HDTV + Digi Cable = what tuner?

M

mrnuke

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 24, 2005
Messages
170
My sister is wanting me to build her a media center pc, but she loves all her movie channels, but hates that she can't record them. I told her to just get a PVR from the cable company, but she wants music, pictures, TV and movies from it so I guess a HTPC will do the trick. I was wondering what vid card to put in (pci-express) and what if any cable card can go past chan 125 and bring in digital quality cable? Also, she's got the HDMI port and I was wondering if any vid card can hook up to that? Thanks for you help!
 
HDTV cards can't do cable mostly. If she wants to record content, she needs to get the Comcast (or whatever your cable company is) HD DVR, for pictures, music, and etc, a HTPC for that.
 
yeah, the HD channels (at least the movie channels) are encrypted -> meaning she can't record them. tell her to get the HD-DVR from comcast and build her a cheap Epia system or something for pictures/music/etc.
 
OP, can you clarify something. Your original post says HDTV + digital cable. this can be interpreted 2 different ways.

Interpretation 1 (the one those guys were thinking)- She gets the HD package with channels like showtimeHD and HBOHD. those channels require a PVR from the company almost everytime.

Interpretation 2 (the one I am thinking) - she has an HDTV set and gets the digital cable packages for better SD content and wants to record Stars, HBO, Showtime, etc. To do this you can use soemthing like the ATI 550 based cards or the hauppauge PVR150, an IR blaster, and your current cable box to record any of those channels. None of the current tuenr cards will tune the digital channels from a dish or digital cable over about 100.

as for the video card, go with any of the nvidia 7xxx series cards. I think the 7600 is a pretty nice spot for price/performance. then you can get a HDMI to DVI adapter from monoprice and go in through that HDMI port. HDMI is basically DVI+audio.
 
IDversusEGO said:
OP, can you clarify something. Your original post says HDTV + digital cable. this can be interpreted 2 different ways.

Interpretation 1 (the one those guys were thinking)- She gets the HD package with channels like showtimeHD and HBOHD. those channels require a PVR from the company almost everytime.

Interpretation 2 (the one I am thinking) - she has an HDTV set and gets the digital cable packages for better SD content and wants to record Stars, HBO, Showtime, etc. To do this you can use soemthing like the ATI 550 based cards or the hauppauge PVR150, an IR blaster, and your current cable box to record any of those channels. None of the current tuenr cards will tune the digital channels from a dish or digital cable over about 100.

as for the video card, go with any of the nvidia 7xxx series cards. I think the 7600 is a pretty nice spot for price/performance. then you can get a HDMI to DVI adapter from monoprice and go in through that HDMI port. HDMI is basically DVI+audio.
Click to expand...


She'd like to do both, but if she can only do interpretation 2, how would you wire it? Would you run it through the cable box or just regular cable into the tuner? Also, I've heard good things about the NV Dual tuner, would that work well with digital cable signal? Another thing. I use sage on my box and was wondering if that would work best or if there is something better? Thanks again.
 
the only HD signals you can record with a PC reliably are the free over the air signals. You need a certain type of tuner to do that. Something like the Avermedia a180, vbox cat's eye, or Fusion 5. You will also need an antenna. I suggest an outdoor antenna as the indoors don't help much. go to antennaweb.org to see what she would need.

for SD, the Nvidia DualTV is a good tuner, but to tune the digital channels you would need to run from the wall, to the set top box (STB), tot he tuner card. to tune 2 digital channels at once, you would need 2 STBs. Or you can just use the card to tune analog cable. In that case you would just go from the wall to the tuner card, but you wouldn't get the extra channels.

sage is my favorite PVR app, no question.
 
There's also the possibility of using firewire from the cable box to capture HD.
 
kleptophobiac said:
There's also the possibility of using firewire from the cable box to capture HD.
Click to expand...
I don't even mention that, just liek I don't mention QAM, becasue the odds of your box having firewire that is enabled are very slim. If it isn't enabled, you have to hack it.
 
for a vid card why not get last gen ATI All in wonder? - then get a seperate PVR tuner

Some of her shows and movies may come in on regular cable as she will still get regualr cable channels with out the digital box (or at least i do)
 
because the all in wonder cards are overpriced and software based. You have to load a hacked driver to even get them to work in MCE.
 
mrnuke said:
My sister is wanting me to build her a media center pc, but she loves all her movie channels, but hates that she can't record them. I told her to just get a PVR from the cable company, but she wants music, pictures, TV and movies from it so I guess a HTPC will do the trick. I was wondering what vid card to put in (pci-express) and what if any cable card can go past chan 125 and bring in digital quality cable? Also, she's got the HDMI port and I was wondering if any vid card can hook up to that? Thanks for you help!
Click to expand...

the only ati card id get for a media center is the 550 (ive heard good things about it). all in all, i think any mce box should be nvidia based, they just work better imo.

there's some hdmi cards coming out soon, but afaik theres none available in retail. u can get a dvi>hdmi cable from monoprice.com i bought a 10ft one for like $7 (28-awg, gold plated). for the video card, get a nvidia based card, preferably the 7xxx series so u can use purevideo. id recommened a 7600gs because they're passive, can do decent gaming, and is the single slot passive solution i know of.

whatever u decide to do, just make sure the parts u buy are on the hcl of whatever frontend u use. it can save you from a lot of headaches down the road
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top