NTL Digital TV quality (was Re: [ILUG] Broadband in Dublin)

[Cian Davis]

Michael Watterson wrote on 10/10/07 08:38:
> Gavin McCullagh wrote:
>> On Tue, 09 Oct 2007, Michael Watterson wrote:
>>
>>> 2) In Ireland it is a criminal offence to connect unapproved
>>> equipment to cable.
>>>     
>>
>> It may be, though if you're paying for the service,  customising the
>> set-top box and not getting extra channels by it, I'd be surprised if
>> anyone would really mind.
>>   
> Unfortunately (I have it from the Horse's mouth) they do mind. 


I was going to get a DVD player for Christmas and am instead now
thinking of building a MythTV box because it works out a lot cheaper
than I thought.

This brings me to the current topic. I have Chorus (/NTL/UPC) "digital"
TV. I would like to buy something along the lines of a Twinhan DVB-C
card and take the (legally obtained) smart card out of the supplied
Sagem box, stick it into the CAM and watch digital TV via the MythTV
box. From this topic, my understanding is that is illegal. Correct?

If so, suffice to say it pisses me off. Why the hell do I have to use
their shitty box to view a standard signal when I'm not nicking it and
not asking them for support? </rant> Could someone who knows the what
the current legislation point me to it please? I am wondering if it
might be possible to whack this on Irish or EU anti-competition laws....

On a slightly different topic, is there much of a difference in quality
between full quality analogue TV signal and standard (i.e. not high-def)
DVB-C? Will I have much of a quality difference for the channels that
are transmitted on analogue as well? The box will have HDMI, YPbPr, DVI,
VGA, S-Video and composite out but I'm also wondering if the displayed,
decoded DVB-C signal goes beyond the quality of S-Video.

Regards,
Cian