TV Card

[Darthshearer]

Anyone reccomend a TV card for a PC?



thanks

 

[babs]

Do you want hardware mpeg encoding (for recording?) If so the Hauppauge DRv-350 is excellent, it'll do hardware encoding and decoding at the same time, so you can watch a recording and record at teh same time no problems.

 

[smurkin]

I just bought a Leadtek TV2000 XP, iirc it was about 35 quid...cheap as chips....it captures to mpeg1 (say, vcd), mpeg4 (e-mail) or mpeg2 (DVD) - picture & sound is good (I have a philips wireless sender to my pc...then a coverter from scart into my tv card) - capture quality is good from what I've seen & it does direct burn (Haven't tried this to DVD yet as my DVD recorder has been dispatched yet). It has pause live tv, picture in picture, time shifting, fm tuner, it will download program info for recording (doesn't work with sky so I havent tried this...it requires subscription, but I believe comes with one year free), has a remote (which I havent tried yet). Hell, for the money, its really good.

I bought it to burn stored stuff from my sky plus onto DVD for long term.

Theres some ulead software for burning/recoding viddy - reviews say its a bit basic - I havent tried it yet.

It IS a budget card...so it will use your sound card to playback audio & it is only stereo and not surround like some of the sophistico cards

Only complaint ??? Doesn't come with dedicated mpeg player...so you have to use the wintv software.

/edit...I looked at hauppage...I thought it was a bit pricey...the hardware coding feature is probably why...so I would imagine you could record a program and do cpu-intensive stuff at the same time...I havent tried this with the leadtek card yet.

 

[Darthshearer]

Cheers

Where did you get the card from smurkin? Also where do I get a "philips wireless sender to my pc...then a coverter from scart into my tv card" from? Cheers again

 

[smurkin]

TV card - the dreaded overclockers (£ 39.07)

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/TV_Cards.html

Amazon do the philips senders, iirc, at a good price....say 90 quid or perhaps even argos (mine was from argos £108).

Note on the analogue sender.....philips is a good one...looks nice & has the best quality of the 2 or 3 I have tried PLUS its dual channel/scart so you can hook up your DVD player/video/whatever BUT the picture quality is VERY dependant on placement of the receiver & is somewhat all or nothing....its also sensitive to my microwave oven ...

The other thing to note....viewing output from your TV on your monitor will show all the flaws...remember even digital sky is compressed & what looks smooth on your low res tv - might be grainy or even pixelated on your monitor...but burn a vcd or DVD and play it back on your TV...you should hardly notice any difference

As for the converter....should be say 10 quid from maplins...go for scart to s-video if you can...

 

[Darthshearer]

Smurkin

Thanks for the help just a quick one for you. Is This the wireless thingy I will need?

 

[smurkin]

yup..thats half the price I paid..same kit

Suggest you check out the reviews tho

The only big problem I have found is when the infra red link is
connected. I find channels changing by themselves! This is due to
the fact one of my neighbours has a similar system, which shares
the frequency.

Heheh...that could be a bit of a shit Appratently not good with NTL or Telewest controls tho :/

 

[xane]

Don't get Hauppauge, their software and drivers are crap.

 

[Darthshearer]

yup..thats half the price I paid..same kit

Suggest you check out the reviews tho



Heheh...that could be a bit of a shit Appratently not good with NTL or Telewest controls tho :/

d'oh I have NTL