TV Cards - PVR?

[MaDDinGO]

I am in the market for a new TV-Tuner card. One of the options I really want is PVR. Do I need to specifically get a card that states it can do PVR or can I get any TV-Card, get Power VCR and it essentially does the same thing? Thanks in advance. So more or less what I am asking is, is PVR part of the hardware or is it just a piece of software like Power VCR?

 

[tallest1]

I'd take the software route. I'd rather rely on one company's software to get my money's worth out of the card

 

[sathyan]

OP, PVR is implemented in the software. Hardware can assist it, reducing demands on the CPU.

If I can, I'd like to add a question. I'm using Leadtek WinFast TV2000XP tv-card and WinDVR software (on XP Pro). The recording and stills capture functions work just fine but "time shifting" is unstable both in the bundled WinFast software and WinDVR. Do you know of a 3rd party "time shifting" application which can be added on.

thanks
Sathyan

 

[NTB]

WinTV PVR 250. I've got one of these and it works beautifully: 125-channel cable-ready tuner, s-video & composite input, and hardware MPEG1 & MPEG2 encoding.

Nate

 

[MaDDinGO]

Originally posted by: NTB
WinTV PVR 250. I've got one of these and it works beautifully: 125-channel cable-ready tuner, s-video & composite input, and hardware MPEG1 & MPEG2 encoding.

Nate

The price seems to be more than what I want to spend. So if I buy a TV Card with remote and get WinDVR or PowerVCR, will I get the similar results? It will work like a TIVO?

 

[NTB]

Originally posted by: MaDDinGO

Originally posted by: NTB
WinTV PVR 250. I've got one of these and it works beautifully: 125-channel cable-ready tuner, s-video & composite input, and hardware MPEG1 & MPEG2 encoding.

Nate

The price seems to be more than what I want to spend. So if I buy a TV Card with remote and get WinDVR or PowerVCR, will I get the similar results? It will work like a TIVO?

It should. The problem with a setup like this - using only software to record - is that it pegs your system, using all the power you can throw at it. Especially if you try recording at a decent resolution, like something above 320x240. I tried doing this before I got the PVR 250 (used a WinTV Go! originally), and the thing would start dropping frames if I tried to do anything else while it was recording. I pretty much just had to let the system sit until the recording was done. With the 250, I don't have to worry about that - compression is done on the board, and the HDD it records to is on it's own cotroller. Doesn't slow my system down a bit.

Edit: if someone can provide the webspace, I can upload a couple of video clips captured with the card as samples.

Nate

 

[mooseAndSquirrel]

I use an ATI 9700AIW and it's software ATI MMC. You can record "just like a Tivo" and you can download TV Guides from Gemstar for every 2 week period.

I also own a Tivo, and the Tivo is 1000 times superior. The Tivo is a specially tuned Linux box, and in 2.5 years I have never had a single glitch.

The AIW is superior in only one area - you can edit the files and write them to SVCD or DVD.

Whlie the AIW does have "pause live TV" and other Tivo-like features, they just don't work as well or as smoothly. But that's ok, because I don't use my PC for that purpose anyway.

So my recommendation is to get both! The Tivo is my family''s all time favorite appliance. ever.