Hardware MPEG2 TV Tuners Compared

EconolineCrush writes "The Tech Report has put together an intriguing comparison of TV tuner cards with hardware MPEG2 acceleration from ATI, eVGA, and Hauppauge. The article examines CPU utilization for typical PVR tasks and highlights some very apparent image quality differences between the three cards. Testing was apparently done with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, but does anyone have experience with the cards in MythTV?"

Comments

hauppauge

[BitchAss]

The hauppauge card is excellent with MythTV. Myth seems like it was built for the hauppauge card. The best Howtos are written with the hauppauge card in mind.

Hauppauge and Mythtv

[w.p.richardson]

The 150 series of cards will work, but the 250 is easier to get up and running with Knoppmyth. PVR350 has a couple of additional features, but they are a bear to get working with Myth.

Other capture cards are not as well supported as the Hauppauge cards.

I swear by my Hauppauge

[TexVex]

I have the Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250 running on an Athlon 2200+ w/ 512 MB RAM, 16G OS/software hard drive, 250 GB video hard drive (both IDE). The machine also supports a DVD burner, and a USB-UIRT for remote controlling my cable box. The PVR portion of it comes from Sage TV. Oh, and the wireless. Mustn't forget the wireless.

This setup gives me a PVR package that has superior capabilities to my old DirecTiVo, but slightly (SLIGHTLY!) inferior quality. It records MPEG video that I can easily work with in many video players, video editors, and DVD authoring/burning packages. I can watch videos either streamed over wireless from the SageTV box's hard drive, or I can use the SageTV Client software.

The only weakness is slow channel change times (2 seconds or so). The computer has to control the cable box through IR, and in order to guarantee precision it "punches the remote control buttons" slowly. However, channel surfing is something I don't miss -- now the machine just records what I want, I watch it when I'm damn good and ready, and skipping commercials requires only a few taps on a key on the wireless keyboard I use to control the computer. (I could use a regular remote through the USB-UIRT but the keyboard is faster (though bulkier)).

other DIY PVR/.MCE resources & recent reviews

[enrico_suave]

first, gratuitous link to my site build your own PVR and the byopvr forums.

Anandtech just did a round up of a bunch of windows MCE "certified" hardware encoding tuner cards.

Also HTPCnews did a Review comparing the new ATI 550 theater pro with the venerable wintv pvr150

E.

Re:Interesting

[benow]

Plextor PX-TV402U - US$199

• First Official DivX Certified PC PVR Product
• Hardware Encode to DivX, MPEG-4, MPEG-2/DVD and MPEG-1/VCD
• Watch, Pause and Record Live TV
• High-Quality TV Tuner Included
• Free Electronic Programming Guide (EPG)
• Schedule Recording For When You Are Away
• Composite Video, S-Video, Composite Audio, RF/Coaxial Inputs
• DivX Certified Hardware and DivX Licensed Software
• InterVideo WinDVR and WinDVD Creator Software Included
• USB 2.0 Interface for Best Quality Video
• Burn Direct-to-Disc and Edit-on-Disc Supported
• One-year full warranty (parts, labor or replacement)

and, active linux support... way to go Plextor! OGG/Theora support would be a plus, but that's not stable, yet... still, use that upgradable firmware for something! Nice device. I'm planning on getting one.