Our Aim
To provide you with an overview on New And existing technologies, hopefully helping you understand the changes in the technology. Together with the overviews we hope to bring topical issues to light from a series of independent reviewers saving you the time And hassle of fact finding over the web.
We will over time provide you with quality content which you can browse and subscribe to at your leisure.
TekSpek 's
PC TV
Date issued:
Tips
There are a few things to consider before you buy a tuner.
First of all, decide whether you want an internal or external solution.
If you want an external USB solution, look out for USB2.0 cards.
USB2.0 offers a much higher bandwidth than USB1.1, so you should
be able to capture a higher resolution, better looking video. Of
course this depends on the device too, and not solely on the support
for a USB2.0 interface.
If you can, find out what software is supported by the tuner you're thinking of getting and whether the bundled software is any good. A good tuner is important, but it's also important to have good software to make the most of it.
The Market
As we draw closer to having exclusively digital television,
the market is seeing a shift towards DVB-T (digital terrestrial
television) tuners. However, there are plenty of analogue tuners
available, some at very appealing prices. Furthermore, the desire
to create personal video recorders (PVRs) has resulted in people
purchasing more than one tuner. Expect analogue tuners to continue
to get cheaper and digital tuners to be pushed more aggressively.
The Players
Some of the big names in TV tuners are Hauppage, Avermedia,
Pinnacle, and WinTV. ATI also have a significant presence thanks
to their All-In-Wonder cards and their new Theatre 550 chip, which
you'll see used as the basis for some new TV tuner cards from various
add-in board partners.
