Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-500MCE

[Poohbee]

is the pvr-250 better than the pvr 500?

 

[Quasmo]

Originally posted by: Poohbee
is the pvr-250 better than the pvr 500?

no

 

[zinkpig]

nope ..there are mostly the same. the 250 is an older model. Its been replaced by the 150. The 500 just has 2 tuners..for all practical applications the 500 is like 2x 150 that share a single PCI slot.

 

[Jassi]

Question: I have a p3 866 MHz system with about 640 MB of RAM. Can I use that as a recorder? I also have 260 GB potential hard drive space if I put all my HDs together. How good is the tuner? I only want to use it as a "just in case I miss a tv show" box. Is that possible?

 

[huesmann]

Your specs exceed the minimum requirements of Sage, so you should be okay.

 

[Poohbee]

awww. darn it.. >_< The price went back up >_<! $131.95 now.. Booo

 

[huesmann]

Dammit! I was gonna buy.

 

[bentwookie]

price is still good...PM if you want a link for the 10% which makes it $118...

 

[Poohbee]

Image from NeweggQuestion....

I ordered the card and today I got it.. But it's weird what I received.... Did you guys get the card in a plastic sealed White box (like OEM boxes or refurb) with only the Hauppauge name stickered to the box and a upc code on the side?

 

[corinthos]

AFAIK, that's normal since there isn't a retail version of the PVR-500, at least not yet.
I bought mine from buy.com and received the optional bracket that allows for additional A/V connections.

 

[Poohbee]

hmm yeah I bought mine from buy.com too... I guess I'll open it up and see what's inside.. I was just a bit apprehensive when I saw the white box wasn't really a "retail" package. I wonder if and when they do get retail packaged I wonder if they will include extras in the box.. If so, I wonder if we can call and ask for those extras since we got the white box version.. =I

Edit: I just opened the box and I too received the optional bracket.

 

[cmv]

Back in stock -- I just ordered one with the $30 coupon "applied and got the Visa card" deal. I found a 5% off coupon (for all) over at Fatwallet but maybe there is still a 10% out there?

 

[BigEdMuustaffa]

You can't really take advantage of the dual tuners if you have satellite. Also , how does this card compare to the 350 other than the dual tuners? Thanks....

 

[Morpheux]

Ya, that's my problem and the reason I still don't have a HTPC. With DishNetwork giving me 4 tuners worth of DVRs I have all the recordings I need, but would like to have the ability of moving the media to DVD, just can't justify a PC strictly for that alone. Oh well.

 

[Linflas]

I have the 500MCE and an HDTV Wonder running together in an MCE box I built out of an old KR7A Raid workstation I had sitting around. My only complaint is that even with the latest big update MCE still does not support unencrypted QAM so the HDTV card is worthless to me ATM. Other than that I had no problems getting it all to work together.

Forums for the Hauppauge cards.

 

[Karaktu]

Originally posted by: Quasmo

Originally posted by: HDTVMan

Originally posted by: Quasmo
no it doesn't do HD tv, it simply has dual TV tuners and I believe FM radio support. The ATI HDTV-Wonder will supply the HD Television I'm looking for. So technically I'll have 3 tuners in my HTPC, and coincidentally 3 HDDs. One for each tuner to record to (Well hopefully, I need to install Windows MCE) But I was looking for a good TV Tuner and These are EXCELLENT Cards and this is their top of the line card for $118 you dont get much better.

Im avoiding MCE with my ATI HDTV because of the problems associated with it. Will wait until its supported in MCE natively first.

But this dual tuner card I believe is a native MCE product.

The HDTV Wonder is natively supported by MCE

Not exactly. The analog tuner on the HDTV Wonder isn't currently supported, so you have to have a separate MCE-supported analog tuner BEFORE you can use the HDTV tuner on the ATI card. :roll:

I hate software...

 

[Crucial]

Originally posted by: Karaktu

Originally posted by: Quasmo

Originally posted by: HDTVMan

Originally posted by: Quasmo
no it doesn't do HD tv, it simply has dual TV tuners and I believe FM radio support. The ATI HDTV-Wonder will supply the HD Television I'm looking for. So technically I'll have 3 tuners in my HTPC, and coincidentally 3 HDDs. One for each tuner to record to (Well hopefully, I need to install Windows MCE) But I was looking for a good TV Tuner and These are EXCELLENT Cards and this is their top of the line card for $118 you dont get much better.

Im avoiding MCE with my ATI HDTV because of the problems associated with it. Will wait until its supported in MCE natively first.

But this dual tuner card I believe is a native MCE product.

The HDTV Wonder is natively supported by MCE

Not exactly. The analog tuner on the HDTV Wonder isn't currently supported, so you have to have a separate MCE-supported analog tuner BEFORE you can use the HDTV tuner on the ATI card. :roll:

I hate software...

I thought the analog tuner on the hdtv wonder was software based and that was the reason it's not supported? MCE requires a hardware based encoder for analog tuners IIRC.

 

[rahvin]

Originally posted by: KaraktuNot exactly. The analog tuner on the HDTV Wonder isn't currently supported, so you have to have a separate MCE-supported analog tuner BEFORE you can use the HDTV tuner on the ATI card. :roll:

I hate software...

That's what you get for using M$ software.