What TV Tuner do you use? Help me make a list

[drewg]

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

P.S. drewg - tuners do not create multipath, antenna locations and antenna designs do. If the HDHR has problems with multipath-like symptoms,

Tuners don't create multipath, true. But an important measure of a digital tuner is how well it can reject multipath, and the HDHR does a poor job of this. Multipath rejection was a major selling point of digital tuners until LG got it right with their "5th Gen" and most others eventually caught up. These days, it is assumed a tuner will have decent multipath rejection.


I'm about 15 miles from our towers. I live on the far side of a small hill from the towers. My antenna (original CM-4228) is in my attic, and my yard (entire neightboorhood, really) is full of tall trees. Cutting down trees and / or putting the antenna on the roof would certainly improve my reception, but they are not options. So for me, the multipath rejection capability of a digital tuner is much more important than its sensitivity. Case in point: All my other tuners hold a glitch-free signal on 2 channels that the HDHR would not hold until I'd moved my antenna to a different spot in the attic (where it still isn't perfect). The only tuner I've ever seen that was worse than the HDHR was an old nxt2002 based BBTI Air2PC that I retired when I got my first LG 5th gen (lgdt3303 based) Dvico Fusion5 tuner.

On the up side, the HDHR is reasonably sensitive, and does a decent job pulling in stations from the neighboring market. Terrain, distance, and foliage combine to naturally reduce multipath from this direction. So I actually get better reception from the HDHR for weak stations 50 miles away than I do for strong stations 15 miles away. Since I could never get it 100% stable for local channels, I'm using it (connected to a second CM4228 aimed in a different direction) to record ABC from an out-of-market station whose bitrate is about 6Mb/s higher than our local ABC affiliate.

I think the HDHR is a fine tuner for QAM or for people who have little to no multipath issues in their antenna setup. For me, I give it a C for ATSC reception, and an A+ for everything else. Contrast this to the Kworld UB435Q that I have. It is LG based (lgdt3304), and has excellent ATSC reception that trounces the HDHR in every respect (it will pull in even more stations from the neighboring market). But everything else is horrible -- support, no QAM BDA drivers, etc.

Drew

[bialio]

3 HDHR (QAM X 6)
1 HD-PVR (Dish Network X 1)
1 PVR500 (Basic Cable x 2)

[ThePaladinTech]

Listed in my signature:

Sage7 winXP with: HDHR, HDPVR, MCE500

Sage6 winXP with: PVR1250, Hava

The Hava is the version that HAS a tv tuner - it works great!
The HDHR works very well AFAIK
I would say these two are my favorites.

the HDPVR if you count it works great as long as I don't enable digital sound

PVR1250 and MCE500 no complaints either.

[Clift]

1. SageTV V7 Beta on Windows Vista 32
2. HD Homerun (QAM), HD PVR, HVR-2250 (QAM, NTSC-cable)
3. HD Homerun is my favorite, Pinnacle PCTV 800i is my least favorite--garbage IMO

1. What HTPC Software do you use? Which version/OS too
2. List the TV Tuners you use with your HTPC
3. Optional – which TV Tuners that you’ve used are your favorite versus least favorite.

[sunray]

1) Sage 6.62 on WinXP Home SP3

2) Three Hauppauge 1600s, One WinTV-PVR USB2.

3) I used to use 3 Hauppauge PVR-250's, then I switched to 3 ATI Theater Pro 650's for a short time then to the 1600s. The ATI 650s didn't work well on my cable system which has a noisy signal. There was a herringbone pattern in the video recorded with them that I couldn't get rid of. The Hauppauge cards didn't have that problem.The 650's also seemed to have a graininess in the picture that the Hauppauge cards did'nt have. the 1600s seem to produce a cleaner image than the 250s. The WinTV-PVR USB2 picture seems about the same as the 250's. So the ranking from best to worse is this:

1) Hauppauge 1600
2) Hauppauge 250 / WinTV-PVR USB2
3) ATI Theater Pro 650

[loomdog32]

first
1 - WinXP MC
2 - Hauppauge 150
3 - well, one tuner. It worked.

second
1 - Vista MC (RC2 and RTM)
2 - same - Hauppauge 150
3 - same - one tuner, it worked.

third
1 - SageTV v6 w/ Vista
2 - same - Hauppauge 150
3 - issues with Vista

fourth
1 - SageTV v6 w/ XP SP3
2 - same Hauppauge 150
3 - about the same performance as MC...

later

2 - added HDHR, Hauppauge 1600 & 1800, and 2 HD-PVR
3 - the HDHR has been awesome, but as noted I get better reception from hauppauge 1600 and 1800 tuners (which replaced the single 150).. The HD-PVR, where do I begin. For me (looking back), have been a complete waste of money. Kinda stable, sometimes. Mostly annoying. When I moved to TX, I never hooked them back up. The 1600 recently died (card is completely dead after 2 years!)..

current

1 - SageTV v6 w XP SP3 - thinking about v7 w Win7
2 - HDHR and Hauppauge 1800
3 - The digital side of the 1800 is still the better tuner than that HDHR. I love the HDHR tho as Ill still be able to utilize it when It gets pulled from Sage production.

[paulbeers]

1. SageTV 6.6.2 (I have the V7 upgrade license, just haven't had time to install).
2. Current: Hauppauge HVR2250, HDHomerun, HDPVR
I've used the following: Avermedia M150, Avermedia M150+, Avermedia Purity 500MCE, Dvico Fusion5 Lite and Hauppauge PVR500
3. Favorite Digital Tuner: HVR2250. Very flexible. HDHomerun as a close second.
Least Favorite Digital Tuner: Dvico Fusion5 Lite (limited capture options)
Favorite Analog: Avermedia Purity 500MCE. Great dual tuner analog card.
Least favorite analog: Hauppauge PVR500. Was worthless as a tuner (fine for composite/svideo capture).

[Brent]

Between the feedback on this question here, on the GeekTonic post, MissingRemote, Snapstream and a few other places I have a TON of responses. Working on compiling all of them and reporting back. Interesting stuff for a HTPC geek like myself

Thanks to everyone who responded - and feel free to add your answers if you haven't already. I'll add it to the list. Thanks!!!

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by HelenWeathers

SageTV 7 on two servers - one is Vista, one is Win 7

Each has two AverTVHD Duet cards (four OTA ATSC tuners).

Love them (replaced Hauppauge 2250s with the Avers, didn't need the analog)

curious - what didn't you like about the 2250's, or what was that much better with the Aver's?

[ybrew]

SageTV 7

Hauppauge PVR 500 (3)
HD HomeRun
DVico FusionHDTV5 USB Gold (2)

The Hauppauge PVR 500 are the favorite simply because they have always been easiest to setup and just simply always work.
I had problems with my signal on my HD Homerun and eventually will get a new one to replace it. I think once I get the new one, I'll say the HD Homerun is my fav, but not yet.
The DVico FusionHDTV5 USB Gold is generally very good, but occassionally I have problems with only one of the two devices working. I don't think I've had any problems since replacing my PC, so it was probably a USB issue on my old board, but I'm not 100% sure of that yet.

I only have 2 PCI slots on my current board and no HD Homerun right now, so I have 6 tuners (2 dual PVR500s and 2 USB Golds. I've run 8 tuners in the past. When I get my HD Homerun, I'll have either 7 or 8 tuners, depending on if I keep by USB Golds connected.

8 tuners *should* be enough.

[loomdog32]

Originally Posted by tvmaster2

curious - what didn't you like about the 2250's, or what was that much better with the Aver's?

My guess, cheap dual digital tuner. Newegg has them for $65 vs $115 for the 2250.