SA 8000 Guide

[cmay4]

I have been a long-time Direct Tivo user. I live in Howard County, MD and I just switched to Comcast (didn't want to pay $900 for HD Tivo and still not get locals in HD without OTA). When I signed up, I asked if I was going to get new Motorola box and was told yes. That was lie. They installed the SA 8000.

On Comcast's website, they are talking about the new guide. I assume that is the iGuide that everyone is talking about. My box defintely does not have that interface. I just got off the phone with them, and they said that Howard county only gets the SA boxes, and that there were problems rolling out the new guide. Once the bugs are fixed, it will roll out through a software upgrade.

Is this true? Can the SA8000 support the new guide?

The guide that is on the box now is HORRIBLE. It's basically a VCR with a hard drive. I know I've been spoiled by Tivo, but this is worse than I imagined.

Thanks,

Chuck

[Theauwolf]

Chuck,

I also live in Howard County and just got Comcast installed this past Sunday. They gave me the SA 3100HD and the SA 8000HD/DVR. I am scheduled for them to come back and switch out the 3100 for another 8000. Do you know if the 8300's are available in our area? Also is there a way to switch the aspect ratios on the boxes for the on demand feature? I was watching Carnivale and the on demand sent it 4:3 and the show is in 16:9 so I had a complete box around the picture.

Thanks,

Joe

[cmay4]

I've talked with them a few times, and I think we are stuck with the horrible 8000. Every other county has the Motorola except Howard and Harford. I was told we would get an interface update, but not told a date.

As for the aspect ratio, I've never used the on-demand. The other HD channels are good. However, I've seen the situation you were talking about a few times. For example, when watching the super bowl in HD, a few of the commercials looked like you describe. I'm not sure what causes that.