Verizon FIOS - Motorola DCT700 ReplayTV

I have no idea whether anybody anywhere needs this blog post.  It's obscure.

But Google indexes EVERYTHING.  So here you go - hopefully, somewhere needs this.

I just got FIOS (giving up my Comcast in the process).  I also own (happily, and sadly) a ReplayTV model 5000.  And I needed to get the ReplayTV to work with the FIOS setup.

ReplayTV, not TiVo? Yeah, I know. However, at the time I bought the ReplayTV it was a little like - like VHS / Beta - nobody knew who would win. I picked the ReplayTV because it had two things going for it:

1. It had a bigger hard drive for the price. Equals more storage space.
2. I could do a one-time buyout of the monthly subscription cost (which essentially pays for the channel guide to be constantly updated.) One-time $250 for a lifetime of channel guide. TiVo didn't offer that, and it seemed a drop-dead easy financial choice.

These days, ReplayTV support (at http://replay.com) - which was around for a few years after the company went belly-up (via DirectTV, which bought the assets) - would answer the phone and still take support questions. As of today - 15 Nov 2009 - that seems to have come to an end, too.
Update 9 Dec 2009: Support appears to be back at a new URL, and they're answering the phones. Hooray!

My Comcast setup was:
Comcast Analog cable<---coax--->ReplayTV<---coax--->TV

Since the ReplayTV had an analog cable tuner in it, changing ReplayTV channels directly selected the cable channel, recorded as needed, and fed the TV.

When I switched to FIOS, I discovered that unlike Comcast, there's a digital signal on the coax coming from the wall. Verizon supplies a converter to change that into an analog signal, but FIOS supplies you with a separate Infrared (IR) remote to control that converter and have it output a particular FIOS channel onto the analog coax.

Here's the way your FIOS has to work:

FIOS digital cable<---coax--->Motorola DCT700 (digital-to-analog signal) converter<---coax--->ReplayTV<---coax--->TV

(Actually, there's a stereo in between the ReplayTV & the TV, but it's irrelevant for this post.)

There core problem you need to solve is how to get around the need to use the FIOS remote. Somehow, the ReplayTV needs to tell the DCT700 converter which channel to send. This is how you:

• Get the ReplayTV remote to select which channel you're watching when you watch live;
• Get the ReplayTV to record the right channel when you're not around.

It turns out that this is actually an old problem that some people had with older analog cable boxes, too. Your ReplayTV can use something called an "IR Blaster" (supplied with the unit) to solve the problem. This gizmo is a wire that plugs into the back of the ReplayTV at one end, and has a little Infrared (IR) transmitter at the other that the ReplayTV can use to shine an IR signal at the cable converter (the DCT700) to change the channels, just as-if it were using the remote that FIOS gave you.

The easy part of the setup is the mechanics. Go find your IR Blaster (or order a new one; I saw some on eBay). Plug the jack-end of the IR Blaster into the back of the ReplayTV; the other end (with the IR bulb) has a sticky side you can adhere to the front of the DCT700 about 3/4" from the right side of the front of it (where is where the IR receiver is located.)

The hard part, though, is that the ReplayTV needs to know the vendor-specific IR codes to send out that IR Blaster. Your ReplayTV knows about tons of "IR Codes", but unfortunately, the DCT700 isn't one of the ones listed.

So here's the end of the story: For those that find themselves with a ReplayTV and a Motorola DCT700 (saying this multiple times so Google gets it somehow), the answer is to follow some directions that are (still) listed on the (still-online as of today) ReplayTV online support site. Though they exist for a slightly different purpose, and though they don't refer to the DCT700 directly, they turn out to work correctly.

(Update 9 Dec 2009) I've decided that - just in case the ReplayTV support site decides to go away someday, I'm going to restate the instructions here. Mostly for my purposes, since I'm likely to need it again someday. If DigitalNetworks wants to come tell me to take this down, let them; I'll comment it out, until they take it offline... ;-)

1. Press the menu button and press select.
2. Select "Setup"
3. Select "Change (Network) Dialing and Input settings"
4. Select the input that you have your cable box assigned to.
5. Select "Cable Box"
6. Select your cable lineup
7. Select "Continue" on the "IR Blaster" page
8. If you have a ReplayTV 4000 or later, you'll first see a list for General Instruments, Motorola, and Other. Choose Other. Then, you'll see the complete list of Cable box brands.
9. Select "General Instrument" from the "Cable Box Brand" Page
10. Select "other" from the list of IR. codes available
11. Select "0015" and press the ">" (right cursor button)
12. Select "0015" and press the ">" (right cursor button) one more time
13. Press the "<" (left cursor button) to get back to the list of General Instruments codes.
14. Select "0476" (DO NOT SELECT 4476) and press the ">" (right cursor button)
15. At this point you should be able to select the "Select" button and then
16. "Keep all settings"

This should flush the code "4476" out and you should be up and running. If not, please use one of the following codes to replace "0015".

• 0160
• 0392
• 0276
• 0877
• 0899

I hope this helps somebody, somewhere.