TV Card User Survey

You can see information about what TV cards others are using in the WhatCardYouUse section. If you have a KnoppMyth setup, enter your information for others to see.

Hauppauge PVR (MPEG-2 Hardware encoder) cards:

All of these cards use the ivtv driver and generally work out of the box. Periodically Hauppauge or their suppliers change the tuner chip being used, in which case you may need a newer version of the ivtv driver. If you do need new drivers, see the CompileIvtv page for directions on getting, building and installing the latest driver. Before you do this however, remember that it is far more common to botch the configuration. To see if a troublesome card is supported by the ivtv drivers yet, see this page: ivtvdriver.org/index.php/Supported_hardware The non-MCE models (PVR-150 model 1048, PVR-250 model 980, PVR-350) come with an IR remote which is supported by KnoppMyth via the lirc drivers and daemons. See the HowTo page for details on setting up lirc. Also, see the HauppaugeTwoFiftySettings page for some notes about capturing DVD-compatible video with these cards.

HauppaugePVR150

The newer cheaper alternative to the PVR-250 cards. You lose some minor capabilities (certain resolutions), save about 25% vs. the equivalent 250, and gain an IR blaster (attached to the IR receiver for the remote) with the non-MCE models. These should work out of the box. However, if your tuner is not recognized by the ivtv driver, you have a flakey remote, or other i2c issues, see the CompileIvtv page for details on how to upgrade. Setting up the included IR blaster takes some extra configuration. If you are using an older version of KnoppMyth for some reason, see the HauppaugeOneFiftyInstallation page.

HauppaugePVR250

One of the best cards to use with MythTv, as its affordable, known to work with myth, and has on-board MPEG-2 encoding which means your CPU doesn't have spend its time compressing the video stream. These should generally work out of the box. The non-MCE models (980, ?) come with an IR remote and a builtin IR receiver.

HauppaugePVR350

Like the 250, with the addition of hardware MPEG2 decoding and svideo output, further reducing the CPU load. This allows a very low power CPU to be used (down to ~450Mhz), and since playback from the PVR350 preserves the interlaced video fields, you don't have to deinterlace, and it provides about the best tvout shy of vga->component, or dvi. The setup and configuration of this card to use its TV-out is now automatic (previous manual setup is described in HauppaugeThreeFiftyInstallation). Since all 350s are non-MCE they all come with a remote like the 250.

HauppaugePVR500MCE

Equivalent to two PVR-150s in a single slot. With R5A16 and below, you'll definitely need a new ivtv driver and some extra configuration work. With R5A22 and beyond, the PVR-500 works out of the box. Since these are all MCE you will need a separate remote. New versions of the PVR-500 now showing up in the retail channel use a a Samsung tuner and do not work out of the box. However the very latest 0.4.2 stable release of the driver claims to include a fix. See the CompileIvtv page for details on how to upgrade.

Avermedia M179

While this card is not from Hauppauge it also uses the ivtv driver and is approximately equivalent to an older (tuner type 2) PVR-250 card. However it doesn't play nice with others, and may require you to manually set the tuner types in multi-card systems since it seems to interfer with the detection of other PVR cards. See this thread in the forums: mysettopbox.tv/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=8902 To determine what the correct tuner types for the other cards are, you should remove the M179, boot the system without it, check the IVTV section in /var/log/messages, and record the types.

ATSC Cards

These can be used two different ways. Currently the most common and best documented way is to pretend that they're DVB cards at set up time. The other less well supported way is using native drivers. Like DVB cards these capture a pre-encoded MPEG-2 stream. Both cards should support OTA (broadcast via an antenna) or QAM (via a cable system) inputs. However, you may find that your cable provider has stripped some critical info from the QAM stream which keeps them from working.

HD-2000 / HD-3000 / HD-5500

These cards, produced by the folks at www.pchdtv.com, are for Linux only. They allow you to tune OTA (over-the-air) HDTV signals from an antenna and also support standard NTSC video. Questions about configuration can be addressed to the pcHDTV forum (where several users have setup the card as part of a MythTV system) at www.pchdtv.com/forum. There is a growing community of KnoppMyth users with these cards, and a special HDTV section has been set up in the KnoppMyth forum to discuss all aspects of HDTV. You can buy them at www.pchdtv.com or mythic.tv. See notes at PcHDTVInstallation. If you are close (my experience is about 20 miles to the antennas) I use a pair of $20 rabbit ears from RadioShack?. YMMV! Local conditions can mean that even with a good antenna you can't get a clean signal. See this page for some KnownWorkingHDTVSystems.

Air2PC-ATSC-PCI

This card receives HDTV off the air and from unencrypted digital cable. Hardware stream demultiplexing helps reduce the recording burden on weaker CPUs. As of R5A16, the rev 2.0 card based on the nxt2002 chipset is supported in KnoppMyth. You can buy them at mythic.tv.

KWorld ATSC 110

The Kworld 110 is a PCI card that comes with a remote. It can be used for HDTV either OTA or unencrypted QAM, and it also comes with NTSC (analog) inputs. Setup for the HD is mostly ‘out of the box’, but some have to do a little more persuading. (See mysettopbox.tv/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=8695) The analog setup is less supported and rarely used, but there are rumblings of further support for this feature in the future. The above thread also has a patch that can be used to get the included remote working.

ATI HDTV Wonder

The ATI is a PCI card that works well for HDTV either OTA or (unencrypted QAM 256 only on 650 PCI-E card version). This card is often packaged with an indoor antenna and/or an RF remote, which can prove to be a nice ‘starter kit’ for HDTV. Add to this that the ATI HDTV Wonder has had some ‘Vista issues’ and you might find some deals on ebay. Some have reported spotty quality, while others have no problems. It is detected with R5F1 but might need similar tweaks to the /etc/init.d/KnoppMyth-tv file that is detailed here: mysettopbox.tv/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=77802#77802 This card also has an NTSC (analog) input but is usually not used as it provides no ‘onboard encoding’.

YUV (Software encoder) Cards

Leadtek 2000XP Deluxe

Works well with Mythtv. Autodetected and configured by the installer. Comes with a remote control too. The quality seems fairly average, but the price is very good. See LeaktekWinfastTV2000XPdlx.

Leadtek 2000XP Expert

Linux drivers are still very much in alpha / beta. Supports NICAM stereo.

DVB Cards

Hauppauge ~WinTV Nova-S Plus PCI

Budget DVB-S card with S-Video-in, composite-Video-in, stereo-audio-in and infrared-receiver. See www.linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Hauppauge_WinTV_NOVA?-s_Plus_PCI .
Works with R5B7, how-to is in the works. NovaSPlusHowTo

Hauppage Nova-T

Guide to setting it up on R5A22/R5A16 here: mysettopbox.tv/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=38322#38322

DVICO FusionHDTV DVB-T1

This card can be used to recieve terrestrial digital television signals (DVB-T), and as the name suggests is capable of receiving HDTV (although you better have some grunt in your processor if you want to decode HDTV in real time). The card works out of the box in R5A22. Because it receives digital broadcasts, the quality of recordings is excellent. Ideal for burning to DVD. The remote control that comes with the card is quite nice too.

DVICO FusionHDTV lite DVB-T

Cut-down version of the above card (no composite or S-video inputs, simpler chipset) basically a clone of the Aver 771. Has loopback antenna socket. Half-height card, comes with short plate. Comes with same remote and USB dongle as full version of card. Due to the standard bt878 chipset, is supported by standard 2.6.10 kernels.

TwinHan VisionPlus DVB-T (3021)

Like almost all DVB cards, recieves SDTV and HDTV signals. Needs a strong signal (i.e. good antenna, cabling, maybe an RF amplifier). Comes with a remote and IR receiver (USB). Supported by Linux kernels since 2.6.3, but has problems with 2.6.11 (and, thus, recent R5 alphas)

AverMedia AverTV DVB-T (761)

DVB -> SDTV, HDTV. Also has analog inputs (composite and S-Video). Needs a very strong signal (i.e. good antenna, cabling and an RF amplifier). Comes with a remote & IR receiver. Supported by Linux kernels since 2.6.3, but needs a firmware file.

AverMedia AverTV DVB-T (771)

DVB -> SDTV, HDTV. Has analog inputs (composite). Much better (more sensitive) tuner (Samsung) than the above card (Aver 761). Supplied with remote & IR receiver. Known to be supported under kernel 2.6.10 (unknown for earlier kernels) Has loopback antenna socket, but requires removal of faceplate to access. Does not need firmware.