snow said:
How easy is it to install a HD-TV Tuner
card in a pc? I read where two companies now sell them. Is the HD-TV Tuner
card expensive?? I just bought a Dell 1704
LCD Computer monitor. I also have a fast PC, with a high end graphics
card. I know I can install a regular analog TV Tuner card in my PC, but I
am wondering if an HD card is now feasible.
Where are you located? The considerations for the US may be different from
other parts of the world.
In the US it's not any hassle at all to install such a board. and there are
more than two companies in the US market, there's Dvico, MIT, ATI, Sasem
(external USB model), Hauppauge, and PCHDTV (Linux-only), and there were
some other companies in the market at one time that no longer appear to be
active.
All of the ones currently on the market can be made to work well. There's
no real hassle to installation, just plug in the board, connect the cables,
install the drivers, and go. The Dvico and the ATI seem to work better
using the nvidia decoder and Media Center Edition 2005 than they do the
manufacturer-provided software (to use MCE with them though you'll need a
second analog tuner board with a hardware encoder--don't ask me why, I
didn't design it), but Dvico has made huge improvements in their software
since the first release and it mostly works pretty well at this point. The
MIT MyHD models seem to be generally the best regarded if you're not
running MCE.
As far as pricing goes, the range in the US is from about 120 for an open
box Dvico to about $350 for a MyHD with all the accessories.
Note that these all work with over-the-air broadcast--some work with cable,
none get the encrypted channels--if you have cable then you need to check.
