Saturday, February 13, 2010

Channel 2000

Posts about finding embedded linux in strange places are pretty common these days - but I couldn't resist this one.

Flipping channels tonight put me on channel 2000 of my Time-Warner Digital Cable, and this was the signal:



Forgive the snapshot.

But is that Red Hat 9 (not FC 9), running 2.4.24 ?

Is that my cable box? Its a standard cable company motorola DVR, which is a lot newer than 2.4.24, but it wouldn't be surprising to see MOT basing an embedded project off an old kernel. Of course, the TV is inherently networked - if not necessarily IP networked, and this kind of abandoned legacy code could be entertaining.

Of course, it might not be the cable box at all - it might just be some kind of generating equipment gone bad - and the video signal ended up on channel 2000. Not sure what is supposed to be there - I wasn't aware there were any 4 digit channels on my system.