Two TV cards in MCE vs one dual tuner card?

[homestarmy]

I am setting up a media center PC for a friend. I see that I can buy two PVR 150's for the same or less than one PVR 500 by hauppauge. Is there a benefit to having them on one card? I know obviously that they will be taking up two slots, but that is not a concern.

And are there any cheaper options for dual tuner?

Please, any insights would be truly helpful.

 

[dclive]

Originally posted by: homestarmy
I am setting up a media center PC for a friend. I see that I can buy two PVR 150's for the same or less than one PVR 500 by hauppauge. Is there a benefit to having them on one card? I know obviously that they will be taking up two slots, but that is not a concern.

And are there any cheaper options for dual tuner?

Please, any insights would be truly helpful.

A benefit is you don't need an external splitter, which may help your signal quality slightly.

 

[homestarmy]

I see, thanks for the info. I saw two coax inputs, and didn't realize that one was for FM.

 

[drewintheav]

In theory the pvr500mce should be better. It has the functionality of 2 devices while taking up only 1 pci slot. furthermore, you only need one cable line to support 2 tv tuners resulting in clearer reception for the tv picture. But I think there are some serious problems with the pvr500mce. A lot of people with AMD dual core CPUs have reported not being able to boot into windows, after installing the drivers, and also not being able to resume from the S3 power management state. Others have had sound issues. There is supposedly a solution for this, but you must send in your card. It is not clear if they repair it or simply replace it but it is definitely beyond the scope of a simple driver fix. I am not sure if any of these issues is related to the fact the pvr500mce uses 2 IRQs in a single pci slot...

 

[homestarmy]

Hmm, that really sucks! Hopefully I'll be getting new stock that shouldn't have this problem. I also won't be using it with a dual core cpu.

I think unless someone offers me a really good deal on a single or two single tuners, I'm going to go for this one for my friend's HTPC.

 

[drewintheav]

No harm in trying it out!

 

[homestarmy]

I ended up getting the Hauppauge PVR-500 for $110 shipped new from someone who bought it and didn't end up using it. Still in warranty with newegg too. Let's hope it works!

 

[mikester]

Nvidia just came out with a new dual tuner card, and I'm pretty sure it's MCE compatible.