TV tuner cards

[Chadder007]

Originally posted by: mcveigh
I have a hauppauge pvr-250 (non-mce) I love it. my next card will be either the PVR-500 for it's dual tuners or the plextor PX-TV402U external USB tuner and DIVX ENCODER!!! http://www.plextor.com/english/products/TV402U.htm
it supported in sagetv, it uses about 1/3 the space to save a file.

....interesting. So it does the encoding in hardware for DIVX and also can do MPEG? I wonder how good the tuning is though.... 12 bit ? 10 bit? ...8?

 

[Vernor]

You can't a have discusion of TV cards, without mentioning what they're going to be connected to.


Tuners, BTW, only work with analog sources.

 

[mcveigh]

Originally posted by: Chadder007

Originally posted by: mcveigh
I have a hauppauge pvr-250 (non-mce) I love it. my next card will be either the PVR-500 for it's dual tuners or the plextor PX-TV402U external USB tuner and DIVX ENCODER!!! http://www.plextor.com/english/products/TV402U.htm
it supported in sagetv, it uses about 1/3 the space to save a file.

....interesting. So it does the encoding in hardware for DIVX and also can do MPEG? I wonder how good the tuning is though.... 12 bit ? 10 bit? ...8?

I'm not sure, try the sagetv forums as I think they may be the only 3rd party program supporting it.
meediotv says they will but thier tv stuff is still very beta

Vernor: true display has a lot to do with it. I'm not sure but I think in europe there are a lot more digital tv options. I think some cable companies in the US do digital siganls as well . there are digital tuners for these.
ex: http://hauppauge.com/Pages/prod_digital.html

 

[orion5010]

I guess the main thing im looking for is a card that will let me record TV to the format that alot of these bittorrent files are in. (A 30 min show; 21min without commercials is usually about 175mb with 512 x 384 dimensions and very clear looking) I think these are divx files... but im not positive. Anyway... would the PVR 250 let me do this... or do i need something like the plextor?

Sorry if someone has already hinted at this... im not really familiar with all hardware/software encoding/decoding stuff.

 

[orion5010]

bump

 

[HomerSapien]

Yes it will, and no it wont.

The hauppage card records to mpeg2. You can set the recording to different qualities, such as vcd to a max of 5gb per hour. I have the pvr-250(love it) and use autogordian knot to make everything xvid/divx. I didnt get the plextor because i wanted to cut the commercials out first and then encode. If i understood right, you cant really do that if it is in divx format already. I may be wrong, but i havent seen any programs that do that yet, but it is still a very good recorder.

I use Sage Tv for my pvr software. It blows the hauppage stuff away.

Basically here is my setup:

Sage Tv software to record-> cut the commercials with womble mpeg vcr->autogordian knot to divx/xvid

Im not sure how to create torrents, but i think you could google it pretty easily.

 

[Vernor]

Those bittorrnt files are sourced from 1080I HDTV.


That's why they look so good.

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: KDOG
I have the ATI TV Wonder VE and I am dissapointed in the image quality. Too grainy... I want to get a card that has an excellent picture, so I will be watching this thread carefully...

If you can afford it, the MyHD 120 HDTV/DTV/ATV card is fantastic for quality. The DVI outputting daughterboard costs extra, but I think most people who get the MyHD 120 probably get the daughterboard, which requires an adjacent slot. The picture quality of DTV is far superior to ATV, and of course, HDTV has literally 5 times more resolution than DTV. Even analog on the MyHD 120 is a lot less noisey than on my former Leadtek TV2000XP Deluxe. However, you will pay up to maybe $300 if you get the optional daughterboard.

The MyHD also has pretty good software and drivers and they continue to evolve. The latest beta driver and application (freely available) supports timeshifting as well as "regular" PVR functions. Best place to research TV cards is probably the AVS Forums.

 

[mcveigh]

Originally posted by: HomerSapien
Yes it will, and no it wont.

The hauppage card records to mpeg2. You can set the recording to different qualities, such as vcd to a max of 5gb per hour. I have the pvr-250(love it) and use autogordian knot to make everything xvid/divx. I didnt get the plextor because i wanted to cut the commercials out first and then encode. If i understood right, you cant really do that if it is in divx format already. I may be wrong, but i havent seen any programs that do that yet, but it is still a very good recorder.

I use Sage Tv for my pvr software. It blows the hauppage stuff away.

Basically here is my setup:

Sage Tv software to record-> cut the commercials with womble mpeg vcr->autogordian knot to divx/xvid

Im not sure how to create torrents, but i think you could google it pretty easily.

HomerSapien: I use sage as well. waht's womble? and do you have gordianknot do this all automatically or do you go in and manually convert to divx?
I use commercial detect and love it!

 

[styrafoam]

Originally posted by: mcveigh

Originally posted by: HomerSapien
Yes it will, and no it wont.

The hauppage card records to mpeg2. You can set the recording to different qualities, such as vcd to a max of 5gb per hour. I have the pvr-250(love it) and use autogordian knot to make everything xvid/divx. I didnt get the plextor because i wanted to cut the commercials out first and then encode. If i understood right, you cant really do that if it is in divx format already. I may be wrong, but i havent seen any programs that do that yet, but it is still a very good recorder.

I use Sage Tv for my pvr software. It blows the hauppage stuff away.

Basically here is my setup:

Sage Tv software to record-> cut the commercials with womble mpeg vcr->autogordian knot to divx/xvid

Im not sure how to create torrents, but i think you could google it pretty easily.

HomerSapien: I use sage as well. waht's womble? and do you have gordianknot do this all automatically or do you go in and manually convert to divx?
I use commercial detect and love it!

Womble mpegVCR is a program that is used to cut/splice video without re-encoding. Very convienient.


There is a HUGE thread in the hot deals forum about the Leadtek TV2000xp Deluxe. Lots of good tuner information in there, it would probably pay to read through it. I have a leadtek 200oxp deluxe, I'm very happy with it.