As spotted by CordCuttersNews, HDHomeRun’s new CONNECT QUATRO 4K network OTA tuner with ATSC 3.0 support has started arriving to backers of their Kickstart campaign and is now available for pre-order by anyone. This is the first tuner of its kind to support the new ATSC 3.0 over-the-air broadcast standard which adds support for 4K video, HDR, and advanced surround sound formats. The new standard is still in early deployment across the US, so check if it’s available in your area before buying. The HDHomeRun CONNECT QUATRO 4K is $199.99 and features 2 ATSC 3.0/1.0 tuners and 2 ATSC 1.0 tuners, for 4 simultanious streams through their Fire TV app or numerous other platforms.
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I got the email alert a few days ago, but at 200.00 and no 3.0 TV in my area, confirmed by an owner who ran a scan and found none, I just couldn’t see buying yet. Maybe this time next year.
I think it still works on ATSC1.0.
I still have my old 2 tuner silver Connect and I guess I’ll just use it until there are 3.0 signals in my area. The truth is 200.00 is really pretty low, considering what forecasters said tuners would cost at first. I wonder if cost had anything to with tuner choices made by SD.
I’m one of the Kickstarter backers and recently received my tuner. Boston is another place with no ATSC 3.0 broadcasts yet.
The ATSC 3.0 compatible tuner is only $50 more than the non-4K Connect Quatro. So even if you don’t have any NextGen TV (the new marketing-friendly name for ATSC 3.0) broadcasts near you for a while it’s not a total loss.
It’s an odd choice to make only two of the four tuners ATSC 3.0. If one is going to spend that much on a four tuner box, they are going to want all four to be ATSC 3.0 capable (with ATSC 1.0 compatibility).
I think what will happen is there will be content on ATSC3.0 and ATSC1.0 for several years. So this device will aggregate both signals into a unified source.
This is a complete guess, since I haven’t looked into this device in detail yet, but my guess is that they added ATSC 3.0 tuners to their existing QUATRO with as few changes as possible to keep the price down as a first offering. I’m guessing there is some bottleneck that they didn’t want to change that doesn’t support 4 ATSC 3.0 tuners. It may simply be the ethernet port, since it’s a 100 Mbps connection. ATSC 3.0 can theoretically reach 57 Mbps per stream, so you simply can’t support 4 streams without gigabit ethernet if they’re high bitrate streams.
But the ATSC 3.0 tuners say they are ATSC 3.0/1.0. Do ATSC 3.0 tuners natively support both formats? Or, are there really 6 tuners in this device and a mechanism to toggle two of the tuners between 3.0 and 1.0?
ATSC 3.0 tuners are not backward compatible with ATSC 1.0 signals. That said, we are so early into the transition that it would be silly for anyone to sell an ATSC 3.0-only tuner, so the 2 ATSC 3.0 tuners in this device also have the circuitry needed to tune ATSC 1.0 channels. You can’t really say that it’s 6 tuners because it’s not like this device can tune 4 ATSC 1.0 channels AND 2 ATSC 3.0 channels at the same time. The 2 ATSC 3.0 tuners can be used for 3.0 OR 1.0 signals, but not both simultaneously.
OK. That explains the mix of tuners and why a local with one of the tuners reported compatibility with all his existing 1.0 stations.
Surprise, surprise. I was watching a recording in HDHomerun DVR, recorded earlier in the month, and while skipping through ads landed on a notice from the station the recording was from announcing they are moving their channel and will begin broadcasting in TV 3.0 effective 10/20 at 10AM, today! Strange. Just the excuse I needed to drop 200.00!