Old PC and want to capture TV audio, etc.

[cantthinkofanickname]

I have a PCI bus (not express) and of course USB2. Not being familiar with this stuff what's the best equipment to buy to capture and store tv progs, radio progs and any other audio (I have some old tapes). I have Nero 8 installed so I assume this will do the capturing of all this?

All and any advice appreciated. Thanks.

[jman98]

Wrong assumption. Nero is completely worthless for what you want to do.

You need a capture card to get video. PCI is fine. In my opinion, you'll get better results than most of the USB stuff anyway. Hauppauge makes some fine video capture cards. The PVR-250 and PVR-350 are both excellent cards for capturing standard definition video sources, including TV. Both have TV tuners. The PVR-350 has video out, so if you don't need that (ie. no need to send the output directly to a TV), buy the 250. I do NOT recommend the PVR-150. The 150 is cheaper, but it has a different chipset and it's not reliable. It completely fails to work for some people and there's no fix if you're one of those. The PVR-250 and 350 cards just work for everybody.

As far as audio capturing goes, you should use some sort of sound card with input jacks, but I have heard of devices that use USB and allow you to play cassette tapes and record them straight to your PC without using an audio card. USB audio capture is fine. I personally do not trust it for video capture and feel that the PCI based solutions are better. That is just my opinion though.