TV Tuner card , NoOb advice

HigHTecHReDNecK · 22-May-06, 11:55 PM

Ok so I'm thinkin of bite'n the bullet and getin' one of these to do some recording and movie watcin and such. My question is this , what would a good choice for a card be , with these features

1 - has to hook to cable and my TV by either S-video or RCA ( no hdtv )
2- Would like to control the TV and card and pc with a remote
3 - would like it to do my stero also
4 - under $150
5 -PCI slot

ok , so those are my wants, any adive and cards with more features would be fine. This will be my FIRST EVER tuner card so I figured i'd get some PCApex'rs experiences with various cards

I'm leaning toward the one of these

Apollo GOOG-PC TV Tuner/Video Capture + FM Radio + Remote PCI Card

MSI Digital@nywhere-ATSC W/Remote PCI Digital TV Tuner

jaziel · 23-May-06, 12:18 AM

look for deals and if your considering a new vid card consider an all in wonder card

if your not check newegg or other good sites i bought a mercury tv tuner am/fm schedule recording
tv/video capture time shifting to watch tv like a vcrut res is maxed at 720x576 with remote for 30$
but even though its a low end brand it still does what i want it to do

THRASHER2 · 23-May-06, 12:22 AM

Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-350

http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/produ...ta_pvr350.html

WinTV-PVR-350 has these great features:
	Watch TV on your PC screen using a 125 channel cable ready (or aerial) TV tuner. Surf the net while you watch TV on your PC screen!
	Record your TV shows to disk using the built-in hardware MPEG-2 encoder. At DVD quality, 2 Gigabytes of disk space is used per hour of recorded video.
	Play your video recordings on your TV set with the included hardware MPEG-2 decoder. Will play your recorded home videos, too!
	Turn your home video tapes (or TV recordings) into MPEG movies, then burn them onto CD or DVD! The included UleadÃ‚Â® DVD MovieFactoryÃ‚â„¢ allows you to author and burn Video DVDÃ‚â€™s, S-VCDÃ‚â€™s or video CDÃ‚â€™s. Play them on your home DVD* player!
	Pause live TV shows with instant replay, fast forward and rewind.
	dbx stereo decoder, for great TV sound.
	Includes WinTV-Scheduler, so you can schedule your TV recordings on a daily, weekly or once only schedule. Includes TitanTV, the on-line TV program guide, for automatic scheduling of your TV recordings.
	Includes the WinTV-Editor, so you can cut and trim your videos without losing video quality!

Marc · 23-May-06, 01:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jaziel


	look for deals and if your considering a new vid card consider an all in wonder card

I'd have to advise staying away from the A.I.W. cards, the tuners aren't that great for starters.
TV tuners get very hot, And You really dont want something that gets that hot next to your GPU.

The one T2 recommended is a good tuner.

carbongraphite · 23-May-06, 01:29 AM

thr DVICO Fusion HDTV5 RT gold, the selling point here is its the only windows HD card that does QAM decoding. aka one of the cable standards for HDTV so if your cable company doesnt encrypt you can get said channels. its $150 http://www.pcalchemy.com/index.php/c...acb93669984125

if you want a dual SDTV card the new Nvidia tuner card is supposed to be superior to the dual tuner hauppauge card

just make sure you dont end up being stuck with a lame WMC only card

jaziel · 23-May-06, 10:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marc


	I'd have to advise staying away from the A.I.W. cards, the tuners aren't that great for starters. TV tuners get very hot, And You really dont want something that gets that hot next to your GPU. The one T2 recommended is a good tuner.

oh i didnt know they got hot sorry about the uninformed info i just went for a seperate card cause it was cheaper

reflux · 23-May-06, 12:14 PM

I have a Pinnacle terrestrial tuner, and the software is pretty poor. It doesn't like my screen, it's slow, it'll only record in uncompressed MPEG (1mb/sec!!!) there's no mouse hide during TV display, the channel tuner didn't work properly last time and it flips to black + white quite a lot...basically it's pretty sucky. Still, it came with a remote and was only Ã‚Â£30 so I guess I can't really complain that much.

Dex has a Freecom one, and the software literally looks like it was written by a 14 year-old. So make sure you get a decent brand one, that'll have decent software. Hauppage are a good make, as mentioned.

Ator · 23-May-06, 09:17 PM

From what i've seen, any tuner card with ATI's Theater 550 Pro chipset has the best picture quality out there for consumers.

PurpleDiamond · 23-May-06, 09:52 PM

I think that we need some more information - for example:

Do you need a digital tuner card or an analog?
When you say you want to do stereo, do you mean you want to play audio through the PC or do you want the remote to be a universal and control your receiver/amp/CD player?
Do you need support for Windows MCE?

I have the Hauppage PVR-150 MCE and it works very well for me. The MCE kit comes with the remote and receiver so you can start using it right out of the box. I am using Windows MCE and it is so easy to use that it even passed the wife test - although she is an Enterprise Software Architect so she knows her way around software

.

HigHTecHReDNecK · 24-May-06, 01:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PurpleDiamond


	I think that we need some more information - for example: Do you need a digital tuner card or an analog? When you say you want to do stereo, do you mean you want to play audio through the PC or do you want the remote to be a universal and control your receiver/amp/CD player? Do you need support for Windows MCE? I have the Hauppage PVR-150 MCE and it works very well for me. The MCE kit comes with the remote and receiver so you can start using it right out of the box. I am using Windows MCE and it is so easy to use that it even passed the wife test - although she is an Enterprise Software Architect so she knows her way around software .

Well to answer your questions
I have comcast (soon to be Dish network) so it had to hook up to that (digital)
I want it to play audio through my PC (not as important as the TV functions)
Remote is just to change channels on the TV

just read up on the card you listed , and that seems like a good deal , and card

Yes it should support MCE 2005 ( forgot about that part )

Cyno01 · 24-May-06, 04:17 AM

I havn't really had any problems with All-In-Wonder cards or standalone ATI tuners. Watching TV from my computer on a TV looks better than just on the TV for some reason.

The guide and PVR software are pretty good too, lots of flexibility in recording format if you have the horsepower.

The Dragon Reborn · 24-May-06, 07:47 AM

I second Ator & PurpleDiamond's advice.... I've got a Sapphire Theater 550 Pro card myself....
just awesome! The Hauppauge PVR 150 and 350 cards are great as well... the latter has it's
own TV-Out/Hardware Decoder...

All cards mentioned work flawlessly with free appz like Myth TV (Linux) or MediaPortal (Windows)...
No need to buy additional software... If you want to go "Windows MCE" the "package" PurpleDiamond
suggested is nice.... but you can also buy the Twin Tuner MCE 500 model....

I recommend combining the TV Card with an ATI X1xxx series or Nvidia 6x/7x series card with a decent TV Out (s-video). Both cards have their own "driver embedded" accelerated hardware decoding.... plus
they can decode HD content...

TDR

eascarface · 24-May-06, 08:40 PM

This might help.

HigHTecHReDNecK · 24-May-06, 10:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eascarface


	This might help.

RIGHT ON , thanks for the link

THRASHER2 · 24-May-06, 11:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HigHTecHReDNecK


	RIGHT ON , thanks for the link

And the winner is ATI TV Wonder Elite Retail ***Free Shipping***

The Dragon Reborn · 25-May-06, 04:37 AM

Fun... that Anandtech article made me go for the ATI....

TDR

22-May-06, 11:55 PM		#1 (permalink)
HigHTecHReDNecK Sophist'Hoe"cated ReDNecK Reviewer	TV Tuner card , NoOb advice Ok so I'm thinkin of bite'n the bullet and getin' one of these to do some recording and movie watcin and such. My question is this , what would a good choice for a card be , with these features 1 - has to hook to cable and my TV by either S-video or RCA ( no hdtv ) 2- Would like to control the TV and card and pc with a remote 3 - would like it to do my stero also 4 - under $150 5 -PCI slot ok , so those are my wants, any adive and cards with more features would be fine. This will be my FIRST EVER tuner card so I figured i'd get some PCApex'rs experiences with various cards I'm leaning toward the one of these Apollo GOOG-PC TV Tuner/Video Capture + FM Radio + Remote PCI Card MSI Digital@nywhere-ATSC W/Remote PCI Digital TV Tuner

23-May-06, 12:18 AM		#2 (permalink)
jaziel Apex Advanced Techie	shop around look for deals and if your considering a new vid card consider an all in wonder card if your not check newegg or other good sites i bought a mercury tv tuner am/fm schedule recording tv/video capture time shifting to watch tv like a vcrut res is maxed at 720x576 with remote for 30$ but even though its a low end brand it still does what i want it to do

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23-May-06, 01:29 AM		#5 (permalink)
carbongraphite Pow - Hoe playa	thr DVICO Fusion HDTV5 RT gold, the selling point here is its the only windows HD card that does QAM decoding. aka one of the cable standards for HDTV so if your cable company doesnt encrypt you can get said channels. its $150 http://www.pcalchemy.com/index.php/c...acb93669984125 if you want a dual SDTV card the new Nvidia tuner card is supposed to be superior to the dual tuner hauppauge card just make sure you dont end up being stuck with a lame WMC only card

23-May-06, 12:14 PM		#7 (permalink)
reflux Sempr0n?	I have a Pinnacle terrestrial tuner, and the software is pretty poor. It doesn't like my screen, it's slow, it'll only record in uncompressed MPEG (1mb/sec!!!) there's no mouse hide during TV display, the channel tuner didn't work properly last time and it flips to black + white quite a lot...basically it's pretty sucky. Still, it came with a remote and was only Ã‚Â£30 so I guess I can't really complain that much. Dex has a Freecom one, and the software literally looks like it was written by a 14 year-old. So make sure you get a decent brand one, that'll have decent software. Hauppage are a good make, as mentioned.

23-May-06, 09:17 PM		#8 (permalink)
Ator At-Whore	From what i've seen, any tuner card with ATI's Theater 550 Pro chipset has the best picture quality out there for consumers.

23-May-06, 09:52 PM		#9 (permalink)
PurpleDiamond Apex Tech Maniac Supreme	I think that we need some more information - for example: Do you need a digital tuner card or an analog? When you say you want to do stereo, do you mean you want to play audio through the PC or do you want the remote to be a universal and control your receiver/amp/CD player? Do you need support for Windows MCE? I have the Hauppage PVR-150 MCE and it works very well for me. The MCE kit comes with the remote and receiver so you can start using it right out of the box. I am using Windows MCE and it is so easy to use that it even passed the wife test - although she is an Enterprise Software Architect so she knows her way around software .

24-May-06, 04:17 AM		#11 (permalink)
Cyno01 Apex Tech God	I havn't really had any problems with All-In-Wonder cards or standalone ATI tuners. Watching TV from my computer on a TV looks better than just on the TV for some reason. The guide and PVR software are pretty good too, lots of flexibility in recording format if you have the horsepower.

24-May-06, 07:47 AM		#12 (permalink)
The Dragon Reborn Apex Elite Expert Tech	I second Ator & PurpleDiamond's advice.... I've got a Sapphire Theater 550 Pro card myself.... just awesome! The Hauppauge PVR 150 and 350 cards are great as well... the latter has it's own TV-Out/Hardware Decoder... All cards mentioned work flawlessly with free appz like Myth TV (Linux) or MediaPortal (Windows)... No need to buy additional software... If you want to go "Windows MCE" the "package" PurpleDiamond suggested is nice.... but you can also buy the Twin Tuner MCE 500 model.... I recommend combining the TV Card with an ATI X1xxx series or Nvidia 6x/7x series card with a decent TV Out (s-video). Both cards have their own "driver embedded" accelerated hardware decoding.... plus they can decode HD content... TDR

24-May-06, 08:40 PM		#13 (permalink)
eascarface Apex Tech God	This might help.

25-May-06, 04:37 AM		#16 (permalink)
The Dragon Reborn Apex Elite Expert Tech	Fun... that Anandtech article made me go for the ATI.... TDR