VidaBox ships Blu-ray / HD DVD-equipped CableCARD HTPCs

Hard to believe (well, maybe not so much) that you've had to twiddle your thumbs nearly half a year to see VidaBox actually ship those well-spec'd all-in-one media centers, but thankfully for those who've waited, deployment starts now. The firm's highly customizable LUX and MAGNUM rigs sport both Blu-ray and HD DVD support (via dual drives or in a single drive like another offering), CableCARD, 7.1 Dolby Digital HD and DTS HD surround sound, up to four OTA tuners, 4GB of RAM, and up to 9TB of onboard storage on select models. Unfortunately for those already whipping out the credit cards, placing your order won't be as easy as you'd expect, as we imagine that "call for price" bit really means "too enormous to list."

[foobarino @ Jun 8th 2007 3:25PM]

I'm still waiting for a standalone USB cableCARD tuner, maybe with a built-in H.264 encoder.

@dan Here is the info from Comcast:

http://www.comcast.com/customers/faq/FaqCategory.ashx?CatId=301

[paloooz @ Jun 8th 2007 3:37PM]

Won't happen. Out little buddy that goes by the name "DRM" has eliminated that possibility.

[Stumpy25 @ Jun 8th 2007 3:27PM]

I called,
$5100 base price
$2000 extra for cable cards
$2000 more for HD-DVD and Bluray.
$9100..... yeah I don't think so.

[David Fox @ Jun 8th 2007 3:37PM]

"...as we imagine that "call for price" bit really means "too enormous to list."

For sure - I've priced those cases - a few hundred bucks, and we all know how much the rest of the stuff costs - maybe a TOTAL of $1,500? Probably less. Seems like a good business op for someone with a little startup cash.

[Maestro @ Jun 8th 2007 3:46PM]

WOW. $9,100? When I call them does my head turn in to a giant lollipop with the word SUCKER under it?

Seriously, I have a ps3 which does blu-ray ($600), an Xbox 360 with HD DRIVE add on ($500), my HD-DVR from Time Warner ($6.95/month). So for basically the same functionality I paid $1,100 up front with a small recurring charge. Also, the 360 will run as a media center extender so throw my PC in the mix and now it's apples to apples.

I have a cable-card on a flatscreen I hung on the wall and the lack of 2-way SUCKS. Cablecard is not the answer. They need to come up with something else that works with satellite, digital cable, whatever.
M

[inny @ Jun 8th 2007 3:56PM]

$2000 just for CableCards?? That's even more expensive than Niveus! VM only adds $454 for 2 tuners and S1Digital charge $499! I bet they're buying someone else's systems and rebranding them...

[jlee104 @ Jun 8th 2007 4:33PM]

man I hate how current retail HTPC's all cost $1000 or more when in fact you can build them yourself for far less.

I mean who needs 4, yes FOUR friggin gigs of ram? one is enough! People who are stupid enough to buy this deserve to be ripped off if they dont know how to spend their money wisely

[jon @ Jun 8th 2007 4:39PM]

for high volume digital editing and engineering work the 1gig in my laptop(not even ddr2)sometimes works well enough, for someone who is only doing playback please give the extra ram to someone who can use it.

[Sean O @ Jun 8th 2007 11:35PM]

Even if this wasn't ridiculously overpriced, this kind of thing is such a waste unless you can use it in a multi-room home theater environment. And you can't. CableCARD only works with Media Center Extenders. And there are none except the 360 which is big and noisy. And does BluRay and HD-DVD work over a MC Extender? Somehow I doubt it.

So this becomes a $9000 media "server" that can only serve itself. The attractive thing about CableCARD HTPCs is multiroom distribution. Without it, WTF is the point? How many Series 3s, PS3s, and HD-DVD players can you buy for $9k?

[dan @ Jun 9th 2007 12:57AM]

Just curious, how easy is it to get CableCard from your cable company? Do they charge you extra to get CableCard? Can you get two cards, in lieu of a dual-tuner cable box?

[Ryan @ Jun 9th 2007 3:08PM]

While it may seem great on appearance the truth is that for 12-15k you still can't record from cablecard or stream blu-ray or HD-DVD to multiple zones.