Recording Sky Digital - Which TV tuner for a Vista HTPC?

Forums › Home Theatre (including HTPC and EPG Collector) › Recording Sky Digital - Which TV tuner for a Vista HTPC?

Tankguy

20 posts

Geek

#14136 17-Jun-2007 22:36

I am looking to build a new HTPC and want PVR functionality. I am a little confused with regards to the correct TV tuner card to buy. If I wanted a card to record Freeview I understand that I would get a DVB-S card. But to record Sky Digital (not Freeview) what type of card is required?

I will be outputing Sky Digital to the HTPC using a SCART to S-Video cable. My HTPC case is low profile. I want to install dual tuners in the HTPC. Can anyone recommend a suitable PCI tuner card using MPEG-2 codec.

My current thought is to buy a pair of Hauppage PVR-150 low profile cards, but I would be grateful for any other recommendations.

I assume that to record using both tuners I will need to split the S-video output from the Skybox. Is this correct? How is the best way to split the S-video cable? Once again, I would be grateful for any suggestions. Thanks

Pete

WirelessNZ

11 posts

Geek

#75146 19-Jun-2007 10:22

Tankguy:

I will be outputing Sky Digital to the HTPC using a SCART to S-Video cable. My HTPC case is low profile. I want to install dual tuners in the HTPC. Can anyone recommend a suitable PCI tuner card using MPEG-2 codec.

My current thought is to buy a pair of Hauppage PVR-150 low profile cards, but I would be grateful for any other recommendations.

Pete

Pete,
Have you considered the PVR500? I think it has two built in tuners. My understanding is that it also has two analogue video/audio inputs for the outputs from Sky box. Output from my Skybox is analogue- so I am guessing yours would be too.

The PVR500 (depending on where you buyit) works out about the same price as two PVR150 cards - which seems like an untidy option

http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_pvr500mce.html

Tankguy

20 posts

Geek

#75156 19-Jun-2007 12:34

Thanks WirelessNZ,

Yes, my preference was for the PVR500 but my case is low profile and I don't think the PVR500 is available as a low profile card. Can anyone confirm this? Hence the only way to achieve the two tuners is via 2 x PVR150.

Thanks for clarifying that the output from the SKY box is in analogue. Am I correct then in that I will need to split the S-video output from the Skybox to feed the two tuners?

grant_k

3539 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#75158 19-Jun-2007 12:53

Tankguy: Am I correct then in that I will need to split the S-video output from the Skybox to feed the two tuners?

What's the point of doing that?

The S-Video output can only carry one channel at a time, so there doesn't seem any point in splitting it. You would be best to dedicate one of your PVR150 cards to recording Sky, and the other card to recording FreeView channels.

Regs

4066 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Snowflake

#75169 19-Jun-2007 14:57

Grant17:
Tankguy: Am I correct then in that I will need to split the S-video output from the Skybox to feed the two tuners?

What's the point of doing that?

The S-Video output can only carry one channel at a time, so there doesn't seem any point in splitting it. You would be best to dedicate one of your PVR150 cards to recording Sky, and the other card to recording FreeView channels.

I don't hook my MCE to a SKY box so I don't know the answer to this - do you assign a specific tuner card to the set top box? If so then I can see absolutely no need to split the s-video cable.

I know that if you are recording TV stations then MCE can select either tuner if you have more than one, with one of the tuners being the "preferred" tuner.

Sales Engineer
Snowflake
www.snowflake.com

about.me/nzregs
Twitter: @nzregs

geekiegeek

2513 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#75181 19-Jun-2007 16:23

Grant17:
Tankguy: Am I correct then in that I will need to split the S-video output from the Skybox to feed the two tuners?

What's the point of doing that?

The S-Video output can only carry one channel at a time, so there doesn't seem any point in splitting it. You would be best to dedicate one of your PVR150 cards to recording Sky, and the other card to recording FreeView channels.

I have to agree. there is no point having two tuners if you only have one set top box. Your Sky decoder will only ouput one channel at a time so unless you want to have a freeview box or a second sky decoder you might as well just buy a PVR150 or I personally use a TUL (sappire) ATI Theatre 550 card.

Tankguy

20 posts

Geek

#75198 19-Jun-2007 18:51

Duh! I guess I hadn't considered the fact that I can only watch one Sky channel at a time so it stands to reason I can only record one channel at a time also.

Unfortunately we receive very poor terrestial service so recording FTA channels has little point. Once Sky & Freeview resolve the polarity issues, I assume I can split the signal coming from my dish and receive Freeview. I assume in order to do this I will need a DVB-S tuner card to act as the set-top box for Freeview? Can digital and analogue tuners co-exist within the Vista MCE environment? I recall reading somewhere that there was issues running two types of tuners concurrently?

Perhaps I would be better to wait until MySky Mk2 is released, with the potential to record 3 channels concurrently?

Thanks for your responses to date.
Pete