ati tv wonder 650 vs hauppauge wintv-hvr 1800

[fadetoblack]

is one clearly better than the other? all i plan on doing is watching digital cable (hd and non hd) and record some shows here and there. thats about it.

 

[blackened144]

Does your cable provider offer much unencrypted service? The cards you posted will only display unencrypted ClearQAM channels, IF your provider offers them. Otherwise you would need a cable card from your cable company to get digital cable service on your PC. You will still have access to all the over-the-air digital and HD channels in your area though, so it would still be worth it I think. My friend has the ATI TV Wonder 650 and it works pretty good in his rather low spec pc, but I have heard good things about the Hauppauge.

 

[fadetoblack]

im actually not sure.. i dont have cable yet but am planning on getting it next week. ill be getting it from time warner, im not sure if that answers your question about the unencrypted service. im still pretty confused about all this stuff, but i was under the impression that i could take the cat5 output (is there a cat5 out?) from the cable box then i would just plug it into the tuner.

 

[blackened144]

I dont have that much experience with them myself either. My friend has Advanced Cable Communication (cheesy local company near Ft. Lauderdale) and they have no unencrypted content, so he has to get all of his HD programming OTA. Hes got a nice antenna on the roof though and can get channels from as far south as Miami and as far north as West Palm Beach. Time Warner may offer some cable cards though, in which case you can skip the box and plug the cable directly into your machine and have it decrypt all the digital channels on the fly. Price may be an issue, even if they offer it.

 

[cardio]

I have both of these cards and neither compares with the AverMedia Pcie 1X Combo dual tuner analog/digital. It is the first and ONLY TV card that has picture quality as good as a set-top box or television built in tuner. HD picture superb and analog better than any other by a mile. I have used (and have in a box) virtually ever TV tuner card ever made and this is the first acceptable one for me. I have a computer with 3 of them running at present. They are Pcie 1X but will run in any Pcie slot if you lack a 1X. They run somewhat hot, don't worry about it, mine have been going for months. Get the latest software drivers from their website with the QAM update. It works. Sold with Media Center remote and receiver and without. I really don't care for the AverMedia software application compared to Windows or Vista Media Center, both of which work great with these cards. Do not install AM's software app with Media Center as neither will work correctly if the other is present.

 

[eltouristo]

I would like to add to cardio's post. I tried the ATI 650 pcie and the Leadtek. Sent them both back and ended up with the avermedia.
It was the only one that would play nice with WMC in WMCE2005.
By making dvr-ms files w/WMC, I could capture subtitles as well. Minor complaint: I like to use the s-video input and if for that you have to use the separate audio inputs of course. But you cant set the record levels if they are low... I have to use an outboard box like a mixer to set the input levels at 0db. Generally speaking TV cards are SHOCKingly poorly implemented, unstable, incompatable etc. You would think such a thing would be easy by this year 2008. nope.

 

[fadetoblack]

i actually ended up going with the ati 650 combo pcie card. it also has dual tuners (http://ati.amd.com/products/tvwonder650/PCIe/index.html). any idea how much better the avermedia quality is than the ati 650 combo? and is there any other advantage of the avermedia combo over the ati 650 combo?

 

[vagetaqtd]

I have the Hauppauge 1800 and the OTA HD is exceptional. Basic cable is ok. However, their WinTv sucks and I only use WMC.

 

[eric54]

yeah i'm pretty sure no company offers a good tv program given how high the bar is set with WMC (just phenominal how well it works). Seems like cardio knows what he's talking about, go for that one as I own the hauppauge 1600 and although it is better than my old ati tuner (tv wonder pro). If the avermedia is as good as he says go for it, heck even i'm tghinking about, the x1 alone is enough to convince me.

 

[fadetoblack]

yeah i went with what they said and got the avertv combo pcie just yesterday. still have time to return my ati 650 combo pcie. the bundled remote is also better than the one that came with the ati 650.

 

[catmouse]

How about the performance of the avertv card? Is it far better than ati 650? Is it comparable to regular LCD HDTV?
I am looking for a tv card too. Your fresh comment/comparison will be very helpful to me!

Thanks

yeah i went with what they said and got the avertv combo pcie just yesterday. still have time to return my ati 650 combo pcie. the bundled remote is also better than the one that came with the ati 650.

 

[leon2006]

I tried different TV Tuner card for my setup and below are my results...
I have not tried avermedia as of this time....

Hauppage 1800 pcie
Digital TV is OK
Analog TV is horrible. It degrades the quality of existing analog TV
Remote & Software: Remote is the best among that is tried. It works with the Hauppage software & Vista-64 Media Center.
PVR function is great...

Pinnacle HD 800i

Non of the software that came with package work. This tuner works great for XP and Vista 32.

I'm using Vista 64 and only Vista-64 Media Center made this card work.
HD video is great. The Video and Audio is out of sync. Pinnacle acknowledge the problem on its webpage. No commitment on fix.

ATI650 PCI.

HD video is great
Analog Video Quality is close to the analog Tuner of my TV
Catalyst software for Vista-64 is still not perfect.
PVR function works
Works with Vista-64 Media Center
Remote works but not on vista-54 media center

As a whole i'm not interested on the remotes that come with these cards. I plan to purchase logitech's denovo-Edge Mini as my media center remote.

Here's my Setup:
CPU: Q6600
Mobo: Asus Maximus Formula
Mem: 4 GByte
GPU: BFG 8800GT OC 512
Display : 70 Inch JVC HD-TV @ 1080P
Drive: LG Hybrid (Blue Ray Writer/Player) HD-DVD Player

My HD input is from Satelite Disc and HD-Antenna
My Analog Input is from Cable Box Analog or regular TV
My JVC 70 Inch TV Digital & Analog Tuner is my reference for quality of Video.


I have a big screen so any pixelation or video degradation is obvious or clear in my setup.

I will try the AVERMEDIA ....

 

[leon2006]

On TV Tuners...

The future is Digital so I dropped the DUAL tuner cards(Digital/Analog).
Vista can support 2 TV Tuners. I can plug 2 separate Digital Tuners.

The 650PCI that i have is a hybrid so it can take analog and digital. After Feb 2009 its going to be all digital. Since its a single Tuner Card it gives me the option to plug in(ADD) a better card in the future.

 

[fadetoblack]

How about the performance of the avertv card? Is it far better than ati 650? Is it comparable to regular LCD HDTV?
I am looking for a tv card too. Your fresh comment/comparison will be very helpful to me!

Thanks

unfortunately i cant comment much on the hdtv part because i havent tried it yet - i should be getting cable this weekend. as for the analog, i noticed it it was a little better than the ati combo. maybe thats just cause my input signal is bad so it couldnt do too much with it. both the ati and avertv cards are good when it comes to vista 64 compatability (dont know about any other OS), you dont even need the driver cds. as for bundled remote, i think the one that came with the avertv is way better, and works better with media center than the ati one. i guess that doesnt really matter if you already have one or plan on getting a better one.

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

Well the Ati (aka Visiontek) 650 USB works well for me, there is no other QAM USB solution that I can get locally so that's what I went with 650. Also prefer the 650 over the DVICO Fusion due to better AV inputs for S-video capture etc.

Love it sofar, but would like to know what you think about the Avermedia when you get a chance to test it since I don't have a chance to compare models with the USB restriction, and would like to know if I'm 'missing something' by not having the same options as PCIe users.

 

[iski4kix]

I have the Hauppauge 1800 and the OTA HD is exceptional. Basic cable is ok. However, their WinTv sucks and I only use WMC.

question for you. I have the 1800 and when I set it up in WMC it doesnt find teh OTA HD channels though I get them when I plug cable straight into my TV Did you have to do somehting special to get to the OTA HD channels, seeing they are numbered differently then the analog channels?

 

[knotknut]

I have the Hauppauge 2250. I bought it mainly for converting Video 8 to DVD with TV and DVR as an extra feature. Anolog Cable and QAM are as good as my new Samsung. I am very impressed. Windows 7 support too!

 

[HunterJoe]

Hmm... I sort of have a technichal issue.

I am using a Hauppauge WinTV HVR 1800 with an ATI Radeon HD 5770 video card.

Are there any sort of compatibility issues with these two that anyone may know about?

I am getting some serious system lag when I launch WMC. The video skips every few seconds, my mouse jumps across the screen, and my CPU usage goes off the charts sporadically then back down again, as well my HDD activity. I recently built a new system with a new Mobo, video card, PSU, and case. I used the CPU, RAM, HDD, and TV Tuner from an HP Elite m9340f Media Center PC that had an NVIDIA 9500 GS in it. Everything worked great in the HP with Vista x64, now I am running Win 7 Pro x64 with the new Mobo, and the ATI Radeon HD 5770 and WMC is freakin out on me. I spent some time posting over in the WIndows 7 forums, and someone recommended getting a new TV Tuner card as there may be some sort of conflict between the Tuner and Video cards that is causing my problem.

And before anyone asks, YES, I have all of the latest drivers for everything in my system. I just built it on Dec. 10th, and ATI just released new drivers on the 17th. Got all that.

So, if anyone might be able to provide me with some ideas on how to fix this issue, or which Tuner cards to look into that will work with ATI video cards, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.