[ubuntu-uk] Suggest a ubuntu compatible TV-CARD

[Darren Mansell]

On Wed, 15 Oct 2008 10:37:07 +0100, "Javad Ayaz" <javadayaz at gmail.com>
wrote:
> i dont have an aerial. im only using virgin (freeview only) to watch tv!
> 

As said below your best option is to get an analogue TV card as they have
composite and s-video in. Generally Hauppauge (pron. hop-hog, not
haw-parsch!) PVR-150, 250, 350 etc work very well with Video4Linux (V4L)
which is what MythTV uses and I assume almost anything else that uses the
TV card on Linux.

You can connect the Virgin box to your TV card using a SCART to composite
converter, where you get 1 yellow phono for video, 1 red phono for right
audio and 1 white phono for left/mono audio. If your cable box sends
s-video out via the SCART socket (unlikely, almost every Sky box doesn't)
then you can get a SCART converter with an s-video output too so you can
get a better picture.

You will have to change channel using your Virgin remote control and then
just watch the picture on the screen.

If you ever want to record or time-shift TV (pause live TV, rewind, FF etc
like Sky+) you will be better getting a PVR TV card as they have hardware
MPEG-2 encoders so the computer doesn't have to work very hard to encode
video before storing it on the hard disk. If you plan on just watching TV
then any analogue Hauppauge card should be fine on Linux.

The audio output from your Virgin box is likely to be coming out of the
SCART and out of 2 audio phono connectors. You can use either but you will
need a 3.5mm stereo jack to twin RCA phono cable to go into the audio input
of your sound card on your PC. Or just take the sound direct to an
amplifier / speakers.

HTH
Darren