Can u program a regular digital cable box to turn itself on and change channels when u r not at home 2 use vcr

Question

I have a regular digital cable box. Is it possible to program it to turn on and off and to change channel so I can use my vcr with it when I am not at home? I do not want a DVR box or service.

Answer 1

Yes the settings file will let you save vcr setting that will permit what you want. I use it all the time for my dvd recorder. (it replaced my vcr. Remember to set your vcr also. Both must be set. You will need to set the vcr to record off of channel 3 (or 4) whichever you have set the cable to play on your tv. It's that simple.

Answer 2

Depends on the box.

Turning on the box and switching channel is the easy box. All set-top boxes with 'record' capability can do it.

Check if your set-top has an IR blaster. If it has, it can send an IR command to your VCR (you need to program the IR blaster of course once to recognize your VCR) to start recording at the given time.

There are also VCRs with their own IR blasters that can send commands to the set-top box.

All that said, if you get a PVR, you will NEVER want to use VCRs again. Technology moves on, time to go away from analog media.

Answer 3

It depends upon the cable box. You probably need to leave the box turned on, but can program it to change the channels, using options found when you get program info.

I have comcast, and there is both a "reminder" (which does nothing other than flash a reminder on the screen 1 minute before the program starts) and "record" which will change the channel.

Hope this helps!