If Comcast encrypted QAM locals in my area, the first thing I would do is cancel Comcast, and next put an Antenna on my roof.

I have been tempted to help get friends and family going on MCE and extenders, but I always struggle with the whole cable card complexity. If they have problems, they become my problems. It is just too much for even the average enthusiast. The required truck-roll from the cable co is the worst part. 2 of them come, IF they know what they are doing, they stand around your house, call the office, get someone that doesn't even know what cable card is, etc. UGH it is brutal. Even if you get it all working, the often forgotten spectre of SDV looms. If DirecTV or Dish came out with compatibility, I would look closely at it, but that is always "coming". Of course, none of this is an issue for me anymore as I am in the process of ripping out MCE and going with SageTV. It runs like a champ on WHS, and the extenders play everything (without stuttering!). 4 Extenders and a 360 going on ebay soon!

fingers crossed

fingers crossed

...

fingers crossed

Mine!

I hope I get this one!

And....I hate the spoiler window too. I have gotten burned too many times with sports scores.

Man, all of those points sound painful. Another glaring omission, IMO, is the lack of OTA tuners. As cable co's continue to compress in order to offer more channels, it is nice to use OTA for your locals. TiVo has an OLD UI, but it seamlessly integrates the cable card channels in with the OTAs, a very nice feature.