Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-150

[FUS1ON]

I had a bunch of video on a bunch of VHS tapes that I wanted to transfer to something more permanent like DVD so I ordered one of these the other day and it works great. If you following the instructions the installation was very easy. They make a version for WinXP/2000/9x etc ... and a version for Windows MCE 2005, mine is the non-MCE version. For $85 bucks, I highly recommend it if you need to capture video.

It has both a VHS and composite video input as well as a on board cable ready tuner. You can order an extra attachment that gives you a second set of RCAs & S-video inputs. It comes with a remote and a infrared sensor and blaster to control a set-top box if you have one.

The software that comes with it is WinTV2000 and Ulead's Movie Factory 3 SE works and is fairly easy to understand and that is a good thing, but even if you do need more info there are manuals in the form of .pdf files.

You can get software to use with it that downloads programing for your area so that you can use it like a Tivo/DVR.

It can capture in both mpeg and avi formats which is nice if you have a DVD player that plays back Divx so you can store a bunch of data on one disk because of the Divx's better compression. There are a bunch of compression formats and screen resolutions to choose from so you can vary the quality as you see fit.

Manuf Link:
http://www.haupauge.com/pages/products/data_pvr150.html

http://img93.imageshack.us/img93/3457/cardwt7.th.jpg (http://img93.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cardwt7.jpg)http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/9025/remoteiq7.th.jpg (http://img87.imageshack.us/my.php?image=remoteiq7.jpg)


Extra A/V inputs (optional, not included)
http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/1553/avcablebigxo0.th.gif (http://img150.imageshack.us/my.php?image=avcablebigxo0.gif)

[Caged Anger]

looks cool man, i might look into this for my august upgrades

[FUS1ON]

Hey Caged they also offer a less expensive model, it is basically the same unit without the remote. The unit is not on the company's website so it must be discontinued. I had ordered this one at first, but UPS lost the shipment, so I had to cancel my order and re-order, but Newegg was out of stock so I steped up and got the more expensive one.
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16815116633

There is one other thing, you will notice on this one it has red and white RCA connectors for the audio input and on the other one they had to use a 1.8" mini plug for the audio input which means you will have to get an adapter to adapt it to RCA if you get the one I got and on this less expensive one you do not need it.

[Caged Anger]

i'm actually just looking for a pretty cheap but still quality tv tuner

[ME BIGGD01]

Shoggy, I have had one of those for a year now and it does work great. I mainly bought it for media center because the ATI all in wonder card I had was not compatible with Media center. All in all, Hauppage is a great company and have made pretty solid cards for a while now.

One thing you may not know is that if you do any video conferencing you can use that card attached to any camcorder. Why would you do this you ask? (you did ask right?) the fps on moany of the webcams completely suck and usually offer crappy signal over 320 res. To me I like a larger video as it defeats the purpose of video conference if you can really see the other party.

p.s. I never noticed the optional cable. Did you get that also? Where did you get it and how much?

[FUS1ON]

I didn't order the extra input yet, but it can be found on their online store for like $15. I'm not sure if Newegg carries it, but you can bet it has to cheaper than Hauppauge's store.
http://registration.hauppauge.com/webstore/hardware.asp

[ME BIGGD01]

I do believe this companyis right around the corner from me. It actually is in Hauppage NY in some industrial park. I would spend 15 bucks for the ease of just plugging and capturing. Makes a great addition to connect your cable box when scheduling a recording.

[Caged Anger]

perhaps i should rethink what kind of tv tuner i want then...