HTPC - TV Tuner Reviews
by Jarred Walton on December 7, 2005 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
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PowerColor Theatre 550 Pro PCIe
The last card that we're looking at is quite a bit different from the other two. It's one of the first truly interesting PCI Express X1 cards for home users. (LAN and SATA cards might interest higher end buyers, but most people don't need to worry much about that.) Given the number of boards that are only shipping with two or three PCI slots, plus one to three PCIe X1 slots, it's nice to finally be able to put the PCIe slots to use. Now, if only someone would get around to releasing a PCIe sound card... but I digress. PowerColor is the first to market with a PCIe TV Tuner, based on the ATI Theater 550 (or "Theatre 550" if you prefer the PowerColor/British spelling, though we'll stick with Theater).
Something else to consider is that there are no PCIe HDTV tuners at present. With most recent motherboards only including two or three PCI slots, you could put an HDTV tuner in one of those slots and place an analog tuner in an X1 slot. Assuming that you have an add-in sound card, you may not have enough PCI slots to fully accommodate your HTPC needs. The maximum number of supported tuners under Windows MCE is four: two HD and two analog. Most people probably don't go that extreme (and good luck getting a clean signal if you split a coaxial input more than four ways), but it's still something to consider.
Besides the card, you once again get a remote, a USB infrared receiver, and a software bundle. There's also an input cable that allows the use of S-VIDEO or Composite sources, and you get an FM antenna and input. (Radio reception is as bad as OTA TV reception, so I didn't bother trying it. I'm not much of a radio listener anyway.) The remote is definitely more attractive than the Fusion remote, but the MyHD remote is still the smallest of the three. As with the Fusion remote, be careful of the power button, as you can accidentally shut down the PC (or put it in suspend mode) rather than just turning off the software interface. To shut down PowerCinema, you actually press the "Home" button twice. (Duh - as if that's not totally clear....) The placement of the power button on the remote makes it easier to hit, unfortunately, and on several occasions I forgot to use the Home/Power button. Some people may like the feature, but we generally just leave HTPCs running and found it to be more annoying than anything.
The software bundle of the PowerColor card is quite extensive. You get a large selection of CyberLink products with the package, and while several are "Lite" versions, they'll still suffice for most people: PowerDVD, PowerProducer DVD, PowerDirector SE+, Power2Go, MediaShow SE, and PowerCinema. Will you actually need most of that software? Probably not, but it doesn't hurt to have it. Also note that the remote is technically from CyberLink and is made to work with the above software, so if you were to purchase a different Theater 550 card, you would get some other remote. The remote is MCE compliant, though, so you can use it with either interface.
The last card that we're looking at is quite a bit different from the other two. It's one of the first truly interesting PCI Express X1 cards for home users. (LAN and SATA cards might interest higher end buyers, but most people don't need to worry much about that.) Given the number of boards that are only shipping with two or three PCI slots, plus one to three PCIe X1 slots, it's nice to finally be able to put the PCIe slots to use. Now, if only someone would get around to releasing a PCIe sound card... but I digress. PowerColor is the first to market with a PCIe TV Tuner, based on the ATI Theater 550 (or "Theatre 550" if you prefer the PowerColor/British spelling, though we'll stick with Theater).
Click to enlarge.
Something else to consider is that there are no PCIe HDTV tuners at present. With most recent motherboards only including two or three PCI slots, you could put an HDTV tuner in one of those slots and place an analog tuner in an X1 slot. Assuming that you have an add-in sound card, you may not have enough PCI slots to fully accommodate your HTPC needs. The maximum number of supported tuners under Windows MCE is four: two HD and two analog. Most people probably don't go that extreme (and good luck getting a clean signal if you split a coaxial input more than four ways), but it's still something to consider.
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| Click to enlarge. | |
Besides the card, you once again get a remote, a USB infrared receiver, and a software bundle. There's also an input cable that allows the use of S-VIDEO or Composite sources, and you get an FM antenna and input. (Radio reception is as bad as OTA TV reception, so I didn't bother trying it. I'm not much of a radio listener anyway.) The remote is definitely more attractive than the Fusion remote, but the MyHD remote is still the smallest of the three. As with the Fusion remote, be careful of the power button, as you can accidentally shut down the PC (or put it in suspend mode) rather than just turning off the software interface. To shut down PowerCinema, you actually press the "Home" button twice. (Duh - as if that's not totally clear....) The placement of the power button on the remote makes it easier to hit, unfortunately, and on several occasions I forgot to use the Home/Power button. Some people may like the feature, but we generally just leave HTPCs running and found it to be more annoying than anything.
The software bundle of the PowerColor card is quite extensive. You get a large selection of CyberLink products with the package, and while several are "Lite" versions, they'll still suffice for most people: PowerDVD, PowerProducer DVD, PowerDirector SE+, Power2Go, MediaShow SE, and PowerCinema. Will you actually need most of that software? Probably not, but it doesn't hurt to have it. Also note that the remote is technically from CyberLink and is made to work with the above software, so if you were to purchase a different Theater 550 card, you would get some other remote. The remote is MCE compliant, though, so you can use it with either interface.
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JarredWalton - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
That's one of the vagaries of our pricing links. I'll see if I can get our pricing person to fix it. Thanks!JarredWalton - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
Okay, I have the "Buy it now!" links corrected. The T55EP03 code wasn't in the pricing engine last week when I was working on this, but it is now.LoneWolf15 - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
In the article, Anandtech mentioned the IOData AVPL2/DVD network converged DVD player, and said if there was enough interest, they'd test it.Count me in as interested. It looks really cool, and for a reasonable price.
By the way, good review --one of the better ones I've seen from Anandtech in recent history. Thanks for taking the time to review products that many of us have wanted, but have not had enough information to decide to pull the trigger on. Might have to think about setting aside some cash for that PowerColor card.
Dug - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
What wasn't mentioned (or I didn't see it) is that the Fusion card can use so many other programs with it. You don't have to use the crappy software included. In fact I don't know of one person on AVS that does.MyHD afaik can only use the software included with it.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
I'm not positive on this, so perhaps you can answer: as I understand it, the QAM decoding is done by the FusionHDTV software. Obviously, that was of major importance to me. Beyond that, though, you're right: the Fusion5 card can be used with more software than the MyHD.PrinceGaz - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
You mention that PowerColor named their card the "Theatre" which is the UK spelling of the word. It seems strange that a company called PowerColor would do that, as "Color" is the US spelling -- in the UK we use "Colour". Of course it isn't important, just seems a little odd.DigitalFreak - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
"The major networks all have HD channels - ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC - but the amount of actual HD content is relatively limited."Uhh... No, it's not. Every primetime show on the Big Four networks, plus UPN & WB, are in HD, except for reality shows. Sports are not the only thing on television (thank God).
gibhunter - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
I agree. Most prime-time shows are in HD. Regarding sports, most NFL games are in HD. NCAA basketball tournament plus the Big East tournament games are in HD. I also now get the TNTHD which shows NBA games in HD. INHD shows a lot of Red Sox games in HD and ESPN shows most baseball games in HD as well as most prime-time college football games and all Sunday Night NFL games are in HD.JarredWalton - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
I wasn't saying that there aren't other HD broadcasts, but they're still far more SD than HD and out there, at least where I live. Most NCAA stuff is still upsampled SDTV/analog. Major league baseball is almost always an HD that I saw, at least on ESPN, and most of the pro sports are generally HD. I don't watch a lot of primetime programming, but I do know that the most popular shows are generally an HD.Honestly, what I want is to be able to tune into an HDTV channel and never see anything that isn't broadcast in widescreen. I imagine it may be several years or even a decade or more before that's the case -- there's a lot of last generation analog equipment that still works very well, for example. Here's hoping I'm wrong. :-)
ElJefe - Thursday, December 8, 2005 - link
hardly anything will be broadcasted in wide screen. HD is great for people who like hd, and for movies, and for etc etc but not the unionized broadcast television stations. they prefer 4x3 and will for many years.this is a big problem with buying a widescreen fancy tv, most likely nothing much of a person's day to day schedule of shows will be in it.
widescreen tv's are a gimic that is forced upon people. get ready for big black band on the right and left side for a long time. suxorz. (i sell tvs too :) gimic has made me a lot of cash)