I have no clue where to post this and I figured this is the best place for my questions. I have a Digital receiver from my cable company. I stopped the digital service over a year ago and I have moved since then, but my cable provider never asked for the box at any time nor have they charged me for the box. I called and asked a few general questions about "a" box to see if they had any record of me having one and it seems that they have no record of me ever using a digital box. So I got curious one day and hooked the box up to my basic cable and to my amazement I was able to get all of the digital channels and so forth. My question is, Can my provider see that I am running the box or do they have to physically come to my home and check the line to know whether I am running it or not. I just want to watch a few shows on certain days. I don't want to keep it hooked up at all times.
Simple answer is, YES, your cable provider can tell you have it hooked up to the cable. STB's as supplied by various cable provider have a feature called "talk back". This enables them to know what channels you are watching, and therefore make sure you are not accessing channels for which you have not paid a subscription.
Well then I guess I will not be hooking the box up every again. So what do I do with the thing? Do I send it back or can I sell it?