cards, whats the score...

[chavslav]

can anyone give us the run down on the cards and what they do etc...


blue titanium, magic, gold wafer and a host of others..

do they unlock some of the channels with the dollar sign alongside it..

[BGonaSTICK]

I don't really do cards to be honest. It's a whole new ball game.

Many cards now open nothing at all. Some cards open some stuff.
Cheap cards open things that can be opened in software, like the Dreambox, Skystar and Technomate patches.
Expensive cards (maybe £50 - £120) will open otherwise unavailable packages.
That's about all I'm going to say.

What I will do is try and describe how the card business works.

Cards drive the black satellite market.

Commercial, professional 'hacking' teams take down different encryption types. Rather than give the secrets away to everyone so that they can watch free TV, they sell it.

What I mean by that, is that they commission a run of high security smart cards (RSA cards) which are themselves secure from being read by other hackers. They release files free for those cards, but you have to buy the card to load it on in the first place.

As you can see, they are very expensive for a card that might stop working the day after you buy it. Often the files dry up very quickly too, followed by the release of another new incompatible card.

That's what funds the hacking process. Sometimes the hackers work itself gets hacked. Sometimes they resell the resold hack. Sometimes it gets released into the wild, and the public gets a sniff.

It's big business.

In recent times (last two or three years) the professionals have become very greedy, changing cards far too often to try and make more money. Buyers are slowly but surely becoming more cynical and alienated, and sales are slowing down accordingly.

People have too many dud cards sitting in the back of their drawers. These are termed 'ice scrapers' as although they may have cost over £100, they are only good for scraping your windscreen in the winter.

STICK

[chavslav]

ok cheers, thanks for reply. i apologise for being late reading it, i've only just seen the replie to my posts link. which appeared when i logged in.

thanks again. i'll steer clear of the un-official cards..

[Jimdefruit]

I would add, chavslav, that you can also buy a legit subscription to various channels, depending upon which country you are in. The two favourites are the Art Sorts and Digitalb cards. There are also the 'naughty' ones for those inclined. These subscriptions take away some of the fun from the hobby but are reliable when you want to watch your favourite team getting hammered.

I have a bunch of the programmable cards like the Titanium, Penta and Fun cards together with Magic and Matrix cams. I haven't used the cards and cams for over a year now and rely on software emulations instead.