4-Tuner ATSC PCIe card for smallish HTPC?

[Randyman...]

Are any of you familiar with any descent 4-Tuner ATSC (HD OTA / Antenna TV) PCIe tuners that work in W7 Media Center?

I currently have a full ATX system with 2x 2250 Happauge 2-Tuner cards plus the video card, and I'd like to streamline into a smaller ITX setup, but I'd obvisouly need to squeeze all 4 ATSC tuners into one card and go with onboard graphics (I still have season-pass conflicts with 4 tuners, so dropping down to 2 tuners is not an option).

I know Ceton has their CABLECARD unit, but that is rather expensive, and I don't believe it supports ATSC at the moment (and it seems rather silly to get an expensive Cablecard tuner when all I need is ATSC/OTA HD off an antenna).

I guess the other option is going with external USB tuners. Does anyone make 2-tuner (or 4-tuner) USB tuners that are worth a darn? Since I'm familiar with Happauge's PCIe 2250's and their nice performance, I'd obviosuly prefer to keep the sensitivity and performance relatively similar (is that possible from a USB tuner? Heat concerns, etc?) What about mixing a Happauge PCIe 2250 along with a USB tuner for a total of 4 tuners in W7? Possible and reliable?

I'd love to swap my 3RU bohemoth for a teeny-weenie ITX which I alrerady have - I just need the correct Tuner compliment...

Thanks for any links!!!

 

[glorp]

Are any of you familiar with any descent 4-Tuner ATSC (HD OTA / Antenna TV) PCIe tuners that work in W7 Media Center?

I currently have a full ATX system with 2x 2250 Happauge 2-Tuner cards plus the video card, and I'd like to streamline into a smaller ITX setup, but I'd obvisouly need to squeeze all 4 ATSC tuners into one card and go with onboard graphics (I still have season-pass conflicts with 4 tuners, so dropping down to 2 tuners is not an option).

I know Ceton has their CABLECARD unit, but that is rather expensive, and I don't believe it supports ATSC at the moment (and it seems rather silly to get an expensive Cablecard tuner when all I need is ATSC/OTA HD off an antenna).

I guess the other option is going with external USB tuners. Does anyone make 2-tuner (or 4-tuner) USB tuners that are worth a darn? Since I'm familiar with Happauge's PCIe 2250's and their nice performance, I'd obviosuly prefer to keep the sensitivity and performance relatively similar (is that possible from a USB tuner? Heat concerns, etc?) What about mixing a Happauge PCIe 2250 along with a USB tuner for a total of 4 tuners in W7? Possible and reliable?

I'd love to swap my 3RU bohemoth for a teeny-weenie ITX which I alrerady have - I just need the correct Tuner compliment...

Thanks for any links!!!

Don't think there is one that's 4 on a PCIe. Ceton is QAM only.

You could consider a SD HDHomeRun and just put it on your network instead of in the case. I do that to get 4 tuners and use one slot. 2 on a card + 2 more with the HDHR.

 

[Randyman...]

Thanks for the reply, glorp. I thought the Ceton didn't currently support ATSC as you confirmed, but I do believe it's a planned upgrade in the near future...

I'd prefer to keep my ATSC/OTA DVR duties confined to the HTPC to have a single record schedule to manage season passe conflicts et al. However, I guess I could point the HDHR's storage towards the HTPC's storage and come up with my own season-pass breakdown to optimize conflicts, etc.

Or are you saying the HDHR would show up as 2 more "tuners" in W7 Media Center? If I can manage both units from the singular W7 Media Center interface (season passes/records/etc plus all playback functions), then I'm sold

I figured someone would have a desire to shrink a 4-Tuner ATSC "Antenna HD" DVR into the ITX form factor w/o resorting to poor-quality USB tuners? Or are some of the USB tuners worth considering compared to something like the Happauge line of PCIe tuner cards? I'm not willing to sacrifice tuner sensitivity and overall performance just to shrink down to an ITX build, but I sure would like to shrink my current HTPC considerably

I guess mATX is the "end-of-the-road" for a small HTPC with 4 good quality ATSC tuners???

 

[glorp]

Or are you saying the HDHR would show up as 2 more "tuners" in W7 Media Center? If I can manage both units from the singular W7 Media Center interface (season passes/records/etc plus all playback functions), then I'm sold

I figured someone would have a desire to shrink a 4-Tuner ATSC "Antenna HD" DVR into the ITX form factor w/o resorting to poor-quality USB tuners? Or are some of the USB tuners worth considering compared to something like the Happauge line of PCIe tuner cards? I'm not willing to sacrifice tuner sensitivity and overall performance just to shrink down to an ITX build, but I sure would like to shrink my current HTPC considerably

I guess mATX is the "end-of-the-road" for a small HTPC with 4 good quality ATSC tuners???

Yes, that's exactly what I meant. You put 2 tuners in the ITX box on a PCIe card. Your existing 2250 will work fine. Then put an HDHR on your network that the HTPC can see and use it's two tuners in addition to the 2 on the card for a total of 4 that 7MC will see and manage for live+DVR use thru the common ATSC EPG. You'd be able to schedule 4 simultaneous recordings at the HTPC (or live + 3, or ...) And you can even share the 2 on the HDHR with other PCs when the HTPC doesn't need them if you want. That's exactly what I do and exactly the configuration I use now in one single DVR box. It works. 7MC handles up to 4 digital ATSC tuners (+ 4 more cablecard and 4 more analog [not that you'd need those!]) in one box. Doesn't matter how you get to the 4 maximum of each type and it can be by combinations of internal cards and/or external tuners of different brands and tecnologies.

Just to be clear, the HDHR doesn't record anything or have any set up that tells it where to record. It's really nothing more than a tuner on a card put in an extenal box with a network interface. You install drivers for it just like for a PCIe card at whatever computer(s) you want to access it. 7MC will see those tuners just as if they were attached to the computer after you set them up in the little HDHR utility run on the PC. To 7MC they just look like 2 more tuners available and 7MC will manage them and you can set tuner priorities for them or assign channels, etc. The newer HDHR have a single antenna connection for the 2 tuners so you just have to get your antenna cable to it. And I'd also suggest you not try to have the ITX HTPC on wireless because 2 channels recording off an HDHR will take ~32-40 Mbit/sec data rate and that's hard to sustain with wireless-N.

I've never used a USB tuner so I can't say much. I don't see why they wouldn't work except of the hassle of running antenna to something stuck on the outside of the box. Not sure how good the signal locking and decoding is on them.

Yea, I think mATX is it if you need multiple PCIe cards to get more than 2 tuners in one box, at this stage.

 

[Randyman...]

I'll be looking into a High-Def Home Run box for sure! If I can get two of those and still get my 4-Streams of full HD ATSC tuners reliably into W7 Media Center, I think I'll be sold. If I go that route, I could still use the ITX's single PCIe port for a descent video card.

Will W7 Media Center "see" the HDHR's tuners over the network off the bat - or will I need to do some hacking? I can't say I've heard about using tuners over a network in W7MC, but I only know my current system with its 2x PCIe Happauge cards.

I definitely have my doubts on USB Tuners. Cooling seems to be one area where they blow (kind of like lots of the USB WiFi AP's that crap out after an hour!) - Sensitivity, compatibility, etc all come into the equation. I know the Hauppauge 2250's are a solid card - and I'm looking to stay in that general performance/reliability sector if at all possible. Most of them seem to be "dongle" types when I'd prefer a breakout-box type unit with more room for the circuits/chips and proper cooling.

Thanks for the leads. More info is welcomed

 

[glorp]

Will W7 Media Center "see" the HDHR's tuners over the network off the bat - or will I need to do some hacking? I can't say I've heard about using tuners over a network in W7MC, but I only know my current system with its 2x PCIe Happauge cards.

Yes, more-or-less. They have an IP port on the back and you just plug them in to a switch and also connect antenna to the coax connector. Plug in the power. That's really all you need to do with the hardware. It should show up as a device when you browse your network as it will have an IP from your DHCP server after it boots. Each HDHR has a unique "ID" too so you can have and recognize more than one on a network if you were thinking to get all 4 tuners off 2 HDHR's. SD has some utilties that lets you "talk" to them directly if you ever need diagnostics (which I've never had to do) and also a utility that lets you monitor signal strength/quality on any channel. You can even update BIOS over the net. That happens automatically everytime SD releases a new driver version.

Then you go to any PC(s) where you want to use the tuners and install the drivers from SD. Then you run a little setup utility too. The setup utility will find and ID all the HDHR's on the net. It allows you to determine whether 1 or both tuners on each one can be accessed from that PC and set what type of signals they will receive (QAM or ATSC). Next you run the 7MC TV tuner setup. 7MC will now "see" whatever number of tuners you assigned as available digital tuners. You go through the usual source scan and determine that (in your case) they are all ATSC. Then it will let you choose the OTA EPG guide for them and do a channel scan just like you've done for the 2250. That's basically it. The tuners will look absolutely no different than the ones you have on the 2250 now (and as said, you could mix/match if you wanted).

When you are using tuner(s) you'll see your PC start to receive traffic over the network and you'll be streaming in ~16 Mbit/sec/tuner for HDTV broadcasts. Other than that it will act exactly as it does now with your 2250. You just need to have adequate inbound bandwidth to do that but any 100M or gig network will be adequate for up to 4 tuners. However remember that if you also tend to watch, say, blu-ray rips on a server to that PC while you are also recording a bunch of TV broadcasts that could end up being a pretty high network load. Make sure you have the bandwidth to handle it all.

If you have other PCs with 7MC you can repeat the set up and then you can share those HDHR tuners as if they were a tuner pool. Of course if you do that it's possible to miss a recording if more than you need are in use when one is needed for recording.

They really are slick devices and incredibly reliable. I think mine locked up and had to be power cycled once in over a year's worth of time. Depending on your OTA reception you may need to boost signal strength. Just get a good quality amp/splitter to boost the antenna if you don't already have one.

 

[Randyman...]

Thanks for the incredibly informative reply, glorp! I'll let my fingers do the walking and start doing some in-depth research ASAP. I've already got a nice Motorola amplifier mounted at my antenna, and I have a Gig-E Switch like 3' from the HTPC. Seems like a match made in heaven .

I'll likely buy one, and try it with my current setup (sawp one of the Happauge cards for the 2-Tuners in the HDHR) and go from there. ITX HTPC - Here I come!!!

Thanks again for the input

 

[Randyman...]

FWIW - Newegg has the HDHR3-US for $99/ea with free shipping! Just snapped up 2 of them and a cheapo USB MCE remote (I use a Harmony, but my current IR Reciever is tied to the Happauge 2250 cards with an 1/8" plug, so I needed a USB IR reciever for MCE).

Thanks again for the info, glorp - I'll post back next week with the results.

 

[glorp]

Great. I'd probably choose to add them to your net and set them up in 7MC one at a time. That will require 2 runs through TV setup but if you do have any problems getting them to talk to you or any signal strength issues you will know which one is the culprit.

I think the newer model HDHR3s have only a single coax connector (my older HDHR2 has a connector for each tuner). The newer ones have to be both QAM or both ATSC since there is only one connector but also don't require an external splitter.

For sure, let me know how it goes.

 

[Randyman...]

Yep - The new HDHR3 is supposed to have better sensitivity, and the internal splitter is supposed to help in this regard, too (fewer RF losses). QAM is a plus, but all I need is OTA ATSC (I have a DirecTV DVR for everything else, and dedicate the W7MC to OTA duties to free up conflicts and storage space on the DirecTV DVR).

Thanks for the "one-at-a-time" tip. I'm going to try these with my existing HTPC (temporarily disable the Happauge tuners and re-run MC Setup) to make sure I can get everything jiving. Then I'll swap over to the tiny ITX HTPC and enjoy less power/heat, and a much smaller box. My current HTPC is in a mammoth 3RU Lian-Li case that's like 20" deep!!! The ITX is like 8"x8"x10" And I'll still be able to use my ATI video card since the ITX's PCIe slot will be free. Woot!!!

Looks like I'll have a pair of HVR-2250's for sale really soon

 

[Mpegger]

In regards to OTA HD signals, the tuner is doing nothing more then recording the stream, much like you downloading a video to your computer. Its the decoder that processes the compressed stream and send it out for display, which for a PC usually means the system itself (CPU, Video card, etc).

A USB ATSC tuner should not have any issues at all, since again, all it is doing is grabbing the stream via the air waves, and feeding it to your PC to save it (either in system ram for immediate decoding and display, or your hard drive for later playback). The only issues a USB tuner would have, is if there wasn't enough bandwidth available over the USB bus to handle the data stream, as in you just took a dozen USB ATSC tuners and hooked them all up to one USB port via a HUB, and tried to record from each and every USB tuner at the same time.

However, from various reviews and postings I've read, USB tuners seem to be poor on signal reception (sensitivity), so unless you have a very strong signal to begin with, you probably won't pull in as many channels as with a normal TV or PCI/PCIe tuner card. Although I do question just how accurate those reviews are, as many tend to use the included little whip antennas usually included with those USB tuners (cause they're on their laptop), and they somehow expect to get the same performance (reception) as they do with their home TV sets and roof antennas.

 

[Randyman...]

Yep - RF Sensitivity (primarily how low they can get with regards to s/n ratio and still get a clean lock) and temp/overheating were 2 of my primary reasons to stay away from USB tuners. USB tuner sticks don't instill confidence from me at all I do have a nice attic-mounted antenna with the clean motorola RF amplifier, but I do get TONS of "fringe" sinals from all around the greater Houston area, so s/n performance and overall sensitivity are pretty important specs for me...

The HDHR3 seems on-par with my current Happauge 2250's, and I'm glad to give two of them a shot at proving their worth. If they fall short, back they go and the 3RU bohemoth HTPC and the 2250 PCIe cards will stay where they are (hoping that's not the case!).

 

[Randyman...]

Wow - That was easy! Plugged them in, installed the drivers/software on my current HTPC, ran W7MC Tuner Setup - Done! I even pushed my luck and installed both at once - not a single issue. All 4 tuners detected quickly and all is well. So far they seem at least as nice as the Happauge 2250's they replaced, and might even be a bit more sensitive with the fringe signals!

I'm going to nix the two required wall-warts, and hard-wire the HDHR's into the HTPC's +5v rail to make it more streamlined/clean, and I had a GigE switch literally next to the HTPC - so the wiring will be really clean once I'm done swapping in the ITX.


I'll be swapping over to the ITX HTPC at my earliest convenience. Thanks for turning me on to these, glorp

 

[glorp]

Excellent! Glad everything worked as expected. They really are slick little devices. I'm seriously thinking about getting a Prime unit for CableCARD once they are out and proven, but I don't know if I can stomach paying my cablescam company again.