Digital television receivers

General Questions
#1

How “universal” are digital television receivers? If I have a receiver which works with one local cable company and then move to a different area, will the old receiver work with the new cable company’s digital signal?

(My local cable company saw fit to use off-the-shelf RCA receivers with a smart card thingy, and sell them rather than rent them. I’m trying to decide whether or not I should try to sell the receiver to someone else in my building before I leave.)

Thanks.

#2

I don’t have the info in front of me, but I own a DirectTV box that functions as a off-air receiver, off-air HDTV receiver, and digital cable box. To use it as a digital cable box, I have to set it to 1 of 2 or 3 different formats of digital cable that it supports. So if your box only supports 1 format, it probably isn’t “universal”…

-lv