Townshend:

Mine shipped as well, yesterday, via DHL.  Should be here tomorrow.  Comcast is coming Thursday.  Did anyone else have to pay the $17.xx fee per CableCARD for installation?

They told me there would be a charge of $16.95 for the install (one fee; not per card); the customer service rep then told me that if I got the service protection plan at $3.72/month this would be waived.  They came installed and the technician said there would be no charge because I had the protection plan.  My bill however showed the $16.95; I called and they told me the first rep should not have told me that; change to service is not covered; and they took it off anyways.

Bottom line is they wanted $16.95 for the install of the 2 cards but I got it dropped.  Might be a regional price.

Chris

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bjdraw:

The stock must of replenished as I ordered mine on 3/31 with a promise date of 5/22, and it is now marked as Shipped.

Congrats to you.  I ordered mine 3/30 and they still don't show shipped.   Guess its not a first come first serve basis. 

I went into the local Comcast office and just picked up the CC myself when I was picking up a HDTV Cable box.  I put the card into my TV, called comcast to give them the host information, and in a couple mins was fine. I think Comcast is trying to force tech-visits to reduce install problems from people who don't know what they are doing (ie, positive experience from the start).  Also, techs understand the cabling and most people don't.  Except for the extremely few of us (compared to the mass general) here that can accomplish this, most need the help/visit.

The charge is standard for any visit of a tech to your house. Comcast (in this area atleast) starting charging $17/visit for ANY type of visit, regardless of the problem.

Im a true believer in, "If its Comcast's fault its their dime, if its my fault its my dime". That use to be Comcast's policy, but they changed it.  Outside of "install" fees, visit fees can be negated with the service protection plan only now.

I am typing this on my new xps420 that I ordered April 6 along with my dual ATI tunners.  While the 420 shipped right away, the tunners showed a ship date of 5/23. 

So I called Dell to get some more info on the 21 day return policy.  They were very helpful, and I explained that I wanted to test the whole system together before deciding to keep it or not.  The customer service rep, Roy, said that not only would he notate my order so that I could return the entire system after testing my cable cards, but he also checked to see if he could move my tuners' ship date up. 

Today he called me back and told me they are scheduled for delivery this Thursday!  Very cool, and I have to say that Dell definitely impressed me with the customer service.

I would recommend giving them a call and explaining your situation.  It def helped me!

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Dell XPS 420 - Vista Ultimate x86
2 x ATI Digital Cable Tuners
HDHomerun Tuner
1.75 TB storage

Xbox 360 + 40" Sony Bravia XBR4 LCD = Living Room
Xbox 360 + 50" Samsung Plasma = Media Room
Linksys DM2200 + 27" Sony Wega = Bedroom

Installed two new cablecards in my tuners last night, thankfully I was able to do a self-install.  After the first call, it didn't seem to get proper authorization and I was getting only the locals and locals in HD.  I called again and they did it and it worked.  Took about an hour total from the first call to getting signals on all stations.

No problems so far and I couldn't be happier with the setup.  It does everything I want and with the HDHR, I really only need two tuners. 

Hope you have similar luck.

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XPS420 w/ 2 ATI OCURs
HDHomerun
DMA2100 Extender x 2

Awesome, good to hear it worked out Monty.  Hopefully, I have the same experience!  Just received the two receivers today and having Comcast come tomorrow night to install the CableCARDs.  Will let everyone know how it goes.

Thanks for sharing, I expect to get my tuner tomorrow. I'm also using a HDHR, but also have a 3rd ATSC PCI tuner. Four tuners should be plenty for my family.

I'm replacing my TiVo with VMC, so I'm going to try to pull a lilttle switcharoo with the CableCARDs before resorting to wasting a Saturday on Verizon.

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Ben
How good can it be, if it isn't HD?
Engadget HD

Verizon will have to re-pair and activate the cable cards. You can't just pull them out and stick them in the ATI

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Dell xps420 w/ dual ATI cable cards
Hdhomerun for QAM
Panasonic 50" Plasma fed by xbox 360
Panasonic 42" plama fed by xbox 360
5TB in storage and counting

Ohh I know, I've already tired that with my tv before and it didn't work.

I have however swaped out a defective TiVo Series3 without reparing either  CableCARD. No I didn't expect it to work either and I most certianly don't  understand how it worked, but it has been for a few months now.

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Ben
How good can it be, if it isn't HD?
Engadget HD

BTW for those who have or are getting the ATI tuners I noticed they are not up to the latest firmware.  The ones they came with are dated back to April 07.  The latest were released last October and can be found here:

http://ati.amd.com/support/drivers/vista32/ocur-vista32.html

yums:

I would recommend giving them a call and explaining your situation.  It def elped me!

I called Dell several times, including asking why someone who ordered AFTER me has tuners shipping when mine are not.  I HAVE an RMA for my XPS 420 and am waiting to cancel my order and send everything back if my tuners are not hear before the 21 day mark.  All the CSR did was make a note on my account about it.  He NEVER offered to extend the return policy for me.

Not one person at Dell cared any time I called and just said "Your order date is this.  There is nothing we can do". I guess it really is YMMV when you call customer support.  So yet, another person getting their tuners who ordered after me.  I've never ordered from Dell before this, and now I'm starting to realize why.

Thanks for the heads up on the firmware. I was ready to assume that it was updated since the firmware is from late last year. The update fixed the one problem I had during setup. I like how I got the notification email from Dell this morning about my tuners shipping. Thank a lot.. they are already hooked up to my PC. My friend had his tuners cancelled because Dell said he didn't approve the delay fast enough. Dell can't figure out how to reinstate the tuner order now and wants him to order a new system and return the PC just to get the tuners again.

I received my ATI tuner tonight and although I had to fight with it for a few hours I got it running. Not sure why I had to run the setup so many times before it finally work, but it's working great now.

The funny part is that as I expected, I didn't have to re-pair the CableCARD.

So far the only thing I don't like is that if I tune to a channel that I don't get, it doesn't fail gracefully. Instead of a nice message letting me know I don't get the channel, it kinda sits there blank for a few minutes. Ultimatly it doesn't matter much as I've removed them from the guide. But even that took some time since it kept trying to show me a preview of channels I don't get.

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Ben
How good can it be, if it isn't HD?
Engadget HD

No problem!  I got the same e-mail too yesterday morning about the tuners shipping..even though I already had them in my hands.  Thanks for the heads up Dell! :-)

I just got a email from Dell today about $419 off an XPS system; naturally I logged in to see how much I may have overspent when I bought mine.  I was surprised to see that Dell is not offering the ATI CableCard tuners as part of XPS 420 systems anymore.  I went back to check all XPS 420s; not just the promotional link; but they too don't have it.  Might be a temporary thing until ATI can replenish stock, but thought it was interesting.

I would love to know what is going on with Dell/ATI.  Is it:
1) ATI can't keep up with the demand?
2) ATI is going in another direction with CableCards? (perhaps internal?)
3) Any other suggestions?

I also noticed that it now says warranty for ATI tuners (despite not listing them) is supplied by ATI.  I am almost positive it didn't say this when I bought mine.

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