[mduell]

Originally Posted by zerostar 

In theory this is PERFECT, in play not so much, there were so many problems with cable cards (not to mention monthly fees for 2 of them!) it was not worth the trouble. There are horror stories all over the net, but when it works I guess its pretty great, except you get no on-demand, for that I will stick with my DirecTV that I can take with me state-to-state

I've heard the scattered reports about bad experiences with CableCards; the early adopters got bit, but it's pretty easy now that the cable companies are used to it.
What's the usage scenario for on-demand? I had it with Comcast and I never watched it once. With Netflix (disks and streaming) there was never any significant back-catalog I wanted to watch through that awful interface.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by mduell 

Just implement CableCard and an NTSC tuner and they've got 90%+ of the realistic userbase covered. Like, you know, TiVo HD.

For the same money, you can get an Apple TV or a TiVo HD + the new Netflix set-top box. Personally I see a lot more value and functionality in the latter combination, but I acknowledge that the latter two require subscriptions.

Will the CableCard work with systems that use Smart Cards?

[mduell]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Will the CableCard work with systems that use Smart Cards?

A CableCard is a type of smart card, but the only "Smart Card" based system I've heard of is DirectTV which is not compatible with CableCard.

[besson3c]

I believe that Dish Network also uses the SmartCart, as does Bell ExpresVu in Canada... This is where complexity starts to creep in that Apple would have to find a way to overcome. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like there is a feasible way for them to do it.