCARD, you probably don't need a tuning adapter though. The TA is only needed to watch the channels which are SDV, which are typically the lesser watched expanded basic channels.

As HarperVision mentioned if you buy a CableCARD on eBay it will work as well. It wont be able to decrypt anything, but as long as the channels you want to watch are unencrypted it will be able to map them properly so TiVo can record from them.


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