TV Tuner Problems

[Nickhamm]

I purchased a AverMedia UltraTV 1500MCE for my PC, but the included software (UltraTV) will only let me capture 1h 27m of video (3.99GB) and then it crashes. I have my drive NTFS formatted and have the program set to capture the largest file size possible. I changed it to split the file, but it makes the first file, then stops recording. I decided to take a stab at Media Center 05, so I bought/installed it and it came up just fine. The Radio Tuner works fine on the card in MCE, but the TV Tuner runs 5 FPS and makes MCE unresponsive. I have a 2.0GHz Celeron Processor, 256MB RAM, and a Intel Extreme 845 Integrated video. I can't upgrade the video because the motherboard lacks an AGP slot. Is there any other software I can use to capture movies with this card that works better on my hardware?

[kidmegabit]

A system with only 256 mb of memory might slow you down and stop you all together. With video capture you'll need more ram. At least, 512, or like me, 1gb. By the time your operating system takes what memory it needs to run, and your integrated graphics takes its share, there is not much left for capturing.

[Nickhamm]

I borrowed a stick of 512MB from a friend to make my total memory 768MB, but besides Media Center starting faster, the video is still extremely choppy and freezes the PC. Any other ideas?

[reboot]

It could be your video decoder (mpeg-2 codec), it could be a badly fragged and slow hard drive.
It could be windows is busy using the drive, your anti-virus is trying to scan the file, or any number of other things.
I would try playing the recordings from a second, separate hard drive (not just a partition), or purchasing a PCI video card.

[ROF]

I'd say the software is still limiting you to 4GB file sizes and crashes if it gets to be larger than this, even with NTFS. It maybe a software limitation.

If you have an available PCI Slot, you can upgrade your video. You might also want to try more memory, but I doubt either of those are the issue here.

[Nickhamm]

I disabled all unnessecary services, disabled my AntiVirus, Defagged my hard drive and still get the same results. MPEG2 Video playback from a DVD or local file is smooth and runs with no problems. The MPEG2 Decoder I am using is CyberLink (The one that came with PowerDVD 6).

[SHS]

Nickhamm usedly the 3.99GB and then it crashes is usedly cuase by the boot drive being FAT32 even knowing your capture drive is NTFS formatted like the D:\ drive.

You need REAL Video card for MCE your Intel Integrated graphics is where your problem is.
You should try a diff PVR package like BeyondTV, SageTV, GB-PVR just name a few they should do much better then MCE.

Other then that if your dead set on MCE your only option are a diff motherboard and a real video from ATI or nVidia and besure it the latest video chipset you be much better off in long run when come to MCE.

[Nickhamm]

Both my primary (bootable) and secondary drive are NTFS formatted. I figure the 4GB issue is just because of poorly written software. I will go try BeyondTV and SageTV. I tried Media Portal and GB-PVR and neither would recognize my card.

Edit: I will only be trying SageTV, as BeyondTV has my Integrated Graphics listed as incompatible (requires fully complient DirectX 9 card).

[SHS]

AverMedia UltraTV 1500MCE is base on the "Blackbird" reference design by Conexant and better support usedly found under SageTV, BeyondTV and CTpvr which I forgot about.

[Nickhamm]

I gave SageTV a shot, and it worked, but I didn't like how it was setup in some areas, so I tried SageTV Recorder. SageTV Recorder works well for my purposes, but my output video was about 1/2 sec off-sync. It could be because my source was very bad (old VHS tape with horrible unfixable tracking and sound cutting in and out).