The filters were installed to unscramble the channels. Not the other way around. We had a filter for Cinemax that we’d put in line as it would get to our cable box in the house.
ramble81@lemm.ee 3 weeks ago
I remember when cable was analog, channels you didn’t pay for were blocked with a frequency filter. let’s say channels 13-60 were 425-475Hz (purely an example) there would be a little device connected to your coax that would filter it out. The thing was though, they did this in the cable box usually in your yard. So all you had to do was go out at night, pop the box open (wasn’t hard) and remove the filter to get free channels.
Then they moved to digital and all things changed.
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 3 weeks ago
AtariDump@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Might depend on where you were; I know where I am it filtered the signal out.
I know this because we didn’t get HBO until there was this random coax filter lying on the ground next to the telephone pole in front of the house.
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 3 weeks ago
Could be. I know this because we owned the filter that gave it to us when installed. Each cable company could have been doing something different, though.
jaaake@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
The one in my yard was inside a green plastic dome with a lock connecting the dome to a collar around the base… only the entire thing was connected to the ground with a thin wooden stake. We just lifted the entire covering out of the ground, still locked. Unscrew the filter, free HBO!