Should I stay away from USB Tuners? (1 Viewer)

[ltb76]

Hi,

I’m looking for some DVB-T MPEG4 tuners for my Media Portal (I do not need a CAM).
My TV-Server does not have a lot of expansions slots so I’ve been looking at USB tuners.
I previously had a USB tuner which had a few issues (it was a hybrid tuner though).
Specifically I’m looking at:

Terratec T5, Dual DVB-T
Technotrend MiniUSB Stick
Hauppauge WinTV MiniStick

All should have BDA drivers.

My questions are:

Are USB Tuners in general worse than PCI(e) tuners?

Is it realistic that my TV server (Athlon 64 x2 2,8Ghz, 2GB RAM) can use 4 USB tuners concurrently?

Can someone recommend or recommend against one of the above tuners?

Thank you for any input.

 

[chribe]

i use an internal wintv 1300 card and a dazzle pctv usb stick simultaneously on MP1.1 beta and have no problems
both are DVB-T devices. In addition i have two inbuilt Technisat Skystar HD2 DVB-S2 Tuners which are causing more troubles than DVB-T (i think my dish is too small or the lnb not positioned optimal)

Probably USB DVB-S2 (HDTV) might not be ideal? Normal SD video works.

 

[robyf]

I have experience with Hauppauge and Terratec H5 DVB-T Sticks.

I will stay away from Hauppauge cause it's very sensible to signal quality. I will recommend the Terratec H5: is very fast in channel change and has no problems with signal quality. Using the latest BDA drivers is immediately recognised by tvserver without problems.

 

[jameson_uk]

Are USB Tuners in general worse than PCI(e) tuners?

Had a similar dilemma myself as I have been having a couple of issues with my dual DVB-T / dual DVB-S Pinnacle 7010ix PCI-express card.

Bought a Hauppauge Nova-T stick for £30 as figured that if it was rubbish £30 was not too much money wasted. After I got it installed yesterday channel changing is now much much quicker (two seconds when was eight). I think picture quality is still the same.

One thing to note is that some internal tuners are actually USB tuners with a PCI=>USB adaptor on the card.

The issues I see with USB are that they can take a while to be recognised (there is a delay setting in TV Server which might be advisable) but they also have the benefit that a reset can be done a lot easier without a reboot (Once every so often my PCI-e card is not recognised on resume or boot so only way to get it recognised is to reboot)

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

If you can get them in your Country, these are amongst the best.

USB PEAK DUAL TUNER DVB-T Digital Freeview TV Card XP MCE Vista Win7 - Peak_DUAL USB_Digi - kenable for HDMI Optical TOS Network Ethernet RJ45 Scart Audio Phono Jack USB Firewire 800 ADSL Cable Leads

or internal pci PEAK DUAL DVB-T Digital TV PCI Card: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics & Photo

Both are known to work well with MP

 

[Owlsroost]

I use a Kworld 399U dual DVB-T USB tuner (AF9015 chipset) which works fine with MP under Vista (and has Win7 drivers available) - http://uk.kworld-global.com/main/prod_in.aspx?mnuid=1335&modid=12&pcid=78&ifid=17&prodid=73

Tony

 

[jameson_uk]

If you can get them in your Country, these are amongst the best.

USB PEAK DUAL TUNER DVB-T Digital Freeview TV Card XP MCE Vista Win7 - Peak_DUAL USB_Digi - kenable for HDMI Optical TOS Network Ethernet RJ45 Scart Audio Phono Jack USB Firewire 800 ADSL Cable Leads

or internal pci PEAK DUAL DVB-T Digital TV PCI Card: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics & Photo

Both are known to work well with MP

And cheap.... might be having one of these myself...

 

[altytesty]

No you should not stay away. Please purchase and feel and understand the pain of a USB tuner, then leave a detailed review every place you go on the poor quality of whatever
usb tuner you purchase.

I've tried MULTIPLE usb tuners, NONE of them get all of the OTA ATSC channels, period. Pop in a hauppauge pci or pci-e card, and all channels come in immediately.

How to test this?
Simple, use a splitter from your antenna, send one cable to your HDTV's built in tuner and one to the usb tuner.
Tune channels on your HDTV, and notice how many you have.
Tune on USB in any software you want, and you will NOT get all channels. If you do, then youre in an area with limited channels, not over 60 like me.

Every single PCI or PCI-e card I've ever tried has worked at getting all channels.

Also, first time I tried MP i went crazy because it wasn't working, took out usb, popped in pci, and all was well.

I picked up some diamond/ati usb tuners, and the drivers don't even update. #2, they do NOT reply to any questions regarding reception #3 they try and blame reception on antennas in their FAQs....but as a simple test as described will show, it is the unit, not the antenna

I've tried 5 different brands of usb tuners, the current one I'm using doesn't get all channels, but it gets enough for me to see if MP can run stable...and wait for a better price on a 2250 or equivalent.

 

[ltb76]

Thanks for all the replys.

I ordered 1 Hauppauge WinTV Ministick HD. For test purposes. And it works like a charm.
Watching HD TV takes 80% CPU load, but recording only pulls 15%.

 

[Gixxer]

If you can get them in your Country, these are amongst the best.

USB PEAK DUAL TUNER DVB-T Digital Freeview TV Card XP MCE Vista Win7 - Peak_DUAL USB_Digi - kenable for HDMI Optical TOS Network Ethernet RJ45 Scart Audio Phono Jack USB Firewire 800 ADSL Cable Leads

or internal pci PEAK DUAL DVB-T Digital TV PCI Card: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics & Photo

Both are known to work well with MP

PD does it work with HD channels???

the stick looks very promising, specially the fact that is DUAL tuner.

and if you recommend it i can take the chances of buying it online.