Cheap TV Tuner

[someguynamedmatt]

Well, the title pretty much says it all here. You've probably seen my other thread related to this, but I gave up on that idea.

What I'm looking for now is a cheap PCIe or PCI TV Tuner card which can accept what is pretty much a standard TV Cable. I don't know what runs through it... I'm pretty sure it's analog, though, as it works on a really, really old Sanyo television. On the other hand, another television in our house has a Comcast HDTV Converter box on it so that it can run HDTV from the same cable line... I guess I'm not really sure exactly what I need. I'm a computer guy, not a television guy. Oh, and I'd appreciate a remote.

Anything that fits this bill for under $100?

 

[someguynamedmatt]

Oh, and I forgot to mention - I'm running Windows 7 64-Bit on a system with no limitations on this level. 3 PCI-e Slots open, 2 PCI, and a PCI-e x1.

 

[Wolfshadw]

For under $100, this is probably the best you're going to find:

Hauppauge Win-TV HVR 1850.

For about $30 more, you can get what most consider the best TV Tuner card on the market today:

Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250.

Both come with MCE Remote Controls and receivers.

-Wolf sends

 

[nforce4max]

a used ati HD Tv wonder 550/650 with the disk and input block on ebay for about $20 isn't to bad.

 

[someguynamedmatt]

I've heard bad things about ATI TV Tuners, because of the "Catalyst TV Center" they use...
How's the Hauppauge HVR-1250? I'm not really looking for something that can record like 6 channels at a time, nor do I need an onboard encoder. All I need is something cheap that I can watch TV on...

 

[Wolfshadw]

Can't vouch for the newer HD ATI TV Tuners, but my old X1800XL All-In-Wonder card works perfectly in my XP MCE 2005 system without the "Catalyst TV Center" software installed. (Note that this card's TV functions are not compatible with Windows Vista/7).

Also can't vouch for the Hauppauge HVR-1250. My rule of thumb for my purchases of unknowns is this: If the sum of four and five egg reviews doesn't add up to more than 75%, I'll pass and regardless of whether I decide to purchase or not, I'll ALWAYS read the one and two egg reviews.

-Wolf sends

 

[nforce4max]

When using ATI tuners use Dscaller since it works the best however Hauppauge is the apple of TV tuners it is common to not get sound unless you are using there propreitary software. TV tuners are tricky to pin down and may take a few tries to get the right one.