This e-mail was sent, it said for all of $14.00, one can get a legal de-scrambler for the Cable TV, with of course, payment to an address in another stae.
Is this possible?
most likely no. who was the email from?
It’s legal to own one. It’s not legal to use it to get movies for free. It’s called Theft-of-services. For $14.95, I’d question the quality of the merchandise, too.
You can go buy a descrambler and hook it up, but legally you need to inform your cable company that you’re getting every channel so they can bill you appropriatly. Lets see pay per view on 24/7…
I remember that offer & its still floating around the net?
What you get is plans for some stupid thing that would get you free cable in 1980 but not today with the new cable equipment which is immune to that stupid box.
Real descramblers are $400+ these days.
Not at all, a test chip and a cable box cost a lot less than that.
I do not know about the specific offer you saw, but I know for fact that one can buy a chip for their particular cable box (yes, you need a cable box) in the $15 - $40 range and easily solder it in. The example I know about involved a Zenith box and a chip. The only difficult part was buying a set of “security torx” tools to remove the box screws. The set of tools was less than $10. The chip enabled the box to pick up almost every channel, including 24/7 pay-per-view.
This jists of the posts are correct. Remember when you didn’t OWN your telephone. The telephone company did. You paid them a fee. On most Cable bills you are paying a fee to “Rent” the box. (it’s often a hidden fee of a $1.00 or so a month)
Thus if you buy a box they have to not charge you the rental fee. They still can charge you for the service. Like the phone company does now.
BTW I read the baby bells still lease out phones. They said they will do so as long as there is a demand for it.
The address given to mail your bucks to is:
Consumer Services P O Box 283 Johnston, Iowa 50131
Just read a message that Radio Shack did sell one component needed for this, but such a fuss was made they quit selling it. If it is sold at Radio Shack, guess it can’t be that good.
If all else fails remember Macdonald’s Rule:
No legitimate business ever has to tell you their product is perfectly legal.
In order to modify your cable box with a chip, you have to know which chip & which box you have…So maybe you can do it for $40.00 yourself, however buying a pre-chipped box is going to be around 400.00 maybe its less today. Shucks, all the plans for the real thing, parts & all, are free on the net. Including satellite, DSS, etc descramblers.
I think satellite descramblers would be better because they don’t send a signal back that you’re hooked up 
they is a simple way to steal cable. speaking from experience, there are some websites which sell the ever elusive “black box” a device to descrable your cable signal. basically the cablin line goes into the black box, descrambles the signal and sends it to your cable box. it cost $180 two years ago. i split the cost with my two roomates and watch all the pay per view or what every channel i wish. you still need to pay for basic cable because the box only works when there is a signal to descrable, but the box pays for it self if you were ordering pay channels (HBO etc.) unfortunatly i did not order the box online, my roomate did and i do not know the URL. It is in no way legal. the advantage of this is approach to stealing cable is that you can remove the black box.
Customer: Hi I want a cough test chip.
Evil Chip Dealer: Sure what box and where do you live?
Its really that simple, they send you instructions too. No soldering involved but if you knock the box too hard the chip pops out and you have to go through the trouble of reinserting it.
I have seen a $300-$400 box that supposedly descrambles every cable company’s scrambler, regardless of method. It probably senses whats coming down the line or maybe you have to keep pressing buttons until it kicks in. Its certainly not worth it unless you’re especially lazy and have money to burn. Well, unless you travel and really need the playboy channel to work in every motel you stay in.