HDTV (US ATSC) cards and software

[Doom9]

MIT MyHD 120 http://www.mitinc.co.kr/mitinc/e_site/prod/prod_mdp100.jsp
Dual RF input (analogue and digital)
HDTV upsampling of SD signals
RGB and component ouput (DVI in/out with additional daughter card)
5.1 recording and output via SPDIF
DVHS recording via FireeWire
trbarry's comment: newer and reportedly pretty good

HiDTV http://www.dstreamtech.com/english/product/HiDTV_Twin.html
trbarry's comment: newer and pretty good, better reception than my Hipix (I have both)


Telemann HiPix 200 http://www.telemann.com/products/dtv200.html
Analogue (Cable or Terrestrial) and Digital (Terrestrial) RF input
SVHS and Composite input via expansiaion card
SPDIF out
Remote included
rather old and not properly supported by the manufacturer, but alternative software can be found here:
http://www.midwinter.com/hipix/
trbarry's comment: older and maybe not supported by Telemann but software dev has been mostly turned into a semi open source effort by a bunch of guys on the AV Science HTPC forum so it is some of the most advanced. May tend to overheat in small boxes.

accessDTV Digital Media Receiver http://www.accessdtv.com/accessdtv/prod_tuner.htm
Analogue (Cable or terrestrial) and Digital RF (terrestrial) input
SPDIF out
PVR software
trbarry's comment: initially questionable support but they may be making an effort again.

Hauppauge WinTV-HD http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_hd.html
Analogue and digital RF (cable or terrestrial) input
component output
SPDIF output
trbarry's comment: older and not well supported, very primitive software

Hauppauge WinTV-D http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_d.html
Analogue (cable) and digital (terrestrial) RF input
analogue 5.1 output
Limited to 480i output
trbarry's comment: even older and probably less supported. W98 recording only

pcHDTV HD-2000 http://www.pchdtv.com/hd_2000.html
Analogue and digital (terrestrial 8VSB) RF input
DVR software with timeshifting
Linux only card

DVico FusionHDTV ATSC: http://www.dvico.com/products_mul_hd3.html
digital (terrestrial) RF input
analogue SVHS input
small card
DVHS playback and recording via Firewire (FireWire port required in your PC)
TS to MPEG converter and cutter software
Remote control (optional)

DVico FushionHDTV Gold http://www.dvico.com/products_mul_hd3.html
Same as the FusionHDTV ATSC but with support for QAM modulation (HDTV via cable)

[Doom9]

please post addendums, corrections, etc. here. I'm wondering, is there any alternative software for any of these cards?

many thanks to trbarry for compiling an initial list upon which this list is based.

[smokeslikeapoet]

I am in the market for an HDTV tuner card to receive terrestrial broadcasts. For my area I'm going to need a $200 USD amplified antenna to receive the broadcasts so it's really going to be and investment for me and I don't want to make any mistakes. The e-merchant i'm looking at is here (https://www.digitalconnection.com/store/Product_List.asp?CID=3&CAT=HDTV%20TUNER%20CARD) (digitalconnection.com)

I was initially considering buying an external tuner and a capture card with dvi or component inputs, but I'm afraid that I wouldn't get encrypted broadcasts. There are 2 cards I'm considering.

The Fusion 3 QAM specs are here:
http://www.digitalconnection.com/products/video/fusion3qam.asp

The MIT (Macro Image Technology) MyHD MDP-120 specs are here:
http://www.digitalconnection.com/products/video/mdp120.asp

I really am wary to trust any of the reviews I see on any of these cards. Just because they work in some countries or areas, doesn't mean they'll work with my local broadcasts. Any of you who own any hdtv tuner card please reply with a brief review and your geographical location. Thanks for you're help, I really don't want to make a $500 mistake.

[smokeslikeapoet]

I almost forgot. I would rather not have to keep my analog BT878 card, so a tuner that receieves both analog and digital tuner signals is a plus.

[minolta]

@smokeslikeapoet:

According to www.antennaweb.org the digital stations for Cordova, TN are:

WPTY-DT 24.1 ABC
WLMT-DT 30.1 UPN
WREG-DT 3.1 CBS
WKNO-DT 29 PBS
WPXX-DT 50.1 PAX
WMC-DT 5.1 NBC

All stations are about 15 miles from source (Memphis)? I easily get stations 20 miles away. You might simply try an unamplified indoor antenna before purchasing anything else.

The MyHD is a good choice (a lot of people here have one, including myself). The QAM capability of the Fusion only works with unencrypted digital cable (here in iowa they encrypt everthing but my local HD tations).
-Minolta

[edit] oops, read your other post. you probably 'wish' you lived 15 miles away... good luck.

[smokeslikeapoet]

Yeah the problem here is not my distance, but the strength of the broadcasts. Looks like the MyHD card has an analog tuner built in. I think that one is the one i'm going to go with.

[trbarry]

A few updates:

I think the HiPix development has pretty much stopped.

The AccessDTV card is now open source, supported on AVS, but I'm not sure how active they are now.

There doesn't seem to be much HiDTV support anymore unless they've started another forum I'm not aware of. The first one was closed. But my 2 cards still work as long as I avoid certain quirks. The main one is that sometimes it will take more than a minute or 2 to start and if I get impatient and start trying to wave he mouse around it will hang, probably just overflowing some mouse click buffer if there is such a thing.

There still seems to be mostly good feelings about the MyHD cards, though I've never owned one.

I also recently bought a Fusion 3 QAM card but have not had much luck trying to record or watch Comcast 256 QAM HD cable. But it's new, I have not had much time to play with it, and I really need to re-cable my new rental home.

- Tom

[Stereodude]

I have a MIT MyHD 100. It works pretty well. I don't have any real complaints other than it's DVD playback limitation.

I'm about 15 miles from the towers, and I use a Zenith Silver Sensor antenna (indoor) with a 10dB amp (to overcome the 25' run and the splitter at the end of the cable).

I record over my gigabit network to my file server's RAID-5 array. The local Comcast only seems to have about HDTV 3 channels that aren't encrypted from my scans with my QAM capable HDTV set. My WOW (Wide Open West) has 0 free QAM channels (other than Music Choice).

I want a way to record HDTV from cable or satellite, but I'm not paying the 169time guys over $1k to mod some hardware. It looks like getting a Firewire capable cable box is the best way, but there is no 5C compliant software for the PC yet (which limits what you can and can't record). :(

[Emp3r0r]

ATI HDTV Wonder http://www.ati.com/products/hdtvwonder/
Analogue (Cable or Terrestrial) and Digital (Terrestrial) RF input
SVHS and Composite input via purple breakout box
Remote included
Antenna included

The ATI HDTV Wonder is available now at CompUSA. I picked one up last weekend.

If you have read any of the reviews or threads at other forums about this card you know that the software is not mature. The setup process is about impossible to get right. I'd say in its current state the average joe will not be able to get this card working.

The card comes with a RF remote, Silver Sensor clone antenna, and some crappy drivers and software which you should NOT use. Download the newer versions from ATI's website.

ATI has alot of work to do on the software for this product. Right now DTV is totally disconnected from old analog TV. The remote doesn't correctly control the DTV app and overall the MMC software is just plain ugly.

Recording, pausing, rewinding, fastforwarding of HDTV does work. The interface to do these things suck. The remote doesn't help any.

The card records to hidden VCR files which you can export to HD MPG files to retrieve the original broadcasted video and audio. It does not record to transport stream. No biggy.

Playback and recording requires about 70% cpu usage while recording takes only 6% on a Athlon 1.9ghz with a Radeon 9200.

<edit>added screenshot of NBC 1080i mpeg2 converted to 720p mpeg4.</edit>
http://jvance.com/images/tv/NBC Father of the Pride.png (http://jvance.com/images/fotp.jpg)

[ChrisBensch]

I just bought this card from Ati in hopes to record some of my local HD broadcasts. I dropped this card into my existing WinXP Pro installation and couldn't get it to recognize the card properly. No matter what I did, I cannot get it to work. I am in the process of reloading XP to see if I can get it to work. I'm also running a Radeon 9600...wish me luck.

Edit: After a clean XP install (no SP2) i'm able to get the card working with regular TV, still no luck with DTV...still trying.

[Torghn]

I've found a few reviews for these cards, but are there any independed comparisons?

[trbarry]

There are still discussions of them over on the HTPC forum over at www.avsforum.com.

I'm still using a DVico Fusion F3Q (QAM) card with some success for cable and also my old HiDTV Pro card for antenna HDTV. Both are quirky but work.

There is also now a newer MyHD 130 card that also has QAM cable capabilities. It has good reviews but I haven't tried it.

I'm also thinking of building a Linux/MythTV box and getting one of those Air2PC cards for it. But that parts still in the planning stage.

- Tom

[TMLewiss2]

I have direct-TV satellite with just the basic package. If I buy an HDTV Tuner for my PC would it even pick up HDTV Channels. I notice some of the prime time shows I watch say "Simulcast in High definition" and I am wondering if I will actually pick that up as HD or if I have to pay extra to do that...

[Toti]

I have the new My HD card MDP-130 with the optional card. This card is wonderful. It plays not only TS & TP files but it can also play VOB, MPG, M2V and MPV files and will upconvert them to HD (although it looks the same to me). Output to my system is DVI and optical digital output.

The neat thing is that you can get any video either record it or download it from the internet and you can recompress it and create your own TS files that will play on the My HD card. I recompressed Minority Report, Bad Boys 2 and some programs from HDNET. I have recompressed them in 8.5GB size (2-DVDs or a single dual layer) and the quality is almost identical from the original broadcast. You do see some compression on high movement scenes but not bad to downsize it from 20 GB.

Sometimes it makes me wonder why they haven't released a HD-DVD that will play on current DVDs. Since it can be done!

By the way, the 169time firewire mod is $500 and the AVX1 is easy to do on your own. The specs needed for the AVX1 is like a 4-5 year old PC so you can grab them cheap on Ebay. Is it worth it? every cent!! For the first time I see all my TV provide me. The only downside is that recompressing HDTV MPEG2 takes way too long.

[Joe Fenton]

You should probably change the pcHD2000 entry to the pcHD3000, which replaced it almost a year ago. :)

http://www.pchdtv.com/hd_3000.html

[jeffareid]

I have Motorola cable box / dvr. This box has 2 1394 interfaces on it, could it be used to transfer recorded video to my computer (via the 1394 interface)? (Probably would use Adobe Premiere Pro 1.51 to do this).

[Revgen]

I have a non-DVR Motorola Digital Cable box and I am able to record broadcast HD networks only.

You can go to this page (http://htpcnews.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10499) for more info plus WinXP drivers at the bottom of the post. They've worked for me.

[goldplated]

How Up-to-Date is this List?

[Revgen]

^ Doom 9's post is from May 2004.