Recording TV?

[Mattyl110792]

Hey,

I've finally got my Media Center (budget lol) PC set up and working perfectly. It does everything except viewing and recording TV. I want to get a decent tuner card, as in one with an MPEG2 Hardware Encoder, which I know takes the stress off the CPU but will it be enough for an old Celeron 2.4 (running at 2.6)? I would really like this to top off the cake, but can't afford a new cpu etc, so am wondering if I would get decent results recording with a Celeron?

Something like this I was looking at..

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815116620

Of course I think i'll need the PAL version being in Aus.

Matt

 

[borat_sagdiyev]

yea go for it. it will work

 

[Celegorm]

Haupauge is supposed to be the best at TV tuners. I've been looking at that very same card for myself.

I think that would help, but i don't now if it will help enough. not knowing what your budget is, i can only ask if a low-end Pentium four could be a consideraton? I'll throw this one out there for you to look at, not bad for $74 processor http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116197

How much RAM do you have as well? from what i've heard its best if you have 1GB, but i'm just going on hear-say there. If you don't have 1 GB ram, then consider taht instead of the processor, as i've seen media center run decently off of a Celeron.

 

[Mattyl110792]

Thanks for the replies...

The PC has 768mb of RAM (1x 512 and 1x 256)...Yeah I was looking at P4 processors, but problem is it's a socket 478. Ah what the heck may as well throw it out lol. It runs MC perfect but I think if I wanna start doing the TV recording etc then it's too dated.

Worst thing is I can't find any Hauppauge cards in Australia, not one!

Thanks,

Matt

EDIT: I remember when the celeron was my main PC and I had a cheap tuner card in there (no hardware encoder and only analogue reception) and the celeron really did struggle recording, thats why i'm a bit iffy.

 

[Celegorm]

can you find any KWorld cards? they're not the greatest in the world, but still decent quality cards. Or is that what you currently have installed?

 

[Mattyl110792]

Well at the moment the celeron has no tuner card in it, I have the old crap one in mine, and it does OK for the price, but it's analogue and a resource hog lol...this is it


http://www.centrecom.com.au/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=86&products_id=12017

Hmm...can't say i've seen any on eBay or around shops

Matt

 

[phaze112]

aw, I miss my old TV card. now I have to get one again cause of this thread

 

[Celegorm]

can't say i've ever even seen that brand for the tuner you linked. By price alone it doesn't look good. It seems too cheap to be good quality, but then again price can be misleading.

That said, it's getting good reviews here.

looking a little more, if the step up for it is available the Leadtek WinFast TV2000XP PCI Expert Edition is also getting great reviews.
http://www.hardwarecentral.com/hardwarecentral/reviews/article.php/3343921

 

[Mattyl110792]

Although that card looks good for the price, I think i'm gonna save that bit more and get this one, looks like a nice card..

http://www.centrecom.com.au/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=86&products_id=23296

Matt

 

[Celegorm]

Yes, i saw taht one too, but i thought that would be too far out of budget seeing how low the first one was.

It looks nice, but its still a shame that you cannot get the haugppauge cards over there... Do you have any close friends in America or Europe that could order one and send it off to you? might cost you a little more that way, but atleast you'd be getting a good quality card.

[edit] thats not to say that what we have both linked are not good quality cards. its just i know haugppauge, and i know that they work as advertised.