Hi Bartman,

That is interresting that the AverTV USB works with the PCI Nova-T as I have not had any joy getting the USB Nova-T to work other than with the old 1.3 drivers. The NOVA-T USB2 MCE drivers are part of the standard driver package. The simplest way I found to get it is to go to www.hauppauge.co.uk and in the forum is a section for the USB2 tuner (Not the USB one) and a sticky post has a copy of the driver. You only need the driver and not the TV application installed.

Your site looks interresting and I would be interrested in hearing if you get the 2 USB tuners working together. As you seem to be focussing on small machines have you tried the IWill zpc64 or similar?

Kevin

Hey, with the Hauppauge Nova-T PCI Card

Theres a MCE Edition and a non-MCE Edition.
The MCE edition is hard to find in any UK Online Stores (unless someone else knows of somewhere I don't?) while the non-MCE edition which comes with a remote control is available in quite a few places.

Does the non-MCE one work in MCE, and if so does it need any special drivers etc?
I assume you can use the MCE Remote to control it, instead of the one it comes with.

 

Thanks to anyone who can help

On another note, could someone please post a link for the Hauppauge Nova-T USB2.0 MCE drivers?

If you go to www.hauppauge.co.uk and look in their forum, the drivers can be found there.

Cheers
Andy

The non-MCE version should work fine.   The MCE edition is available in 3 packs from eBuyer amongst other places - eBuyer quickfind code is 81444 and cost is £164.97 inc VAT.

Cheers,
Andy

I've just spent a couple of days with the Hauppauge Nova-T USB2 as a 2nd tuner with my Black-Gold PCI card.  I eventually found their MCE drivers (they're at http://hauppauge.lightpath.net/de/chelsea/hcw20nova-t.exe , and got the unit working, but only at the expense of the PCI card working.  Although MCE thought there were 2 tuners installed, only the Nova-T was working (viz. record 1 channel, try switch live TV to a 2nd channel - get "no TV signal found").   After talking to Hauppauge UK's technical support, apparently they reckon their USB unit will only work as a 2nd tuner to one of their PCI cards.  I give up.

Doesn't surprise me - the BlackGold card is very close to the Hauppauge card in terms of components.  If you install the Nova-T drivers on your system and then plug in a BlackGold card, it is picked up as a Nova-T (doesn't work but a real pig to sort out!).  

Cheers,
Andy

Do BlackGold's drivers require an exact frequency or base frequency?

For example, from Belmont Mux D is on CH57 which is 762MHz. However there is an adjacent analogue signal on CH56 so Mux D is offset by +167KHz, making the actual frequency of Mux D to be 762.167MHz.

There are two ways to handle this:
1) Scan every frequency including offsets (i.e. tell the card to check them all)
2) Scan just base frequencies and let the card find offset if required

There are additionally problems when tuning:
1) Some cards drivers will only accept base frequencies, so if you specify an exact one it will be ignored.
2) Some cards drivers will need to be given the exact frequency.

What it sounds like is happening in your case is (in my example):
1) You scan for channels, using the BlackGold card, and it finds Mux D on 762.167MHz - fine
2) When the Nova-t USB2 tries to tune into it it finds 762.167MHz as invalid - it wants 762MHz

Or it could be this:
1) You scan for channels, using the Nova-t USB2 card, and it finds Mux D on 762MHz since the driver will automatically go to 762.167MHz
2) The BlackGold card tries to tune to 762MHz and finds nothing since it can't find offsets in the driver

I know that the above reply is a bit waffly but I hope you understand it.

um thanks, but I'm just an ordinary mortal, with no idea of how you'd do that, even if I could be bothered.  Giving up is a more rational thing to do...

 

Like it!

To translate - if CX's thoughts are right, the two cards will not coexist.

Cheers,
Andy

We have all hauppauge MCE cards available as single units instead of 3-packs if you need them.

Do any of the cards mentioned above support "Common Interface" ? I am specifically looking for a DVB tuner that supports CI (Common Interface) cards and works under MCE2005.

Thanks.

Regards,

Kamran

I don't know of any cards that yet support CI.   Both Hauppauge and GDI are supposed to be working on CI addons.

Cheers,
Andy

Twinhan have had one out for a while but I haven't heard of anyone who has tried to use it with MCE. Would be nice to know...

Its not labelled MCE certified, but that doesn't mean it doesn't work (don't know).

It depends on what is required to get the CI working - if it's all done on the hardware and transparent to MCE, and it supports their BDA drivers you may be lucky.  I would have thought that they would have made a big thing about it working if it did though (unfortunately).

If you decide to try it, please post the results on this thread!

Cheers,
Andy

Hi there

Just FWIW I have 2 MCE machines, one with 2x twinhan DVB-T PCI cards, the other with 1x.  They work fine either with current BDA drivers from "windows update" or the latest ones from Twinhan's site.

Not done any comparitive testing yet, I don't have any other DVB-T cards to hand.

A minor downside, there is no RF loopthrough, so you need a distribution amp or splitter.

Regards