Difference Between Hauppauge & Blackbird DVB Cards

[bingmel]

I'm in the process of upgrading my Computer to receive and capture satellite feeds, and have narrowed my search to the Hauppauge NEXUS-S DVB PCI Satellite Card and a newcomer called BlackBird Vision. Has anyone done any comparisons between these two boards to determine which is better for capturing satellite feeds? I'm looking into picture and audio quality, especially sync issues, as I don't want to spend the $$$ just to find out that these cards have problems. Any suggestions that can help me with my current investigations is greatly appreciated. THANKS!!!

[SatStorm]

When you "grabb" satellite DVB transmission, you actually "rip" TS to your HD. So, there is never lipsynch problems because of this.
The problems appears because of the software: There are programs, try to convert TS to mpeg 2 and they don't do the best possible job on this. There are also other problems, like the changing of the audio (switchings from 128Kb/s mono to 192kb/s stereo for exampe) and the changings of the 4:3 to 16:9 transmissions and vice versa. But the programs now have almost eliminate those problems today.

Also, the picture and the audio quality you get, is a clone of the transmission, so there are no differences. No encoding / convertion / transconding take place when you rip DVB transmissions to your PC.

The reason some people notice a difference, is because they forget something: The DVB receivers / standalones have built in mpeg 2 decoders, which are decent. On the PC world, we have software mpeg 2 decoders. And those decoders don't have the same picture quality results!

The same might happen with the standalones: When you watch a DVB transmission on a DVD standalone (after you author / burn it to DVD-R), you may notice differences in the picture quality. But this happens because of the different decoders your DVB receiver and your DVD standalone have built in for this job.


Anyway: Hauppauge never was the top solution for anything, but because of the Germans (excellent Hauppauge distribution in Germany) always had 3rd party support. Same story here.
Also, keep in mind that after all, you need a card compatible with programs like progDVB for example. So better see how compatible is your choice with those programs.

[satviewer2000]

If I am thinking of the same thing, then a "Blackbird" is a standalone free-to-air receiver, similar to a Dishnet receiver but it has only the software and hardware to decode DVB unencrypted transmissions.

So as far as I'm aware, to get the data from a Blackbird into the computer, one would need to hook it up to some kind of video capture card on the computer, and the result would be analog rather than digital.

The DVB cards however, download data directly from the satellite onto the hard drive, so all data would be in its pure digital form with no loss of quality. Be aware that except for HDTV transmissions, all other MPEG2 transmissions are more like SVCD quality rather than DVD quality. DVD quality transmissions would simply use too much bandwidth, so from what I can see, virtually all DVB MPEG2 data is in the order of SVCD quality.

http://forums.dvbnetwork.com/

[SatStorm]

So Blackbird is a FTA DVB receiver?

In Europe, the CCIR 601 or cropped CCIR 601 transmissions ain't rare. Half of the channels broadcast more than 704 / 720 x 576 using statistical multiplexing (VBR) from 1500 - 8000. The usual average is 4000kb/s which produce very easy macroblocks.

The 352 x 576 DVB channels are rare: They mostly used for Eutelsat Skyplexx' channels, mostly those from Italy and East Europe.
The 480 x 576 channels are mostly channels came from USA or they are a European version of American channels. For example, all the Viacom feeds (encrypted to cryptoworks), like the MTV local channels (Hotbird satellites), are 480 x 576.
The channels from Multichoice or ex multichoice services, use resolutions like 528 x 576 and 544 x 576. With an average of 3500kb/s, those channels look good, but not excellent.
The channels once unter the Canal Plus control, are mostly 544 x 576, except the moovie and the premium channels.
The German channels are always at least 704 x 576. So the Austrian, Swiss and the Scandinavian subscription services (Canal Digital, encrlypted in Conax).

Merdock and his channel in Europe are bad in terms of picture quality. Most of them are 544 x 576 but with 2000 - 2500 bitrate! They look like shit. Sky Digital and Sky Italia sucks in terms of picture quality. There are of course exceptions: The Sky movies channels are looking good (not excellent). So the Sky Sports. But the MTV channels on both Sky Italia / Sky Digital are really bad: There are times, I believe that I 'm watching a bad NTSC tape realtime converted to SECAM ! Awfull picture, many macroblocks. The worst DVB example we could have.

For the record, all the multiplexxed arabian channels of Arabsat 26E, are 704 and 720 x 576. Only the Iraq TV (a USA channel) is 480 x 576!

[bingmel]

Thanks, fellow Members, for your great replies! I'm now debating whether to capture satellite feeds using my PC because I've read that the cards may conflict with my ATI All-In-Wonder 9600 Video Capture Card. I've read that the Blackbird Vision DVB Card does not work at all with ATI cards (too many conflicts both hardware and software wise), and that other DVB Cards have various issues preventing full enjoyment of the audio and video. Also, since I'm in southern California, I read that I'd need a BIG dish (about three meters in diameter) on a motorized mount to utilize any DVB equipment (PC Card or Receiver) to its full potential and to get decent video quality. The motorized mount also points the BIG dish to the proper satellite depending on which channel you want to receive. The total cost for buying all these items, not including any labor involved in setting and tweaking this setup, may be around $5000! Definitely too much for me just to get so-so video from the free satellite feeds. Anyway, let me know if I've been misinformed with any of the info I've researched thus far. THANKS!!!

[Vanderlow]

Well just so you know the Blackbird PCI card is nothing more then a Twinhan 1020A card renamed. I wonder which would get you the better DVB picture a Twinhan 1020A/Mytheatre going through your computer using your graphics card (Geforce in my case) or a Blackbird reciever (which seems to be nothing more then a Pansat) with what is probably a cheap Chiinese mpeg decoder. I saw a friend's Pansat FTA receiver and it had a slightly dark picture.

Do you have to save the feed to your HD on Mytheatre if you want to watch it live? If yes all of it or just a buffer amount?