Pinnacle 22427 PCTV HD USB Mini Stick Review

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(More customer reviews)I recently purchased the device to watch basic television on a portable device. I had to get rid of my analog portable television set. I decided to try this instead of paying $200 for a decent digital portable television. I was not disappointed. I am using this product on a netbook, the HP mini 1000. It works great with the external antenna. I only tried it at home (in a big city) and I got 14 very clear channels. The picture and sound quality are great. I have not used the recording functions due to the limitations of the netbook memory. I only paid about $60 for this item at a local Best Buy store. It was worth the money. It does concern me that the device gets very hot after a short time of use. I have not used it for an extended period of time, but it is a concern I have about the item. So far, so good. The setup and installation of the software was simple. The device will take a few minutes to scan for available channels. Until they produce some better portable LCD TVs, if you have a laptop, give this a try.

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Avertv Hybrid Volar Max Tv Tuner Kit for Windows MTVHVMXSK Review

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(More customer reviews)
I've been using Media Center on a WinXP tower since 2004. My HP unit came with a built in tuner which could only receive analog channels and the 2004 version of MC that came with it only supported standard def TV. As the years passed, I was eagerly anticipating for a release of Media center that supported HD programming. Once that happened on Windows 7 (and perhaps Vista), I needed to find a tuner card that would work with it.
Over the years I would check release info on new products and read about one sad experience after another regarding the failure of available HD tuner cards on the market and issues regarding firmware, drivers, configuration settings, etc.
Knowing that most new technology needs a few years to get the bugs out, I didn't buy and waited. The last few months had me itching to try and finally set up a HTPC (Home Theater PC) system. When it comes to video quality, my assumption was that I'd get better performance from a PCI internal tuner card in a tower. Thing is, I don't have a new Windows tower but I do have an inexpensive netbook running Windows 7 Home Premium. As there's no way to install an internal tuner card I'm limited to using an external USB tuner. After reading the reviews on Amazon, I decided the Volar Max was my best bet (and at $55 I figured I could only go so wrong).
I remember going through error and configuration issues with Vista and XP in the past, the idea that this little flashdrive-sized gizmo was going to allow me to tune in analog channels, digital channels as well as actual hi res HD seemed suspect at the very least. I was dreading the thought of experiencing the usual whole night investment of getting a new peripheral up and running on Windows only to have it not work well.
I plugged the Avertv in the USB slot and it found & installed its driver automatically and quickly. It then gave me the option of installing it's own tuner/viewer software. I declined in favor of Media Center.
Now I can't say how this thing works with any other OS's but, with Windows 7 Home Premium, the Avertv Volar Max blew my mind. My laptop is connected to an LCDTV- I fired up Media Center, which found the Avertv right away. I selected it, went through the channel scan (like any tv) and was watching great quality analog & digital HD tv within minutes. It WORKED! And not only that, it worked without my having to do any manual installations or configurations. Windows media center rocks (and IMHO blows away Apple in this particular area). The picture and sound seems as good as any HDTV tuner I've seen built into HD televisions. I hooked up my HP Media Center IR remote and can now flip through channels, set DVR recordings, play music, etc. from my couch.
Maybe this shows my age, but I thought any kind of decent resolution tuner hardware needed to be relatively big in size. That this tiny unit does so much, so well and so easily is immensely impressive.
The age of HTPC's is definitely here.

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Avermedia AverTV-USB Plug and Play TV Tuner for Computer Monitors Review

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(More customer reviews)Running Win XP home addition
I purchased the Avermedia AVERTV USB at Fry's electronics.
On the box " Compatible with win 95, 98, 2000, XP "
Inside the box there is a notice " DO NOT LOAD THIS SOFTWARE IF YOU ARE RUNNING WIN XP. GO TO OUR WEB SITE AND DOWNLOAD THE CURRENT DRIVERS FOR XP BEFORE INSTALLING SOFTWARE "
GUESS WHAT? there are no drivers for XP at AverMedia web site.

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VisionTek TV Wonder HD 650 USB TV Dual Tuner/Recorder Review

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(More customer reviews)I was able to get this tuner during a 24 sale the weekend after Thanksgiving at a VERY good price (over 50% off) and I have been very happy that I did. To be honest, this model was on my short list to start with but the price made it a no brainer. I've been using this tuner daily since the first week of December when I first installed it and have had very few issues with it.
For the record, I have used this on two different software installs: Windows Vista Ultimate 32-bit and the Windows 7 32-bit Beta.
Pros:
Easy integration with Media Center both under Vista and Windows 7. In fact, it's been better under the Windows 7 Beta Media Center than under Vista!
Easy hardware set up. Plug it into your computer, install drivers, and plug in a TV and radio antenna and you're set. No needs to worry about the hardware aspect (minus turning the antenna in some cases).
Onboard MPEG-2 decoding that takes some of the pressure off of your CPU and other components.
Not very steep hardware requirements for your PC.
Can be used with other Media PC DVR software suites.
Great HD picture!
Cons:
The included Catalyst Media software is very buggy.
Cannot get the included remote to work.
As alluded to under cons the Catalyst Media software is more than a little buggy, both under Vista and Windows 7. It will work, most of the time. However, if you're like me "most of the time" just won't cut it if you're counting on it to record shows when you're away from your PC. Further, the Catalyst software does not seem to be able to display on a 16:10 ration display such as my LG LCD 22 incher. The upside is that if you play the recorded content back in another application such as Windows Media Player the aspect ratios are correct. It's just very distracting, to me at least, when watching live TV.
After two days of trying to get used to Catalyst I decided to seek out alternatives and settled on two. The first was Beyond TV and then Windows Media Center (Vista). Beyond TV works much better than the included software, produces a better picture quality, and has the correct aspect ratios. Windows Media Center under Vista has just a tad under the quality of Beyond TV. To me it was worth it to rely on Media Center after the trial period of Beyond TV was over as I wasn't ready to pay $40 more than I paid for the tuner for a software package.
My only complaint using under Media Center with Vista was the lack of the digital sub channels that many station simulcast. This is a problem with Vista and not the tuner so I do not ding the tuner for it.
The tuner really started to shine though under Windows 7 Beta, of all things! Media Center under 7 is more feature complete than it is under Vista and displays all the digital sub-channels and records in better quality (max quality under settings) than under any of the previously used software packages. In fact, even though the Catalyst software is installed under Windows 7 I have only used it once in the last month and rely totally on Media Center for my TV recording.
Now on to some of the issues some may have with this tuner.
I do not have cable so I rely on over-the-air broadcasts for my TV viewing. At first I was using my old trusty rabbit ear antenna figuring that I live less than 8 miles from the three main broadcast antennas for my television market. This was a mixed bag of results. The three main stations came in fine but I had "issues" picking up others such as the local PBS station. A quick run to the store to pick up an amplified antenna (RCA ANT1450B Multi-Directional Digital Flat Amplified Home Theater Antenna (Black)) and I was in business on all my local stations.
One other issues is my inability to get the included remote control to work. The poor documentation that comes with the tuner offers no help in this regard and I've given up. I don't really listen to FM radio so other than testing it to make sure it works once I've not used that feature.
Overall, this is an excellent choice for someone looking to setup HDTV recording on their computer in either a home media center setup or on their desktop machine for casual watching.


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CC Witness 2GB Digital Recorder/MP3 players with AM/FM Review

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(More customer reviews)Great little recorder. Received mine yesterday, charged it up, recorded a few test recordings on AM and FM. Programmed it to record from midnight to 4am and it worked great. Fairly easy to use! AM receiver is sensitive and worked well with no interference. I followed the instruction manual and turned off th AM Radio display to minimize/eliminate any interference. Uses SD Memory devices as big as 16gb! That is in addition to it's built-in 2gb of memory. Maybe in a future model it will use a USB Thumb Drive or maybe a regular USB External Hard Drive! This unit is going to make late night recording and recording of specialty radio programs a real easy task. I calculate my recording usage at slightly more than forty hours a week.

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Global TV Terminator, PCI TV & FM Stereo Tuner with Remote Review

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(More customer reviews)Though I've had some troubles with finicky drivers, this TV/FM tuner card is quite worth the money. The program it comes with, QuickTV, generally works quite well. The remote works pretty good too, though it doesn't seem to work with anything other than this company's own software, which rather annoys me.

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Panasonic TH 42PX600U - 42" VIERA plasma TV - widescreen - 720p - HDTV Review

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(More customer reviews)
I recently purchased the Samsung 46 inch LCD (LN-S4692D). I bought this TV because I loved the style and the no glare aspect of an LCD was appealing to me. When I got it home, I was very dissapointed with the picture quality. The analog channels were unwatchable and I think buying a $3000 TV for a handful of HDTV channels is crazy. I then switched to this plasma because when I asked Best Buy associates to turn the channel to an analog channel, I was very pleased with the picture. I purchased it, took it out of the box and I didn't even have to make any changes! The difference between this plasma and my old LCD was astonishing. Almost every channel is crystal clear and the blacks are deeper than any other TV on the market (even the Pioneer). It's also brighter than the Pioneer, if that is an issue for you. If you are serious about picture quality, purchase this Panasonic. The 600U has a cooler design than the 60U and a cable card which are very important to me. The digital camera slot is pretty cool too.
So, if you are in the buying stage and still wondering if you should go LCD or plasma, here is my take:
Only go LCD if you play video games, have an extremely bright room and watch TV a lot during the daylight hours, or plan on using your monitor as a computer (LCD's are immune to burn in.) If you want a clear picture with eye popping color, buy a Plasma but not a cheap one, buy this Panasonic. Good luck shopping!

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Sabrent TV-ATSC Dual ATSC & Digital HDTV and Analog TV Tuner / Video Capture PCI Card with Remote Control Vista Ready Review

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(More customer reviews)I haven't got this thing working yet, but that's part of what drives me to include a warning amongst the rave reviews here. The thing comes in a crudely labeled generic made-in-china box that does not show the name "Sabrent" or any other brand name at all.
There is not one word of documentation. The ports are not marked (not the tiny miniplug, regular miniplug, DIN, coax, none), nor is anything else. The company chose to save maybe 3 cents by using a tiny "mini-CD" (the format some videocameras use) instead of a normal CD for the drivers and (according to the label) an array of software. My CD/DVD drives will not read a mini-CD or even recognize its presence, and I've seen this complaint elsewhere, so it's not just me.
OK, so I went to the Sabrent website for drivers and documentation and software. Ooops, too bad, the page does not list this model at all. I sent them an email using their incredibly cumbersome form, and I'm still waiting for word from them. I will follow up with news if there is any.
Lastly, be warned that Amazon has mislabeled this product. It is NOT a "dual" tuner; it is a HYBRID tuner.

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Sangean HDT-1X HD Radio Component Tuner Review

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(More customer reviews)The HDT-1 is an excellent tuner however being the initial offering from Sangean there were some annoyances like the display that could not be dimmed and no optical output. Well these two issues have been addressed in the HDT-1X! Other improvements like forced analog mode; split comparison between HD and analog signals; accurate time keeping; display that goes black when in the standby mode but you can push the INFO button and the time will come on and stay on for a few seconds. The sensitivity of the tuner is superb as I live almost 50 miles north of NYC. While I do not get all the HD stations, I pull in a fair number to cover the various music genres. I am most satisfied and I am not a teckie, but I know a quality item; as I said this is my second Sangean tuner and I am enjoying it! Buy it, but make sure you have a good FM antenna -- I am using an indoor whip antenna and a Magnum Signal Sleuth and I get HD stations -- imagine with a roof or attic antenna (I can't have either as I live in a townhouse). Of course if you live close to a large city like NYC you won't need any elaborate antenna!

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KWorld PVR-TV 300U USB 2.0 TV Tuner/Video Input Adapter Review

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(More customer reviews)This product is excellent for the price. A lot of people have complained about it not wanting to work, but I would just go to the manufacturer's website and download the latest drivers. As far as the PVR software that comes with it, I must say, that even with my high-end, dual core system, I was unable to record a minute worth of footage before the sound went out of sync. This, however, isn't caused by the adapter, but rather, by the software that came with it. There is an update on the company website for it, but even after installing that, it still wouldn't capture video and audio that was in sync.
My solution was to get a program called "BeyondTV" by SnapStream. There are other programs out there, but this one has a decent price tag and a great interface. It also has a lot of features that make it easy to use and is more than capable of recording and scheduling recordings effortlessly and without losing sync along with excellent record quality.
With that installed and this adapter, you can expect this device to be more than suitable for your needs. You can even get a firefly remote from Snapstream to truly turn your PC into a PVR if you like. I never bought the remote, so I don't know how well it will work, but their PVR software is excellent.
I've knocked one star off for the incapable PVR software included and because KWorld never responded to my inquiry about recording footage and maintaining sync. Thankfully I came up with my own solution.


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Enjoy watching live TV with PVR-TV 300U in a resizable window or full screen on your PC or laptop. In addition, you can even hook it up to your home video entertainment system through the additional AV and S-Video input.With TVR application, you can pause live TV and continue from where you left with the Time-Shifting function. Scheduled Recording function allows users not to miss any TV show, especially it provides a powerful function - S.R.P.O. (Scheduled Recording in Power-Off Mode).Any video file can easily be converted from and to avi, mpg, etc with MPEG Converter and then edit your favorite video files with MPEG Editor. Finally, make a copy of the edited file into DVD / VCD / SVCD with Burn DVD.PVR-TV 300U Dongle also includes a fully featured Infrared Remote Control, which allows users to access every feature with a simple press of a button, especially shutting down PC via the remote control.

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