[ubuntu-uk] PCI Tv tuner cards

[Dave Walker]

Rob Beard wrote:
> <SNIP>.
>
> You don't mention if you want an analogue tuner card or a Freeview card. 
>   If you want an Analogue one then probably anything with a BT848 or 
> BT878 chipset would work (which covers most analogue PCI TV Tuner 
> cards).  For Digital cards check out this site...
>
> http://www.linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
>
>
> You'd be looking for DVB cards (DVB-T for Terestrial i.e. Freeview, and 
> DVB-S for Freesat).
>
> Rob
>   
Hi Rob,

I personally don't recommend the Brooktree Bt848/Bt878 chipset, unless
cost is a major factor.  This chipset is as old as the hills, and as you
say has really good support in Linux.  However, it is a framegrabber
card - which means that it uses CPU cycles to convert it to MPEG.  The
Hauppauge PVR 250/350 cards include an onboard hardware MPEG encoder,
and therefore just dumping to disk.

DVB cards get this feature 'for free' because DVB is received as MPEG,
so the cards only need to tune the the MPEG stream.  It is worth noting
that the new Freesat should require "DVB-S S2" cards, however I am a
complete noob to Freesat - Hoping to get it before xmas.

Kind Regards,
Dave Walker