Nvidia DualTV

[tomblik]

Now that I actually have 5 posts, here is a direct link to the review.
http://gadgets.consumerelectronicsne...e.jsp?id=42221

[lennyr]

Thanks for posting the link, but wow, what a content-free "review." It basically recites the features list. No mention of picture quality, not to mention stability or anything else one would find in an actual review.

I ordered a DualTV last week, and expect it RSN. I'll put my impressions up here shortly.

[tomblik]

Here is a user's opinion posted on The Green Button.
http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/thread/101522.aspx

[davej0h]

Dear,

I am looking for the NVidia`s Forceware Multimedia software to download or to buy it because my driver cd from my XFX NVTV Single tuner Pal card With FM has been broken.

So, my question to you was: where can I download this software, or were can I buy it ?
Or could somebody place the software on internet for me ?
I`ve spent more than 5 hours to search but I can`t find a thing!

Kind Regards,
Dave van Engelen
the Netherlands

[N3W813]

Originally Posted by davej0h

Dear,

I am looking for the NVidia`s Forceware Multimedia software to download or to buy it because my driver cd from my XFX NVTV Single tuner Pal card With FM has been broken.

So, my question to you was: where can I download this software, or were can I buy it ?
Or could somebody place the software on internet for me ?
I`ve spent more than 5 hours to search but I can`t find a thing!

Kind Regards,
Dave van Engelen
the Netherlands

I don't think you can download it, Nvidia doesn't offer it on their website. You should try contacting Nvidia or the manufacturer of your tuner card to see if they are willing to send you another CD with the software.

[VideoJames]

Originally Posted by davej0h

Dear,

I am looking for the NVidia`s Forceware Multimedia software to download or to buy it because my driver cd from my XFX NVTV Single tuner Pal card With FM has been broken.

So, my question to you was: where can I download this software, or were can I buy it ?
Or could somebody place the software on internet for me ?
I`ve spent more than 5 hours to search but I can`t find a thing!

Kind Regards,
Dave van Engelen
the Netherlands

For the single tuner NVTV:

ftp://download1.nvidia.com/Windows/n...winxp_whql.exe

For the dual tuner DualTV:

ftp://download1.nvidia.com/Windows/d...ll_install.exe

[denyart]

Okay, some news here. PCAlchemy is now selling the DualTV. Yes, you heard me right. I ordered one to replace my AverMedia AverTV Purity 3D 500. Someone had asked earlier about that in this thread. I have it and although it may be an adequate tuner, the picture is really not mych better than my old EVGA single NVTV and it does not get along with my VBox DTA 150 tuner. If I use the AverMEdia at all (silent or live) the Cat's Eye turns into a Cat's A$$. It also kills my audio from everything except ATSC tuner soureces and requires a restart. I read on PCAlchemy that a guy had a Hauppauge 500 and the DTA 150 working fine together, so I know I can probably go that route. For now I thought I would try the DUalTV to see if it works better. I am going to probably RMA the AverMedia to Newegg as long as there is no simple fix for this compatibility problem. I liked the Purity 500, but I can't live with this problem. I will post when I get the DualTV to say what I think of the two cards side by side.

[lennyr]

My experience was a little different than yours. I got the DualTV a while back, and pulled my old EVGA single tuner NVTV. The picture is quite a bit better on the new card. It gets along with everything in my system fine, and seems to use less CPU than the old card - I can even play resource intensive games like Oblivion while it's recording with no noticable slowdown.

[denyart]

Um,I think you misread my post. I probably didn't make it clear enough. I have the AverMedia Purity 3D 500 dual analog tuner right now. That is the one I am having problems with. It doesn't get along with my VBox DTA 150. I will be receiving the Nvidia DualTV soon, so I hope I have the same luck as you. By the way, if you are still watching this thread, can you post your hardware so I can see what this tuner will work with?

[grg83]

I use the nVidia DualTV also. Received it about 2 weeks ago and all has been well. Picture is a big step up in my opinion over the Hauppauge PVR-250 I had.


Athlon64 3000+ Venice @ 2.55GHz ..
nVidia 6600GT AGP @ 560/1140 ..
DFI Lanparty UT NF3 250GB ..
2x1GB G.Skill RAM @ 1:1 ratio ..
nVidia DualTV ..
XP MCE '05

[umdivx]

Originally Posted by denyart

Um,I think you misread my post. I probably didn't make it clear enough. I have the AverMedia Purity 3D 500 dual analog tuner right now. That is the one I am having problems with. It doesn't get along with my VBox DTA 150. I will be receiving the Nvidia DualTV soon, so I hope I have the same luck as you. By the way, if you are still watching this thread, can you post your hardware so I can see what this tuner will work with?

well sorry to burst your bubble, but unless nvidia changed the drivers significantly you'll probably have the same issues, as the Nvidia Dualtv tuner is the same exact card at the Avermedia purity 500. Same PCB, same chipset. I think Avermedia is the company making the cards for nvidia.

- Josh

[PGPFan]

Actually Josh,

The Avermedia Purity 500 is a different board entirely. The Nvidia has dual s-video inputs, and dual stereo "mini-jacks" as audio inputs.

The Purity 500 has inputs exactly like the Hauppauge PVR-500. It comes with the 2nd s-video "dongle" just like the Hauppauge unit. The only thing the Avermedia and Nvidia units share is the ViXS chipset (Xcode-II), otherwise they are VERY different animals.

-PGPfan

[umdivx]

Originally Posted by PGPFan

Actually Josh,

The Avermedia Purity 500 is a different board entirely. The Nvidia has dual s-video inputs, and dual stereo "mini-jacks" as audio inputs.

The Purity 500 has inputs exactly like the Hauppauge PVR-500. It comes with the 2nd s-video "dongle" just like the Hauppauge unit. The only thing the Avermedia and Nvidia units share is the ViXS chipset (Xcode-II), otherwise they are VERY different animals.

-PGPfan

Hrm..... Coulda sworn I read they were the same boards. Oh well. I did know they were the same chipset though.

- Josh

[pcalchemy]

Originally Posted by umdivx

Hrm..... Coulda sworn I read they were the same boards. Oh well. I did know they were the same chipset though.

- Josh

Both the AverMedia 500 MCE and the NVIDIA DualTV share the same ViXS chip and both have the same problem with the DTA-150 (As well as FusionHDTV5 PCI cards, and Aver A180). At least that has been our experience.

[Fatawan]

No problems here with the DualTV , PVR-150, and the OnAir HDTV-GT, all getting along under GBPVR.

[lakaw]

Originally Posted by Fatawan

No problems here with the DualTV , PVR-150, and the OnAir HDTV-GT, all getting along under GBPVR.

Most people with conflicts between these cards have an nforce based mobo.

[jalyst]

Originally Posted by pcalchemy

Both the AverMedia 500 MCE and the NVIDIA DualTV share the same ViXS chip and both have the same problem with the DTA-150 (As well as FusionHDTV5 PCI cards, and Aver A180). At least that has been our experience.

pcalchemy/anyone,

Is this just PCI digi tuners, or can the DualTV cause instability for "any" PCI device sharing the same bus? e.g. soundcards, RAID cards etc.

I'm talking about nForce base motherboards of course. As I understand this issue is non-existent for non-nforce PCI controllers (could be wrong).

[Y2KFirehawk]

I've built quite a few Windows XP MCE computers/DVR units for people and the last two I have purchased the NVidia DualTV to go in. The only other card that came close for picture quality was the NVTV... I have used various Hauppage cards as well as the ATI 550 cards.

As a side note and no technical value: The retail box of the NVidia DualTV was very impressive. It came with EVERY cable possible...

I've been now considering getting into the HDTV tuners and what not, so I am going to have to start researching those...

[jalyst]

yeah but have those machines used nforce mobos & had other PCI devices sharing the PCI bus with the dualTV?

If so, did you have no weird behavior with those systems?

cheers

[Y2KFirehawk]

Originally Posted by jalyst

yeah but have those machines used nforce mobos & had other PCI devices sharing the PCI bus with the dualTV?

If so, did you have no weird behavior with those systems?

cheers

No the motherboards were not nForce but there were other PCI devices sharing the bus. (i.e. FireWire 800 card, SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ZS, etc.) I also was using standard run-of-the-mill NVidia cards (nothing crazy as they weren't designed as gaming boxes) either AGP or PCI-X.

[samsonta]

I just started using the DualTv on a new MCE box and I'm not very happy with the picture quality. I don't really have any previous experience with other tuner cards so I'm only comparing it to the picture quality I get out of an old Series 1 Tivo or straight cable. Does anybody have any recommendations with settings or using some other decoder like ffdshow? My main issues are with noise, grainy images and blacks being too dark. I've gone through the MCE screen calibration for brightness/contrast, etc. I tried setting gamma in my nvidia forceware settings (7950gt). The next increment up opens up the blacks but brings in all kinds of artifacts in the image. Before I consider a different card or abandon SD content on MCE altogether, I was hoping somebody here would have some insights.

[Y2KFirehawk]

Originally Posted by samsonta

I just started using the DualTv on a new MCE box and I'm not very happy with the picture quality. I don't really have any previous experience with other tuner cards so I'm only comparing it to the picture quality I get out of an old Series 1 Tivo or straight cable. Does anybody have any recommendations with settings or using some other decoder like ffdshow? My main issues are with noise, grainy images and blacks being too dark. I've gone through the MCE screen calibration for brightness/contrast, etc. I tried setting gamma in my nvidia forceware settings (7950gt). The next increment up opens up the blacks but brings in all kinds of artifacts in the image. Before I consider a different card or abandon SD content on MCE altogether, I was hoping somebody here would have some insights.

A couple questions come to mind...

1) How are you feeding the DualTV card? Coax direct in?
2) How are you feeding the display which you are experiencing these problems?
3) Are you running the most recent drivers for the DualTV card?
4) Make sure your cable connection to the card is solid.

In my experience I have not had to do any tweaking to this card out of the box... Looks good from there!

[samsonta]

Thx for the quick response.

1. Using a coax splitter. Tried direct with no difference.
2. DVI from 7950gt to hdmi on Sony A2000 (60" 1080p LCOS)
3. Yes, I have the latest - 5.9.5.21
4. Tried different cables already, all connections ok.

Other video content look great so it's not the TV or video card. Picture quality issues may be more obvious on a big screen. What kind of screen are you using?

[Y2KFirehawk]

On most of the installations I have done I have gone S-Video out from the PC to the SDTV's... But some of them I have gone DVI directly to HDTV's as well..

And when I am setting them up I connect them to a 17" LCD via DVI. Have you tried adjusting it at the display versus the computer...?

[umdivx]

The problem is your feeding a 1080p display a 480i/p image nothing you can do will make it look any better.

if you took the same HTPC connected to a SD tv it'll look fantastic.

its just the whole SD on an HD display issue.

- Josh

[Y2KFirehawk]

Originally Posted by umdivx

The problem is your feeding a 1080p display a 480i/p image nothing you can do will make it look any better.

if you took the same HTPC connected to a SD tv it'll look fantastic.

its just the whole SD on an HD display issue.

- Josh

Excellent point... totally overlooked that one...

[skepticon]

That's true to a point, but it's only half the problem.
For example, I'm hooked into a 720p display, and my SD recordings look acceptable.
The difference is that I'm using 2 set top boxes and connecting them to the tuner card via S-video. Set top boxes do a far better job of demodulating the cable signal than any PC tuner I've ever used. I've used the Hauppage PVR 550, Nvidia DualTV, and VistaView Saber2020...and all of them have had horrible image quality when plugging the cable feed directly to the tuner's RF input.

If you go the set top box/s-video route, the tuner card will have a much cleaner picture to encode, and the graphics card will do a decent job of scaling the image to your resolution.

[ams123]

Originally Posted by samsonta

I just started using the DualTv on a new MCE box and I'm not very happy with the picture quality. I don't really have any previous experience with other tuner cards so I'm only comparing it to the picture quality I get out of an old Series 1 Tivo or straight cable. Does anybody have any recommendations with settings or using some other decoder like ffdshow? My main issues are with noise, grainy images and blacks being too dark. I've gone through the MCE screen calibration for brightness/contrast, etc. I tried setting gamma in my nvidia forceware settings (7950gt). The next increment up opens up the blacks but brings in all kinds of artifacts in the image. Before I consider a different card or abandon SD content on MCE altogether, I was hoping somebody here would have some insights.

I use a DualTV card in my HTPC and I think it is just as good, if not a little better than the TV tuner. If other content looks good played through the HTPC, like a DVD, than I would consider for overamplification of the signal. The incoming cable signal is analog and is internally split in the card. The Nvidia card has a built in amplifier to correct for the splitting but if you already have a really strong signal this would not be needed. If the noise/grain is in a pattern than maybe you should try and put in an attenuator, check for something at radio shack.

[samsonta]

Thx for the suggestions. I'll try an attenuator and then a cablebox if the attenuator doesn't work. Just an FYI, I'm not expecting miracles. I know it's SD. But I was hoping the DualTv would get better PQ than my 8 year old Tivo, not worse.

[ginnal]

Originally Posted by samsonta

Thx for the suggestions. I'll try an attenuator and then a cablebox if the attenuator doesn't work. Just an FYI, I'm not expecting miracles. I know it's SD. But I was hoping the DualTv would get better PQ than my 8 year old Tivo, not worse.

The issue isnt dualtv it's TV tuners in general dualtv has one of the best pqs for tv tuners around.
Personally I'm not estatic about the pq but it gets the job done.