If you are a cable cutter and have an HTPC, this is a perfect alternative to a DVR. Before purchasing, I read many reviews on this and two other USB tuners. This one had some bad reviews, mainly due to the software. If you have trouble installing it, the product key is on the paper DVD sleeve flap. If you knew that and the key did not work, you actually need to include the hyphens in the code. Simply typing the letters and numbers will not work. Type the hyphens (-) as well. Once I got the drivers and the PVR software installed, it worked great. The main reason I got this is to be able to record TV shows.
This is being used on an old 3.6 GHz Pentium 4 660 LGA 775 (with hyperthreading) Hewlett Packard PC (Upgraded from a 519k) with 2 GB DDR2 RAM and a built in Intel GMA graphics card with 128 MB RAM. The PC has USB 2.0 and I am also using a VGA to HDMI with sound adapter to connect it to my TV. I am running Windows 7 Pro 32-bit on it and also have XBMC installed. Basically, I took a 10 year old, virtually useless PC and re-purposed it into a decent HTPC.
For those of you who still have single core PC's and are wondering if this will work, it should work in standard definition (480p) if you have at least a Pentium 4 2.4 GHz. My PC, a 3.6 GHz P4 is able to display and record TV shows in full 1080p without any choppiness or lag. Despite the CPU's fairly high clock speed, it is unable to do "time-shift" playback or the ability to rewind live TV or fast forward a show as it is being recorded. I attempted to do this in 3 different TV tuner programs: the software that came with the tuner (Total Media), NextPVR and Windows Media Center. All 3 programs are able to play live TV and record and playback in 1080p flawlessly. But when I try to put it in time-shift mode, I get the blue screen of death (BSOD) and my PC immediately restarts with all 3 programs. Also, you are supposed to be able to use XBMC as a front-end combined with NextPVR as the back-end for the tuner, but I was unable to get XBMC to recognize it and after several hours I gave up. I found that the best software is the one that came with the tuner. It plays live TV fine, channel changes are fairly quick. It has a nice program guide (EPG) similar to Uverse or most cable guides. The best EPG source is actually from over the air. The web based EPG has more info, but due to something dodgy about java script, I keep getting run time errors. The over air EPG source is just fine as it tells you the name of the show and when it starts and ends. The tuner software also has the easiest to use recording system. Just type in the start and finish time, the channel, and frequency. It is almost exactly like Uverse.
The tuner came with an antenna, a remote control and a USB extension cable. All three of these things were useless. The antenna picked up a grand total of ZERO out of the 44 stations in my area. Luckily, we have a giant outdoor antenna, so it wasn't a problem. The small antenna does have a nice magnetic base though. Just be careful to not put it near your PC's mechanical hard drive or RAM as it may cause some problems. Why they chose to include the remote control is baffling since it is an infrared remote and there is no way for it to work. The tuner has no infrared receiver, nor do 99% of computers out there. There is no explanation on how to get it to work or even what you would need to get it to work. They did include a driver it on the disc. I am guessing you need to buy a USB IR receiver separately, although I have yet to see one sold alone without a remote. The USB extension cable is a nice idea, but after it disconnected for the 10th time because it is just slightly loose, I just plugged the tuner directly in to the USB port and had no problems since. If I would have known that the remote was this useless, I would have looked for one with just the tuner and software. But, it is still a great deal for $30.
Considering that DVR systems such as the TIVO can cost $100 to $200, this product is a great value. If you already have a computer and it can be hooked up to your TV, this is well worth it even if all you need it for is recording. One advantage it has over other DVRs is that the capacity can always be upgraded. I have 180 GB free on the hard drive and according to the PVR that much disk space can hold up to 45 hours of 1080p video. I read somewhere that 1 hour of 1080p = about 3.6 GB. So if you have a 1 TB HDD, you can record a ton of video.
My Pentium 4 (3.6 GHz with HT) was able to do 1080p, but it BSODs when I try to time-shift. The minimum system requirements are a Pentium 4 2.4 GHz, but what they don't tell you is that it can only do 480p. I think that in order to be able to use all the features, you need at least the following:
Dual core CPU
4 GB of RAM
512 MB, Directx 11 capable GPU
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