TWC TV customers will be REQUIRED to have a digital adapter for ALL TV's starting next month

[soxhop411]

 
I called TWC for more info... Even if your TV has a digital tuner but no cable box (ie basic cable) you still need this as EVERY station (from CH2-90) will be going HD/digital and without out the adapter your TV will be useless. If all your TV's have a cable box you are fine

 

[Couperin47]

Yeah, after 4 botched tries they finally reordered our TW station lineup here in NH to align with their all digital lineup they are finally trying to make uniform everywhere. Considering how they have acquired literally hundreds of incompatible cable systems around the country, it has taken them a decade to finally start to bring unity to the network. At least they have added a few new channels here, (as well as a whole host of new shopping channels...are there that many old women still addicted to that 'programming' ?) and they took a few channels that were previously only available in some weird, obscure, additional bundles and made them 'free'...I'm particularly enjoying The Smithsonian Channel that was previously one you had to pay extra for.

 

[Winger 03]

Comcast down here has had this for a few years. What is shitty is that the little box you get from them for $2 or whatever does not get all the channels that the larger box gets.

 

[Chemistry Schmemistry]

Charter did this last month here. That was the end of dual-tuner TiVo. So I have to be really careful not to change the channel when I'm recording now.

On the positive side, about 100 channels I never watch are now in HD.

It's too bad there's no package out there that's just the broadcast networks (I live too far away to get them over the air), the ESPNs, Big Ten, HBO and maybe AMC.

 

[saintnick912]

Charter did this last month here. That was the end of dual-tuner TiVo.

Cablecard is a digital tuner, and the first one they have to give you for free by law. If your tivo is older than that I don't know, I have an old hd (series 3) collecting dust if you want it.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

Cox did this back in 2011 and while they told their customers (mostly through forcing us to do it while dealing with them face to face) that even modern/digital TV's wouldn't work without the adapter, any digital TV still worked just fine.  I'm not sure if this will be the case with TWC, but it might be worth waiting until the switch date to see if you can still pick up the channels without having to buy more equipment from them, even if it only saves you 2 bucks.  Worst case scenario, you find out the TV doesn't work, take a trip to the closest TWC outlet and pick up the adapter.
 
And saintnick is right.  A cable card is issued by the cable company and is basically a cable box without the case or DVR.  So TIVO should work just fine.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

TWC here did this two years ago.  Gave us a free year of "rental" on the converter boxes, then went to like $2.99 a month per box after that.
 
The built-in digital tuner on my HD set still works though it only picks up the basic tier channels (local over the airs mostly).  Sometimes a higher tier channel pops up for a little bit but then disappears again.  Had NESN coming through for about a month once (sharper HD picture than through the box too), and the free previews of the EI package usually work also.  The catch is the channels aren't mapped like they would be with a box, so they're on odd numbers like 8-12 and 34-135, and they occasionally change so you have to re-scan the dial to find them again.
 
Basically, if you want to watch anything more than the over-the-air local networks while being able to reliably find them on the same channel numbers every day, you need a converter box.  But you probably don't need one for every TV in the house if they have a digital tuner built-in.

 

[Chemistry Schmemistry]

 

Cablecard is a digital tuner, and the first one they have to give you for free by law. If your tivo is older than that I don't know, I have an old hd (series 3) collecting dust if you want it.

 

Thanks for the offer. I have a Series 2, and it just won't do the dual recorder this way. The Series 3 will, but we are already using the "free" tuner for our second television, and the setup with Charter would require another tuner and not one, but two CableCards. If I'm careful, I can make do with the one tuner until I take the time to evaluate U-Verse, which is just entering this area.