Most Popular Hauppauge 1196 WinTV HVR 1250 PCI Express Hybrid High Definition TV Tuner Card
Band : Hauppauge
Model : 1196
Product Features :
- Watch pause and record digital and analog TV on your PC
- Compatible with ATSC and QAM digital TV and NTSC analog cable TV signals
- Dbx TV stereo decoding for spectacular sound
- MPEG 2 software encoder for analog TV
- Includes remote control and Personal Video Recorder software for scheduled recording of programs
>> Works great
I bought this because I got tired of having to home when my favorite shows were on and I dont like watching commercials I stuck it in my computer running Windows 7 Pro and connected it to the arial on my roof I didnt even bother with the CD it came with and just downloaded the Windows Media Center drivers from the Hauppauge website Everything installed and setup in a couple of minutes Works great I havent tried out the included remote since I already had a StreamZap remote for my computer
>> Instant TiVo
If you have Windows 7 there s really no point in delaying the purchase of this TV tuner Windows automatically identifies the tuner installs the drivers and then it s only a matter of opening up Windows Media Center WMC and letting it guide you through the steps I was concerned that just having a direct cable connection no cable box obviously would limit the channels But I get pretty much all the cables I do normally plus the HD channels Having an HD monitor and a large hard drive HD recording takes up about 5 GB/hour makes this capable of taping full seasons and plenty of movies without batting an eye Movies on all cable and basic channels are categorized for you You can browse titles in an iTunes like view and BluRay movies are even marked as such just the way they would in the store I use iTunes for a lot of things but not anymore Why pay the money for shows and movies you can record yourself Why wait patiently for buffering and annoying commercials on Hulu when you can just fastforward WMC has really come into its own and this Hauppage tuner really allows you to exploit its full potential
>> A few considerations but works well
The card works well on my win 7 media center system with QAM Clear channels from Comcast no cable box Here are some concerns
o The remote supplied seems to not launch media center from the desktop like another Hauppage remote USB that I have It appears you need to have Media Center Launched then the remote works A minor inconvenience
o The cable tv receiver is not as strong as my TVs When my signal was weak my TV would receive the channel but the 1196 was getting dropouts
o I put a Wireless N PCI express card in the slot right next to the 1196 It was causing a dropout of the cable signal every few seconds I tried to build a shield but that didn t work I had to take out the wireless N card and the 1196 worked perfectly after that Definitely confirmed interference between the PCI express Wireless N card and the 1196 I m not sure which card to blame I have a small form factor PC so I couldn t try separating the cards more so I don t know if that would have helped
o Many clear QAM channels scan in the setup as if they are locked and scrambled but if you select them many can be viewed After finding them in setup you need to manually set them up in the guide so that the system knows what shows are on what clear QAM channel That is a bit of a pain to do but worth the effort it makes it very easy to record shows In my area Comcast offers HGTV History Comedy Central CNN MSNBC PBS Fox News CNBC Golf Style and many more through clear QAM
All in all I like using this card with Windows Media Center and not having to have a cable company s DVR or cable box Comcast offers plenty of basic channels through clear QAM but you can t get premium Comcast channels or encrypted channels through this card You need to set up a cable box and use an IR blaster to get those to record on this card
