pci HDTV Capture Card = waste of $$ for me???

[EAO]

Really want a HDTV capture card but given limited pci slots on all future motherboards and the liklihood that my next mobo in July may only have 1 or 2 pci slots I am concerned about throwing my money away on a short term investment.

Don't really see a clear solution at this point given:

I have a pci sound card (Xfi Gamer) and a pci capture card (hauppauge 250).

What I'm seeing is that the MyHD 130 is not a great replacement if I capture a lot of standard TV because capture quality is not great... and I do cap a fair amount of SD TV. But it has HW processing for HD capture and that appeals to me.

Then there is the Dvico Fusion and they also have a usb version. It get's solid reviews except I've heard the timer program is a little buggy and that is something I would heavily use. I'm also concerned that I would be using my cpu to process the HD capture. I know my current (and future) system is robust enough to do that but I am concerned about multi tasking. For example with my current 250 I can capture and play a cpu intensive game like Half Life2 with no problem to either program. I've also captured while burning a DVD and surfing the net. I don't want to lose that flexability.

My budget is about 300.00 and I don't see a complete solution in a single card out there. Am I wrong? I'd love to use one of the newer pcix slots but I haven't found any HDTV cap cards in that price range. Much as I'd like a HD capture card I believe I need to wait but any advice is appreciated.

[jman98]

Maybe I can help. I have the MyHD 130 AND the Happauge PVR-350. The PVR-350 is the best standard definition video capture card I have ever used. I like the MyHD 130, but where I live, I can't get reliable over the air HD TV. I had a TV antenna connected to the card and the recording quality was great, but my OTA reception started getting worse and worse. Finally it became unusable. I had to get a cable box from my cable company and that basically made the MyHD 130 unusable because I couldn't figure out a way to connect the cable box to the card and do anything but analog captures. I'm not sure that you can do anything but analog captures through a cable box to this card.

My salvation was to go to
http://hdjunkie.com/tutorials.html
and following the directions there, I installed the drivers to capture via firewire from my cable box to the PC. I don't take any premium channels, so all my HD stuff is unencrypted and can be recorded to PC. The quality is outstanding. If you have to use a cable box too, you could potentially avoid buying any card and just using the method I use.

Some have claimed that all current HD cards use the CPU for capturing. I can neither confirm nor deny it. I truly don't know. I do know that ATI cards definitely work this way. The Hauppauge card you have (and mine too) uses a chip on the card for capture. I don't recommend trying to multitask while recording HDTV because if they are right that it uses the CPU, you won't get good results if you do other things.

On the downside, capture cards haven't gotten any better in the year and a half since I bought the MyHD 130. To make things worse, the TV industry in the US is still trying to get the Broadcast Flag to become law and if that ever happens, at some point all cards will have to start obeying it and you don't want that to happen. If you buy a card now, it will ignore the flag. Finally, the MyHD 130 capture quality for standard TV and all analog captures is very poor. It is simply an HD only solution unless you can be happy with bad VCD quality analog recordings. Try the link I talked about and see if that can solve your problems, assuming you have a high def cable box.

[EAO]

That does help some. It pretty much eliminates the myhd card. I will not sacrifice and of my future pci slots on that.

I'll search for reviews of the dvico usb version. I am esp curious how much processing this card is using. Right now I am on dual core but once I get to see what both Intel and AMD have to offer in July I will be moving to quad core and perhaps that will allow me to multitask even if capturing HD using the cpu.

I suspect pci is going the way of isa and will be totally in the not too distant future. Writing is on the wall with some current boards only having 1 slot. Don't want to throw $$ down the drain.

Thanks for the input

[dun4cheap]

Pinnacle just came out with a USB HDTV Tuner maybe that will work for you.

[painkiller]

DVICO also came out with a PCI-express version of their premuim plug-in card.

http://www.fusionhdtv.co.kr/eng/Products/fusion5express.aspx

I have the PCI version myself and am quite pleased with it.
But, as the original poster - EAO- says, if and when I no longer have a motherboard that offers PCI - - I might have to go this route as well.

[EAO]

That was a sweet card to look at. Thanks for the link.

If I assume - given Dvico rep - that this card is no worse than the USB version this is tempting... got to get a better look at the inputs and outputs - to consider connection options.

Wonder if anyone else is that far along developing similar.

Will check out Pinnacle... but I'll def wait on some reviews before jumping on their product... unless I can find it B&M so I can easily return it.

Considering their quality all this makes me wonder why Hauppauge never developed HDTV cards to compete.

Very tempted by that Dvico.

[JustPlainDon]

I've ordered the Fusion5 Express and it is supposed to ship today (but we all know how that goes). I'll let you know what I think of it when it does get here and I have a chance to test it out (using Vista 64-bit).

L8r,
Don

[Silver Fox]

I have had great luck with the Pinnacle PCTV HD Pro Stick. This is a USB device so slots are not a problem. OTA captures in HD can not be easily distinguished from the original broadcast. Analog captures are equally impressive especially capturing from video tape. Also the HD captures will directly import into Movie Factory 5 Pro to quickly create the folders to burn to a standard DVD which will play in Hi Def on the Tosh HD DVD player. For $100, on sale at web site, it is tough to beat.