# Which is the best TV Tuner card ?



## michael (May 19, 2013)

Hi Guys,
Which is the best TV Tuner card  to record TV shows in 1080P HD ?
It should also record HD TV channels.

Please guide me. I need to buy it.


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## TheLaughingMan (May 19, 2013)

I believe this will: Ceton InfiniTV 4 Quad-tuner Card for Watching Digi...

However, I understand the Ceton Tuner requires the same control card as your basic cable box. This is something you will have to ask your cable provider to....well provide. They should not have a problem with this.


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## michael (May 19, 2013)

I need to know from Avermedia company


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## Jetster (May 19, 2013)

SiliconDust HDHomeRun is the only tuner I would buy


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## FordGT90Concept (May 19, 2013)

michael said:


> Hi Guys,
> Which is the best TV Tuner card  to record TV shows in 1080P HD ?
> It should also record HD TV channels.
> 
> Please guide me. I need to buy it.


-HDTV (ATSC and PAL) is 1080i, not 1080p.
-Computer TV tuners do not work with digital cable.  They need QAM decrypters and that's basically non-existant.  You'd have to get the tuner directly from the cable provider.  Edit: TheLaughingMan's suggestion looks like it overcomes this issue.
-Computer TV tuners are only good for over-the-air signals and potentially analog signals.   Edit: TheLaughingMan's suggestion looks like it overcomes this issue.
-If you're intending to just capture a signal from another device, you need a capture card, not a TV tuner.

I have an Asus NyCinema EH3160 Combo card.  It works great for OTA HDTV and analog using Windows Media Center.  The FM tuner works well but it clearly has buffering problems. If you listen to radio for 30-60 minutes, it will eventually start skipping.  I have to pause it for a while then resume.  It'll stop for a while until it gets caught up and runs into buffering problems again.  Kind of annoying, but it works.


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## insane 360 (May 19, 2013)

i have a hdhomerun dual 

its awesome for OTA HDTV and has dual tuners as the name implies but only takes in one input.  

if you need to do this with hd cable then you will need either the ceton or the hdhomerun prime...

both can do 2/4 channels with the right cable card from your cable provider...

satellite gets a little tricky...not sure on it probably a capture card.  maybe firewire used to work...but never tried it..

the nice side to network turner (like my dual) is any pc that is connected can use the tuners and it works from mac/linux/windows and you can watch two channels at the same time.


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## erixx (Jun 14, 2013)

After some USB tv sticks i use a PCI-Express card: Hauppauge Capture HD, and it is MUCH more stable than anything I 've had before.


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## cdawall (Jun 16, 2013)

I have several ATi HD750 based tuners in USB form all of which work well with WMC. They are cheap, work, have good drivers and are available from almost any manufacturer you can think of.


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## CBRworm (Jun 18, 2013)

I use the HDHomeRun Prime w/ a Comcast cablecard and have had great luck with it - my biggest complaint is that 3 tuners is not enough.  To get more tuners using silicon dust components, you need more cable cards.  Comcast charges an HD outlet fee for each card along with the card rental - so the $2 a month rental is really $12 a month.

The next caveat is that to record HD shows - most likely they are copy protected or have some form of DRM.  This requires you to use Windows Media Center to record - which works fine, but may not be your first choice.  There may be some workarounds, but I have not found any.

Ceton just released, or is about to release a single box (InfiniTV6) with 6 tuners that uses a single cable card.  If my HDHomerun Prime didn't work so well, I would probably buy one of these.  My fear is that I have 4 televisions set up using my current config and it just works.  It took a bit of work to get there and I hate the thought of messing it up.


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## Compgeke (Jun 18, 2013)

I have a Happauge WinTV HVR-1800 that does ATSC\NTSC\QAM with 1080i support. Randomly has a FM tuner as well, but it's nowhere near the quality of my 70s Kenwood receiver.


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## CBRworm (Jun 18, 2013)

It's funny how poor most FM receivers are these days.  My 70's pioneer is also quite good compared to what I run into today.


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