PCI card or Reciever + Firewire

331 Views 3 Replies 3 Participants Last post by seldenpat, Mar 4, 2005

stephsully

Discussion Starter · Mar 2, 2005

I've been doing some research into HDTV and I think now is the time to jump in on it (read: I can afford to).

I don't have a HDTV, but the main reason I'd like to get HDTV, is for recording and viewing shows on my computer (I have a nice computer monitor).

I've been looking and the two options I see are as follows:

Option #1: Get a PCI card like an ATI HDTV, fusion 3 or a MYHD, etc. These will run me about $150-200

Option #2: Get a cheap OTA receiver + use the firewire that's on my card. I saw that I can get the old receivers with firewire for relatively cheap (~125ish)

Panasonic TU-DST50 & TU-DST51 (DTV)

Sony DHG-M55CV (Cablevision, still available)

Samsung SIR-T165 (DTV)

Plus 20-30 for the firewire equipment.

I don't want to spend more than $175 on this (and truthfully the cheaper the better). I also don't care about automatic recording functionality, etc. I just want to be able to get the content onto my computer for viewing. I have a middle of the road computer AMD 1800+, 512 MB of RAM, Geforce4.

Is the Sony DHG-M55CV an OTA reciever or QAM only? Also, I am under the impression that it can only be used with cablevision, is that correct?

I like the idea of having the OTA reciever hardware stuff (i.e. digital audio outputs, etc) but I also like the functionality the PCI card will give me.

Any information that you guys have to help me would be appreciated it. I'm also open to suggestions if anyone has something they think would help me. Thanks

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stephsully

Discussion Starter · #2 · Mar 4, 2005

Noone has any input or insight into this?

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pete4

· #3 · Mar 4, 2005

I have Sony M55CV and it's a cable box for Cablevision. I don't think that box can pick OTA programs. On the other hand it has pretty solid firewire and would be good thing to have if you had CV signal. I've been trying to capture HD from DVHS deck to PC and I'll tell you my results are pretty good, when it works but for about 80 % of time it doesn't and I have no idea why. I would think it would be a safer bet for you to buy PCI receiver since the card should come with drivers for capture and should be more stable albeit I have not tried such setup myself yet.

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seldenpat

· #4 · Mar 4, 2005

Pete's right on.

The Sony DHG-M55CV is a proprietary cablebox built for Cablevision (thus the CV suffix). It has no OTA tuner, but if you live in a Cablevision area, they provide all of the locals except UPN and WB in HD. And I have to believe it is the most SOLID firewire cablebox available, since there has been only one time in the past 18 months that I have gotten a screwed up recording and that was due to my mother-in-law, not the box (she changed the channel).

If you only care about OTA, get the PCI card and have a blast. If you need some of the premium movie channels, you're going to need to go with a cableco that can provide you a firewire enabled cablebox and it would help if they carried the movie channels you want in HD

. You can then read up on how to use your PC as a DVHS recorder...I can't help you there.

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