What Card <Budget>

[Sn1p3]

Ok mainly im going to be capturing from satelite a/v rca's , S-video or a regular coaxial, depends on card i get. Im not going to be doing movies. But about 30 minutes max at a time capturing. I have a 1.1 ghz with 256mb sdram. Runnin xp. I was lookin @ the AIW but not sure what one to get unless some one can specify something better. I want best quality capture i can get for around $130. I whould like a realtime/hardware encoding card, but thats out of my price range id say. Also some of the AIW are agp i only have a pci on my motherboard. Tho i'm going to upgrade it soon also.

[jpconard]

I am a newbie and haven't tried many (except a Happauge USB version which I took back), but I think the AverTV cards are pretty good (TV, Stereo, and Studio). Studio is around $80 at Compusa and has FM input with antennae, and a remote (and is also stereo). They also have a capture only version without coax input (around $50).

I have a better reception with composite rather than S-video, S-video gave vertical banding (mild but noticeable) where the composite did not.

The included software includes a VCR, FM tuner, and playback mode. There are some limitations but it is usable, I use WinDVR2. WinDVR2 has a more flexible scheduler and more customizable bitrate and capture settings. With the BTwincap drivers I can also cap in VirtualDub at 720x480 to AVI. AVI takes too much hard drive space to capture 2 hour movie or home video tape, even with HuffYUV codec.

MPEG2 files can be edited in TMPGenc, demuxed or re-encoded to a different bitrate if needed, then authored.

[jpconard]

After reading several reviews, although no personal experience, the Leadtek Winfast TV2000 XP Deluxe may be another good option. It also is stereo and has remote and FM. It also includes a version of ULead DVD authoring. I think it is also based on the Conextant 878 chipset.

Newegg.com has it for $55.

Also ASUS has the newer 10-bit chip, also with remote, also at Newegg.com for $62.

Read reviews at this site and at Newegg.com.

[Bob W]

I second the AverTV cards.