It is a novelty that insiders have been waiting for for a long time and that is about to become a reality: Tivusat’s conditional access module, the classic CAM, is about to become a simple USB sticka solution certainly more compact and simple than the PC Card module, now decidedly dated and no longer used elsewhere.
We had the chance to see one of the first working models at work: the decoding happens immediately, provided of course that the TV operating system is in a version ready to accept this solution.
The result for the user does not change: the tivusat channels can be seen with one and the other solution; However, it changes a lot for manufacturers, who will no longer be forced to provide for the PCMCIA PC Card module which is not used at all outside Europe and which therefore complicates the production of the boards and affects the production cost and therefore, indirectly, also on sale prices.
Inside the USB CAM you must still put a card, which will however be small, in SIM format (actually a cutout of today’s largest one). The rest of the operation of the system is very similar to the current one. The transition from one to another form on the market will certainly not be instantaneous and the classic CAM and the USB CAM are destined to coexist for many years, precisely to guarantee owners of dated TVs that are not compatible with the USB solution. It remains to be seen if, as hopefully, the fully operational USB CAM may cost less than the more complex one on the PCMCIA interface: everything suggests that this will be the case.
Obviously, for the solution to work, it must be supported by the TV: Philips (like the TV we saw in operation) e LG it seems that they have already adapted their 2022 models (those coming out in spring / summer to be clear) to be compatible with the USB CAM, as it should also do very soon Panasonic which has already made some working prototypes. The other main brands should follow shortly (but we do not know if already from the 2022 range, perhaps with a firmware update).
This is just a first glimpse “stolen” in a context not intended for the press. The official launch of the USB CAM is probably scheduled for this autumn, not surprisingly close to the next World Cup in Qatar. In the hope, of course, that Italy is in the game.
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