The Great HDCP Fiasco

[Arty]

Alan's new peice. You knew this was coming.

 

[Geo]

"When in danger or in doubt,
Run in circles, scream and shout.

Bang your head against the wall.
Make life hell for one and all."

I'm hoping Alan is missing something here with reverse compatibility thru driver and/or bios updates. But then I'm well known as a dewey-eyed optimist.

At any rate, I'm saving up my outrage for the moment, tho I'll be happy to hear some informed comments on the matter from our journos and others in the know.

 

[kyleb]

That guy is really missing the big picture, and rather late to the plate as well. Here is an article from last year that goes into much better detail on what it will take to acomplish HDCP protected content playback on PCs:

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1871&page=1

 

[Kanyamagufa]

Choice quotes from the firingsquad piece:

We’ve been able to confirm that none of the Built-by-ATI Radeons support HDCP. If you’ve just spent $1000 on a pair of Radeon X1900 XT graphics cards expecting to be able to playback HD-DVD or Blu-Ray movies at 1920x1080 resolution in the future, you’ve just wasted your money.

NVIDIA, being a GPU manufacturer was unable to discuss the plans of board manufacturers. We contacted all six of NVIDIA’s Tier-1 board partners. None of the GeForce 6 or 7 video cards available on the market, including the most recently released GeForce 7800GS, have HDCP support. So if you just spent $1500 on a pair of 7800GTX 512MB GPUs expecting to be able to play 1920x1080 HD-DVD or Blu-Ray movies in the future, you’ve just wasted your money.

Even if it's all true, it's a little blunt...

Still thought it was mildly humorous, even if it's gonna have some consumers literally up in arms...

 

[Geo]

Another choice bit on retro-fitting thru driver/bios:

Turns out that this was also wishful thinking.

An ATI representative said: “People will not be able to turn on HDCP through a software patch since the HDCP keys need to be present during the manufacturing. We are rolling out HDCP through OEMs at this time but we have not finalized our retail plans yet.”

As I pressed for more information about potential retail plans (i.e. trade-in programs, whether existing boards already have traces for the HDCP hardware where it can be plugged in), I got only a vague response:

“We cannot get into more detail at this time, as any further discussion would get into our trade secrets. However, we do promise to give you a full update on our retail plans once they are finalized.”

I’m not going to speculate on whether ATI’s reticence is because they’re trying to downplay a big fiasco, or if they’re trying to keep their super generous solution secret to throw off the competition. There’s actually no way to know.

Well, what about NVIDIA? They were actually very direct: “The boards themselves must be designed with an extra chip when the board is manufactured. The extra chip stores a crypto key, and you cannot retrofit an existing board after the board is produced.”

Wow. You can pick your favorite expletive.

 

[Tim]

Another choice bit on retro-fitting thru driver/bios:

I am a bit angry with Ati about this, they claim "DVI 1.0 compliant / HDMI interoperable and HDCP ready" for the x1000 series - I was going to buy a x1000 card for my HTPC (currently using integrated GF 6150) to be able to play Blu-ray and/or HD-DVD when the time comes. (I know that the chips itself might very well be HDCP ready, but I think most people reading the specs will expect shipping products will be able to use HDCP when the time comes).

I know the situation is no better with NVIDIA cards, bu atleast they have made no lcaims about being HDCP ready.

I am going to wait until HDCP capable cards are availeble before I buy a new one, I would like to improve gaming performance on the system - but is low priority and I am going to spend any money on a new card that wont alow me to play HD-movies at HD-resolutions.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Ouch, just ouch.

 

[neliz]

USB dongles I say.. USB dongles!

 

[Sxotty]

$15,000 isn't cheap.

All of these stupid standards should be free. If sony wasn't trying to milk money from blu ray and other doing the same then we would not always be in these stupid messes. If it was completely free then there would be a reason to be upset, but it isn't so I blame intel if they truly are the ones siphoning money from the other manufacturers.

 

[ANova]

HDCP is nothing more than an artificial limiter. It's like adding a throttle control to a 500hp car so it can only reach 175. Both my perfectly good monitor and X850 XT are not HDCP ready and I don't plan on replacing them any time soon for such a useless feature, so I just won't be buying any HD movies and I doubt many other people will either. Seems their anti-piracy greed is backfiring on them.

$15,000 isn't cheap.

All of these stupid standards should be free. If sony wasn't trying to milk money from blu ray and other doing the same then we would not always be in these stupid messes. If it was completely free then there would be a reason to be upset, but it isn't so I blame intel if they truly are the ones siphoning money from the other manufacturers.

They're only trying to make money like those who pushed for the protection systems. That is the only reason for HDCP afterall.

 

[SugarCoat]

I am a bit angry with Ati about this, they claim "DVI 1.0 compliant / HDMI interoperable and HDCP ready" for the x1000 series - I was going to buy a x1000 card for my HTPC (currently using integrated GF 6150) to be able to play Blu-ray and/or HD-DVD when the time comes. (I know that the chips itself might very well be HDCP ready, but I think most people reading the specs will expect shipping products will be able to use HDCP when the time comes).

I know the situation is no better with NVIDIA cards, bu atleast they have made no lcaims about being HDCP ready.

I am going to wait until HDCP capable cards are availeble before I buy a new one, I would like to improve gaming performance on the system - but is low priority and I am going to spend any money on a new card that wont alow me to play HD-movies at HD-resolutions.

Quite a few do have it listed as supported under Nvidia's PureVideo specifications. Nvidia's AIBs do represent Nvidia in my opinion. Not to mention there arent anymore BBATI cards since even ones marked as such are manufactured by Sapphire. Everyones hands are just as dirty.

NVIDIA PureVideo Technology
Dedicated programmable on-chip video processor
MPEG-2 video encode and decode
High Definition MPEG-2 and WMV9 hardware decode acceleration (up to 1080i)
Post Processing Features
Spatial-Temporal De-Interlacing (adaptive)
NTSC 3:2 Pulldown / Bad Edit correction
PAL 2:2 Pulldown correction
High quality 4x5 video scaling and filtering
Microsoft Video Mixing Renderer (VMR)
Integrated HDTV output (with HDCP support)

 

[Sxotty]

They're only trying to make money like those who pushed for the protection systems. That is the only reason for HDCP afterall.

No, see it is supposedly about piracy.

Since this is the case, Hollywood should have come up with some silly plan and then made it free for anyone to use the protection. Otherwise they are simply gouging in to many places. I am not buying anymore DVDs until bluray and HD gets settled, and that may be years. So only rentals for me I suppose...

 

[ANova]

No, see it is supposedly about piracy.

Is that sarcasm? I can't tell.

It's not the piracy itself, it's that it supposedly causes them to lose money. Even though they cannot seem to comprehend that duplicating 1s and 0s doesn't cost anything to anyone. Many people who download the stuff wouldn't buy it even if they couldn't download it, either because they simply can't afford it or don't think it worth their money.

 

[Mintmaster]

I still don't see how the copy protection that HDCP provides will last for long. If the people designing the hardware know how to encode, decode, and handshake between devices, then they must know how to snoop on the communication and decode it.

Anyone know enough about HDCP to tell me why I could be wrong?

 

[PeterT]

Seems like I'll just have to download pirated HD content instead of buying it if I actually want to watch it in HD. It boggles the mind.

 

[EX||illuminati]

I still don't see how the copy protection that HDCP provides will last for long. If the people designing the hardware know how to encode, decode, and handshake between devices, then they must know how to snoop on the communication and decode it.

Anyone know enough about HDCP to tell me why I could be wrong?

These devices are going to become very popular. http://www.engadget.com/2005/07/15/spatz-techs-dvimagic-killing-on-hdcp/

One of the reasons dvd's were successful was the quality improvement out of the box connected to any TV. With blu-ray and hd-dvd people are only going to see noticeable improvement if they have exactly the correct equipment. In the end I see HDCP doing far more harm then good for everyone, consumers and electronic vendors.

 

[LeGreg]

Here's coming to the restaurant. Table for two. Eheh.

"Hi"
"Hi, I would like huh.."
"I'm sorry but as it is I can't serve you. You first need to go to the hat shop next door and buy this wonderful hat with feathers before I can serve you."
"err. I've always eaten here without wearing a hat. Why would I need to buy a hat now ?"
"Sure. There was no technical reasons we couldn't serve you if you had no hat. But we've just signed an agreement with the shop next door that makes it legally impossible for us to serve you if you didn't get a hat from that shop before."
"What the ..! I'm off. I'm leaving to another restaurant"
"Actually all the restaurants in town have signed the same agreement with that hat shop. Really you shouldn't complain. What you should realize is that hat is not really a *hat*, it's more like an *enabler*. After buying this one you'll be able to enjoy any restaurant in town without constraint."

So comply or starve !

 

[Sxotty]

Is that sarcasm? I can't tell.

It was tongue in check to say the least, and sarcasm yes, but the point was it is supposedly to disable unauthorized copying, and if that is their goal hollywood hsould make it free

 

[Geo]

Not to mention there arent anymore BBATI cards since even ones marked as such are manufactured by Sapphire. Everyones hands are just as dirty.

Umm, no. That just doesn't fly. As a consumer, I don't care who the subcontracter is, I care who's name is on the box. It is just not reasonable to presume that somehow Sapphire built the "BBA" cards that way without ATI's knowledge and approval, and ATI is now "shocked, shocked" to discover it. I'd be stunned if any of our ATI friends hereabouts would suggest something like that. They might have other points they'd like to make about this situation, but you'd have to scrape my jaw off the floor if they pulled that one out. . .

 

[Geo]

I am a bit angry with Ati about this, they claim "DVI 1.0 compliant / HDMI interoperable and HDCP ready" for the x1000 series - I was going to buy a x1000 card for my HTPC (currently using integrated GF 6150) to be able to play Blu-ray and/or HD-DVD when the time comes. (I know that the chips itself might very well be HDCP ready, but I think most people reading the specs will expect shipping products will be able to use HDCP when the time comes).

Well, the key phrase there is "was going to". Now you're educated. . .and can make that decision with this in mind. . .

Just curious, since this is a serious concern for you. . what do HD/BRD PC drives have to cost (max) for you to be all "itchy trigger finger" about it?