Are WinTV-PVR-250 & WinTV-PVR-350 older models ?

Hi,

I'm considering buying a TV recording H/W for my PC and I'm interested
in Hauppauge's PVR product. As I approached a computer shop in my city,
the sales recommended me WinTV-PVR-150 and said this model is more
updated than WinTV-PVR-250 & WinTV-PVR-350. Is that true ?

3 models. Any users of Hauppauge could tell me the strength & weakness
of these 3 models in terms of performance & reliability ?

 

If you have any plans to use MCE to record one show and watch a second, I
recommend Hauppauge's dual-tuner WinTV PVR 500MCE card. I have had this
card since they launched the product and it has worked perfectly for me.
The fact that it only takes up one PCI slot for two tuners makes it all the
better. It also has an FM radio tuner built-in too.

 

Mike Z 寫�：

That's optional for me only.

Mike,

Did you encounter problems met by some users here with 150 model ?

http://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=278771
http://www.shspvr.com/smf/index.php?board=55;topic=8858

Any major problem about your 500 model can be shared here ?

I used Althon 1700+ CPU w/ 256MB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce2 DDR card
(GeForce2 GTS chipset, 64MB on board RAM, BIOS version 3.15.0104). My
city adopted PAL-I TV standard. With this configuration will it be
better to use older 350 model instead of 150 in terms of getting best
AV quality without loading too much on my PC (though I think the card
should handle most of the jobs with it's onboard H/W) ?

Another concern is price/performance, the shop quoted model 150 price
(promotion price) at $114 while model 500 at price $185 (converted to
US dollar from my city's currency).

 

Mike Z ??:

Another concern is price/performance, the shop quoted model 150 price
(promotion price) at $114 while model 500 at price $185 (converted to
US dollar from my city's currency).

Couple of thoughts here to consider, the 500 card has only 1 coax
connection, which is fine if you have a plan analog connection (no set-top
box), the card can split the signal on-board. However, if you have to use a
cable box, you will need to use up a second PCI slot for a secondary
connector (that is not included with the card, you have to buy aftermarket),
so you still lose two slots.

Not sure in what country and when you priced the cards, but when I purchased
my 150 6 months back, they could be bought for $65 and the 500 was $165, so
it seemed silly to buy the 500. I think now Hauppauge wised up and prices
are more in line; on Amazon the 150 is still $65 and the 500 is $135; still
seems like the 500 should cost less the price of two 150's.

The other issue is redundency, if one of your 150's craps out, you still
have a tuner to use, if the 500 dies, your system is down.

 

Re the PVR-500MCE dual-tuner:
They (Haup.) toss in the 2nd "video-in" connector board now.
Just check that it's included in the carton before you buy it. But yes, you
still loose a PCI slot unless you pull out the connectors elsewhere in your
case...shouldn't be too hard to do.

 

So is there a significant difference between the 150 and the 250?

Thanks,
Harvey

 

Jaime 寫�：

I've no plan to use cable TV within this year so no set-top box
consideration.

Current price

$65 ? US dollar ? Wow that's attractive price!

I need to calculate the transportation price (outside USA) and consider
the time to deliver. But $65 (if US dollar) is very attractive when
considering price only. I would like to ask if $65 included all the
items listed in Hauppauge homepage ? 1st hand card or 2nd hand card ?

My redundancy is my old KWorld TV card. It's not a good backup solution
but better than nothing

 

J. Clarke 寫�：

Get the point, Tks

Agree, that's why I seek for comments here.

I didn't find one Dvico board yet (may be it exists here, I don't
know).

 

Following my last reply, I found no Dvico board yet but I found some
Pinnacle products in HK. I would like to ask if any models of Pinnacle
have comparable or even better performance as these Hauppauge models ?

 

amazon Hauppauge 150 for $65 is the mce edition, not the regular one, which
is $88.


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Ed Light 寫�：

I'm not living in USA. Amazon listed that they provide only delivery of
Hauppauge cards (150, 350, etc) within USA only. Do you know any online
shop can deliver the items outside USA ?

 

While the PVR-250 and 350 are older, that doesn't mean that they are less
caapable--the 150 is built to a price. You're comparing a $60 board to a
$160 board. While sometimes with electronics the newer product being
cheaper doesn't mean anything, in this case it does--TV tuners were a
mature technology with around 40 years of market experience before the
first PC was ever shipped.

Ask the shop if they have the 250 in stock to sell you. If not, then you
know why they are pushing the 150. Never, ever trust a computer
saleseman--even with the best of intentions he may be lying through
ignorance, and most of them don't know the products or the market
particularly well.

The 350 is in a different ballpark from the others--it has hardware for both
encoding and decoding where the 250 and 150 have it only for encoding.
With video boards having partial support for hardware decoding these days
and multi-GHz processor the norm, the hardware decoder on the 350 is less
useful than it once was, and unless you have a special requirement is
probably not justified.

You don't say where you are--I see you're posting from a Hong-Kong ISP so am
assuming you're there--before you spend money you might want to investigate
the availability of digital or high-definition signals in your area--if so
and if you want to receive them then the Hauppauge boards would not be the
best choices. In the US I'd say take a look at a Dvico board, but don't
know if they have a board that will work where you are.

 

Directron, if you pre-pay.

http://directron.com/shipping-policy.html

http://directron.com/video---camera-tv-tuner-capturing.html


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MS Smiley :-\

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Bring the Troops Home:
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You may also consider video tuners based on ATI 550 Pro Theater chip. It
has hardware compression.