Best Splitters for my Cable modem and HTPC with 4 tuners.

3173 Views 25 Replies 13 Participants Last post by Dreamwriter, Mar 10, 2010

yazyazoo

Discussion Starter · Mar 8, 2010

I am building a HTPC with 4 USB Hauppage 950q tuners. It has Win7 Media Center. I will have two XBOX 360 as media extenders and another HTPC in the living room.

I plan to use this PC for the server, it is going to record the shows from my Comcast cable and then serve the recorded shows to my various extenders or HTPC. This PC is also used heavily to download shows and stream. It also serves as a Magicjack server.

Currently my cable modem is connected in the middle of the house and I plan to have my computer there. I need to split this one connection into 5.

1 x Cable Modem

4 x splitter to each Hauppauge.

What is the best splitter to do this without any signal degradation? I see cheap ones on ebay or monoprice but I want to make sure I get a decent quality splitter.

I also do not want any slow down on my Cable modem.

Any suggestions from HTPC users.

TIA

1 - 20 of 26 Posts

SUBCOB

· #2 · Mar 8, 2010

I have read nothing but good things about Electroline drop amplifiers. They have models that amplify the return path which helps the cable modem. Here is a link to one at Amazon. They are a bit pricey, but I guess you get what you pay for. I will be buying one soon.

Sorry do not have 3 posts yet. Here is the model that I am looking at though.

Electroline-EDA-FT08300

Servicetech571

· #3 · Mar 8, 2010

Why (4) $70 USB tuners instead of going with internals? USB tuners are more for laptop use. I doubt these have hardware encoders (I've never seen a USB tuner have one) which kill your picture quality and eat up system resources when recording analog channels. For $280 you can do better.

How about a Hauppauge 2250 and a ASUS PHC3-150 instead? Use a 4 way splitter (2 lines to ASUS, 1 to Hauppaugge, 1 to cable modem) You would then have 4 tuners total (1 analog, 1 digital, 2 hybrids that can do either). Total cost under $200.

jmallory

· #4 · Mar 8, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by yazyazoo /forum/post/18268609

I am building a HTPC with 4 USB Hauppage 950q tuners. It has Win7 Media Center. I will have two XBOX 360 as media extenders and another HTPC in the living room.

I plan to use this PC for the server, it is going to record the shows from my Comcast cable and then serve the recorded shows to my various extenders or HTPC. This PC is also used heavily to download shows and stream. It also serves as a Magicjack server.

Currently my cable modem is connected in the middle of the house and I plan to have my computer there. I need to split this one connection into 5.

1 x Cable Modem

4 x splitter to each Hauppauge.

What is the best splitter to do this without any signal degradation? I see cheap ones on ebay or monoprice but I want to make sure I get a decent quality splitter.

I also do not want any slow down on my Cable modem.

Any suggestions from HTPC users.

TIA

Are there any other drops in the house are just this five?

If it just this five, I would suggest the following.

From the drop in the room, connect a 2-way splitter. Off one leg connect your cable modem, on the other leg connect a Electroline EDA-2402 4-way Unity Gain amplifier for your HTPC, unity gain is much better in this scenario as you don't have to worry about overdriving the signal which can be a big problem with Digital. Depending on how much signal you are getting from the pedestal...you may not even need that. Just a 2-way splitter to feed the cable modem, and a 4-way splitter to feed the tuners.

While I am usually a fan of Monoprice...I would only use good-quality splitters...you can get them fairly cheap, I recommend something like..

http://www.yourbroadbandstore.com/pr...php?pid=705507

If this isn't your only drop...you would need to explain the setup to me.

In my scenario, I have the following.

From the Enterance -> 2-way splitter

One leg of the splitter goes to an Arris Cable Telephony Modem the other goes to an unbalanced 3-way splitter.

Off the unbalanced 3-way splitter ->

The "hot" -3.5db leg goes to the office where the cable modem and HTPC is.

One -7db leg goes to a Motorola DCH-3200 STB in the Living Room

The other -7db legs to a Panasonic PZ-80 in the Master Bedroom

In the office -> The drop goes to a balanced 3-way splitter.

One leg is connected to the Cable Modem

One leg is connected to a MoCA bridge to distribute Ethernet to the living room and Master Bedroom

One leg is connected to a EDA-2402 which feeds 2 ATI DCTs and the 2 ports on an HDHomerun for ClearQAM.

Works great. Even with all those splits I get -9 to -11 dBmv (according to the ATI DCT diags, which admittingly isn't all that accurate) on all the digital channels, while that is on the low side, I experience no drop outs.

See less See more

S1DIMMER

· #5 · Mar 8, 2010

I have Cablevision on Long Island and for splitters I just go to the local cable office and ask them for a splitter or two. They just give them to me at no charge. I figure if their splitters are good enough for their installs they're good enough for what I need. Can't beat free.

ckellyusa

· #6 · Mar 8, 2010

Is there a link or can you provide quick information about what is needed and what is bad? Why do we need certain splitters with amplification, etc. and what dB is good, bad, etc. You know, a quick lesson!

Thanks!

candre23

· #7 · Mar 8, 2010

The nice thing about digital signals is that they either work, or they don't. Buy a handful of $1 splitters and try those first. If you get a picture on all four tuners, and your cable modem doesn't slow to a crawl or drop out entirely, then you've solved the problem for $5. If not, then you can start trying the more expensive options.

James Mos

· #8 · Mar 8, 2010

I'm using this amplifier/splitter in my home and it's been working great for me.

http://www.amazon.com/Bi-Directional...8078979&sr=8-1

justinm0424

· #9 · Mar 8, 2010

whynot just buy the ceton quad cablecard tuner for $400. It has one coax input and 4 tuners, also if you ever use cable you can use the cablecards. Well worth it in your situation. Also you could get a pair of dual tuners. I have an a188 dual tuner which only has one coax input.

I'm always told that cable modems are always ran with their own line, bypassing any splitters as it degrades the signal. Is it possible to put the cable modem in another room and running a cat5 cable from it to wherever you need

pixelation

· #10 · Mar 8, 2010

ALL splitters has signal degradation. That's how signal get split. Even cards with multiple tuners also split it internally.

But I agree that internal tuners are better. The connection is better and there is less chance of knocking it off by accident, or earthquake...

If I have to split, I would split the feed between a cable modem and a 4-way splitter.

jmallory

· #11 · Mar 8, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by candre23 /forum/post/18272177

The nice thing about digital signals is that they either work, or they don't. Buy a handful of $1 splitters and try those first. If you get a picture on all four tuners, and your cable modem doesn't slow to a crawl or drop out entirely, then you've solved the problem for $5. If not, then you can start trying the more expensive options.

Assuming your time is worthless.

The splitters I recommended where only $5.10 (plus shipping) for 1 2-way and 1 four-way, which would be the least cost scenario for what has been described. I don't understand why you would spend hundreds, if not thousands on a HTPC and then cheap out on the RF infrastructure and then spend hours troubleshooting signal problems.

ilovejedd

· #12 · Mar 9, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by jmallory /forum/post/18269874

http://www.yourbroadbandstore.com/pr...php?pid=705507

Yep, Regal splitters are nice and inexpensive. That's what our cable company uses. Only gripe is I don't think they sell retail so you'd have to buy online and more often than not, the shipping costs more than the splitters.

See less See more

jrwalte

· #13 · Mar 9, 2010

considering you want to split 1 signal 5 times, your best option is most likely going to be an amplified splitter that helps to keep the signal strength at about the same as the original line. It all depends on the signal Db running on that line if a traditional non-amplified splitter will work.

As said, you can always try non-amplified. If you get skips in the TV signal then consider an amplified option. You could go with a 4-way amplified and then a 2-way non-amplified to 1 tuner (the least used) and the cable modem. Cable modems don't need as good of a signal level as Digital TV.

ilovejedd

· #14 · Mar 9, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by jrwalte /forum/post/18275100

As said, you can always try non-amplified. If you get skips in the TV signal then consider an amplified option. You could go with a 4-way amplified and then a 2-way non-amplified to 1 tuner (the least used) and the cable modem. Cable modems don't need as good of a signal level as Digital TV.

Interesting. You're the only person I know who recommends connecting the cable modem last behind the TV's.

Personally, I'd go with jmallory's suggestion (2-way splitter to cable modem and 4-way splitter to TV tuner).

I'm not sure what the regulations are but if you're getting poor signal after just a -3.5dB and -7dB split with short cable runs from the drop, then I think you might need to call your cable company...

jrwalte

· #15 · Mar 9, 2010

Personal experience. My cable modem can function just fine at 16mbps split 3-way from the street and then one of those lines split 4-way, but my digital TV had consistent drop outs on just a 4-way (I removed the 3-way coming into the house and ran directly to the PC). Once I installed a 4-way amplified splitter and removed the 3-way coming into the house (since I no longer used those splits), my digital TV stopped acting up.

ilovejedd

· #16 · Mar 9, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by jrwalte /forum/post/18275285

Personal experience. My cable modem can function just fine at 16mbps split 3-way from the street and then one of those lines split 4-way, but my digital TV had consistent drop outs on just a 4-way (I removed the 3-way coming into the house and ran directly to the PC). Once I installed a 4-way amplified splitter and removed the 3-way coming into the house (since I no longer used those splits), my digital TV stopped acting up.

Mine's the opposite. I had frequent internet drop-outs at -8dB (-7dB 4-way split then -1dB DC tap) while the HDTV at -13dB worked just fine (albeit some analog channels were fuzzy).

jrwalte

· #17 · Mar 9, 2010

If you were connected directly to the HDTV, then it's probably because the TV tuner was amplifying the signal, which is common. PC tuners don't tend to amplify like a TV, and so require a stronger source signal.

Maybe different areas send the cable modem signal at different frequencies, and mine is sent lower than my digital TV, which would be less affected by signal loss.

ilovejedd

· #18 · Mar 9, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by jrwalte /forum/post/18275785

If you were connected directly to the HDTV, then it's probably because the TV tuner was amplifying the signal, which is common. PC tuners don't tend to amplify like a TV, and so require a stronger source signal.

I don't think they amplify the signal as there doesn't seem to be any point in doing that, but yeah, tuners built-in to TV's tend to be better/more sensitive than PC tuners. I had my HDHomeRuns connected at -10.5dB. Less than that and I'd be losing channels I actually care for.

jmallory

· #19 · Mar 9, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by ilovejedd /forum/post/18275034

Yep, Regal splitters are nice and inexpensive. That's what our cable company uses. Only gripe is I don't think they sell retail so you'd have to buy online and more often than not, the shipping costs more than the splitters.

I always buy some RG-6 patch cable to make it worthwhile.

I would rather see the OP get the good stuff then waste time and money picking up splitters at Home Depot or, God forbid, Wal*Mart.

See less See more

jmallory

· #20 · Mar 9, 2010

Quote:
Originally Posted by jrwalte /forum/post/18275100

considering you want to split 1 signal 5 times, your best option is most likely going to be an amplified splitter that helps to keep the signal strength at about the same as the original line. It all depends on the signal Db running on that line if a traditional non-amplified splitter will work.

As said, you can always try non-amplified. If you get skips in the TV signal then consider an amplified option. You could go with a 4-way amplified and then a 2-way non-amplified to 1 tuner (the least used) and the cable modem. Cable modems don't need as good of a signal level as Digital TV.

You should really try to keep the splits between the cable coming into the house and the cable modem to an absolute minimum. A lot problems with cable modems is caused by too weak of a signal on the upstream (back to the cable company) path. Splitters weaken the signal in reverse as well and amping the return path is a very tricky proposition.

1 - 20 of 26 Posts

This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.