the420star

I just graduated college so i updated my computer with the latest dell deal of slick deals. I got a demension 9100 w/a 20in wide screen LCD moniter. I am hoping to make this my new bed room TV b/c of the 20in moniter. It has 128MB PCI Express™ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X300 SE HyperMemory for a graphics card. I know this dosnt have a TV tuner with it, so we come to my question. I know i need a tv tunner and i want one with a remote and perferably with DVR capability. What is the best way to aproach this problem, should i get a whole new graphics card with it intergrated or a seperate TV tuner card? I really dont game a whole bunch and dont really plan on getting really into it. So lay it on me... where do i go from here?

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trache

I /just/ purchased the Hauppauge WinTV-150 PVR card last night. It cost me $180 CAD.

It is a PCI card with TV-in, SVideo-in, and infrared remote control. There are better cards: the 250, 350, and 500 (which has dual tuners so you can watch or record two streams at once) which all have a bit better hardware encoder than the 150.

I would recommend anything related to Hauppauge or the Brooktree chipset as this chip has wide usage, in that it works under Linux and BSD (I think) as well as Windows 98/2000/XP.

It comes with a scheduler that can schedule recordings and records to MPEG-2.

Hauppauge Computer Works: PVR Products

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"You looked at me as if I was eating runny eggs in slow motion." - Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip

kofspades

I second the Hauppauge PVR PCI cards. I've got 2 PVR-250's running in my Mythtv box and they work great. I've been thinking of getting a 500 added as well.

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Once we get out of the eighties, the nineties are going to make the sixties look like the fifties.