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by omega_rythm 4140 days ago
> The only experience that's worse is those set-top boxes the cable companies provide you with.

I don't know about the American market. Over here (France), set-top boxen aren't so bad. And there are regular software upgrade; some of them even include games and apps.
1 comments
ChrisClark 4140 days ago
In Canada it's like he said though. Press a button, there is just enough of a delay to wonder if you pressed it hard enough, then it starts moving... slowly.
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omega_rythm 4139 days ago
It may have to do that often actions on set top boxes are related to accessing content, for which the software has to check permissions; these are usually embedded in the stream (think mumultiplexed), and the decoder needs to receive the frames before being able to extract the content and display it. Cable network has very high latency (compared to fiber or adsl).

If some of the credential checks are stored in a separate device (dongle, smartcard ), then it could take even longer.

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