# Watching Tv Through The Pc



## Reverie (Aug 9, 2004)

I was at the local Microcenter yesterday and I pulled the trigger on a TV card for my PC. I installed it and this thing works like a champ! Amazing. I'm sitting here with the NASCAR race from Atlanta in a little window in the corner of my monitor while I find other ways to waste my time. I really like this thing. I am using it with Windows Media Center (which was built into the Operating System) and it brings together all of the media available on my computer including the MP3s on a separate hard drive. I hooked up a cheap radio antenna I had already and it pulls in a pretty good radio signal as well.

I was wondering if anyone else is doing this.

Reverie


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## Lady Di (Oct 28, 2005)

Do you still have to hook it up to a cable? I;m guessing yes, but thought I'd ask.

Sounds like a great way to have another TV while camping if one wants to, or one could watch a different channel than what the family is watching.


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## Oregon_Camper (Sep 13, 2004)

Oh yea...I've been doing this for over 2 years.

I have 11 PC's in the house....3 of them have dual tuner cards and 1 has a Dual Cable Card solution for recording 2 HD shows at the same time (www.niveus.com for info)

Enjoy the new found freedom of recording TV shows and watching them on YOUR schedule...commercial free (via 30 second skip)


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## Justman (Jul 22, 2006)

Well, unlike Oregon_Camper, I only have 4 PCs in my house. One is my media PC. I put it together with a PVR-250 card from the company that starts with an "H"... It works very well! I downloaded a free PVR software program (GBPVR) and have been using it for a little over a year now to record and watch TV programs (we like "Good Eats" on the Food channel) and to listen to our collection of MP3's. The computer I have it on could be better, but since the PVR-250 has a built in mpeg encoder, it doesn't need a top of the line computer to make it work...


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## California Jim (Dec 11, 2003)

Us too. Had my last PC made with an ATI All-In-Wonder video card. It has analog inputs among others for importing old video tapes and was the main reason I bought it. The added bonus was a TV tuner. Hooked it up to our cable feed and Voila'! works great.


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## Reverie (Aug 9, 2004)

Does anyone have any idea how to convert VHS tapes into digital?

Reverie


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## LarryTheOutback (Jun 15, 2005)

Reverie said:


> Does anyone have any idea how to convert VHS tapes into digital?


If by digital you mean DVD ... You can buy a VHS to DVD recorder. My cube neighbor just bought one for under $100.

Ed


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## wolfwood (Sep 19, 2005)

All this talk seems to be about PCs. Is the TV-capability there for Macs too? And, if so, what (details please







) do I really need? We not even gonna invest in buying a TV for the camper (that' just not our idea of camping)...but we did come close to missing a Pats game last year and that would have been a very serious thing indeed. Since we almost always have the laptop with us....the 'casual availability' of a "TV-card" might be nice....


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## Reverie (Aug 9, 2004)

I know there are external appliances for the PC which you can use through the USB port in a laptop. I have no idea if they would work with a Mac.

Reverie


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## California Jim (Dec 11, 2003)

Since iMac's don't really have any expansion ports like a traditional "beige box", you would need either a USB or Firewire (iee1394) port device. A box that plugs into the Mac. I haven't looked, but I'm sure there are many.


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## emsley3 (Feb 27, 2007)

I got a SlingBox for Christmas and that thing rocks. You basically run your DVR, satellite box, or cable box out to the Slingbox and then from there out to the TV. You can then use a computer or cellphone if you have web access to watch and control the box. I got it so that while camping I could hookup the laptop to the television in the OB and then teether my phone to the laptop thus allowing us to watch our home TV on the road. Since we have complete control of the DVR, we can watch recorded shows and schedule shows we forgot to before we left. The only limiting factor while camping will be cellphone coverage and the picture is not as good as watching from home but it will allow the kids to watch their normal shows while camping.

Paul


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## BigBadBrain (Aug 26, 2004)

One thing I learned about this setup is that if you use a splitter on your cable it can end up with a weak signal into the cable modem and cause a lot of dropouts from the internet. I fought this for a long time before finding the problem - the installer falsely reported to me that he had run individual cable feeds for TV input and internet.


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## Oregon_Camper (Sep 13, 2004)

wolfwood said:


> All this talk seems to be about PCs. Is the TV-capability there for Macs too? And, if so, what (details please
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Hope you find something for the Mac....as recorded TV is better then sliced bread.

Watch when you want
Pause...fast forward...rewind...skip commercials.

Oh...you can watch a football game in nothing flat. from tackle (hit 30 second skip) and about 85% of the time the quarterback is walking up to line of scrimmage. SOOOOOOO nice!!!


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## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

BigBadBrain said:


> One thing I learned about this setup is that if you use a splitter on your cable it can end up with a weak signal into the cable modem and cause a lot of dropouts from the internet. I fought this for a long time before finding the problem - the installer falsely reported to me that he had run individual cable feeds for TV input and internet.


I built my last couple of PC's and added a TV tuner cards to them. The one located where my Cable/Internet/phone modem was caused me to lose my phone usage. the company (Comcast) informed me that i could not use the TV tuner on the computer at the modem since spliting the line caused a weak signal for the phone, so i stopped. maybe ill try again for the heck of it.

I also use GBPVR on my HTPC in our Media Room. Works very well. Im just not too happy with the picture quality. it seems lacking but that could be some other cause...

Im hoping to get to a point of storing all my movies on a HTPC "server". Anyone done this yet?


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## Oregon_Camper (Sep 13, 2004)

Sayonara said:


> Im hoping to get to a point of storing all my movies on a HTPC "server". Anyone done this yet?


I've been doing this for about 18 months....recommend using "My Movies" for this. GREAT GREAT software...and it is FREE. But I would recommend you toss him a few bucks for the effort.









This is the #1 addon for ANY Media Center PC.

http://www.mymovies.dk/


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## Nathan (Jan 2, 2007)

Sayonara said:


> One thing I learned about this setup is that if you use a splitter on your cable it can end up with a weak signal into the cable modem and cause a lot of dropouts from the internet. I fought this for a long time before finding the problem - the installer falsely reported to me that he had run individual cable feeds for TV input and internet.


I built my last couple of PC's and added a TV tuner cards to them. The one located where my Cable/Internet/phone modem was caused me to lose my phone usage. the company (Comcast) informed me that i could not use the TV tuner on the computer at the modem since spliting the line caused a weak signal for the phone, so i stopped. maybe ill try again for the heck of it.

I also use GBPVR on my HTPC in our Media Room. Works very well. Im just not too happy with the picture quality. it seems lacking but that could be some other cause...

Im hoping to get to a point of storing all my movies on a HTPC "server". Anyone done this yet?
[/quote]

We use WOW for cable, but I think it goes: Phone (Vonage) then Cable Modem. When it enters the house they split it into the data line and the cable lin. Of course there is only 1 wire running too the house.


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## BoaterDan (Jul 1, 2005)

I've been told by a few installers that the key is just to split the internet line off before any other splits. That way, the internet (cable modem) line has a more "pure" connection back to the provider. I've had problems as well putting my own $3 splitter off a TV jack in the wall.

Another installer recently told me it doesn't really matter as long as you have a good quality splitter (he left me an extra one).

Vonage, and other aftermarket (not provided by cable company) IP phone systems, just hook into the cable modem, so they are just riding like any other internet traffic.

(For what it's worth, we recently bit on a WOW bundle promotion, then told them to take all their new crap back after a few weeks of trying to get it to work reliably. Thank God I hadn't cancelled the Vonage service.)


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## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

WOW !!! AWESOME !!! 
Is this Media Center specific? or can i use it on my XP Pro? Actually, can I put it on one PC and use the wireless network for accessing it on my other computers..... ?


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