PCTV Deluxe Tuner & Video Capture Card Watch TV Burn Video

PCTV Deluxe Tuner & Video Capture Card Watch TV Burn Video
Manufacturer: Pinnacle Model: 210100231  PRODUCT INFO PCTV Deluxe Tuner & Video Capture Card Watch TV Burn Video

User Product Reviews and Ratings
Average User Rating:       Number of User Reviews: 7

Reviewed by: rogersoles from CA on Nov 9, 2004 Rating:  Experience: 3 Months Strengths: Flexible, capable of customizing settings; alleged to support multiple units per PC (I could never get that to work) Weaknesses: Doesn't allow LPCM audio capture; required updated driver only available from Windows Update Service (not on Pinnacle's site); product not actually manufactured by Pinnacle -- just remarketed Summary: This is a very nice unit for PVR uses. The software that comes with it is _very_ week; and if you're serious consider using something like BeyondTV or SageTV to control it (unfortunately both are expensive, and there are probably better choices of hardware bundled with the products). If Pinnacle provided better support I would give this unit two thumbs up with no question at all... but at the price of it I would recommend spending a little more and purchasing the Plextor ConvertX -- of course it is more limited in software that works with it right now, but provides hardware MPEG4 as well at only slightly more $$$.   100% of people (16/16) found this review helpful. Was this review helpful or unhelpful for you? There are no comments for this review. Post a comment Reviewed by: apurvasharma from CA on Jan 15, 2005 Rating:  Experience: 2 Weeks Strengths: 1. Hardware MPEG1 and MPEG2 encoding 2. Comes with PC Assistant software that performs tests to make sure your system satisfies all requirements. Weaknesses: 1. Hangs while playing(quite often). 2. No built-in TV guide (have to open up browser) 3. Can't get captions Summary: It was easy to install this on my IBM Thinkpad T40p as well as Dell D600 notebooks. The video quality is only acceptable. Getting tied to the TV antenna socket in the wall destroy's the mobility of a notebook. Wanted to get captions so contacted Pinnacle support (email) and they responded in a couple of days that it doesn't support it. The provided software really sucks. But when you go looking for other software this hardware is not listed as supported generally. Another issue with going with a third party software is the risk of loosing the remote functionality. In my search I found WinTV to be most widely supported by third party softwares. Wish I had gone for that. This product certainly doesn't meet the quality you would expect from Pinnacle.   100% of people (4/4) found this review helpful. Was this review helpful or unhelpful for you? There are no comments for this review. Post a comment Reviewed by: peteblume from CO on Apr 12, 2005 Rating:  Experience: 45 Days Strengths: Good picture and great ease of programming using an internet tv schedule Weaknesses: Manufacturer's viewing software freezes and Pinnacle driver update and online troubleshooting are poor. Having updated every driver, OS, and BIOS known to man, it still has problems. Summary: (Edited April 23rd by peteblume) When viewed in 768 X 576, picture on computer monitor is near cable/tv quality. When used with an internet based tv schedule program such as Titan TV, the ease of programing in VCR (PVR) mode is great. PCTV Vision (manufacturer software) frequently freezes, but does not indicate that it is not responding when checked in Windows Task Manager. The driver update on Pinnacle's website is a beta version from November 2003 (nearly 18 months old). It has been difficult to troubleshoot and there is little technical support on Pinnacle's site. Came back on 4/23 to revise my rating (down). Not yet ready to call it completely unsatisfactory but am very close. I am running a Dell Pentium 4 2.4 GHZ processor, with 1024 mb Ram, and a VisionTek 9600XT 256mb AGP graphics card, Dell 19" Flat Panel monitor, Windows XP SP2, etc. (all well above minimum hardware/software requirements). I have updated every driver, OS, and BIOS known to man, and it still has problems. In using the Manufacturer's own web forum, I have been appalled at the derisive comments and no apparent response from Pinnacle. I am stuck with mine, but you may want to look long and hard before you buy one. When it works, it works great, just hope at some point I can get the bugs out before I give up.   100% of people (3/3) found this review helpful. Reviewed by: chmura89 from WA on Jan 16, 2004 Rating:  Experience: 10 Days Strengths: It works! Good picture! Interference free! Weaknesses: Very slow channel changes Summary: I have actually tried several tuner cards from Hauppage, LeadTek, and a couple of others. This one is by far the best. The picture is just short of great and the timeshifting works very well.   82% of people (9/11) found this review helpful. Reviewed by: Taufiq on Jul 29, 2004 Rating:  Experience: 30 Days Strengths: High-Quality MPEG Recorder. Weaknesses: None. Summary: I simply hooked up my cable to this Pinnacle PCTV Deluxe, grabbed the remote and I was ready to go. It contains a state of the art television tuner, and will allow you to watch any program you like on your PC monitor, in a resizable window. I am able keep an eye on the game while working by reducing the window size, or go full screen for an incredible TV experience.   65% of people (11/17) found this review helpful. Reviewed by: vikramvk from WA on Apr 10, 2005 Rating:  Experience: 10 Days Strengths: Easy to insall and get started. Easy operation. Compact. Weaknesses: Limited funtionality. Instability. Summary: Overall this is a good product and is good value for money. It is not very complex and you can get started easily. However, I found that scheduled recording is very unstable and froze my computer twice. But it seemed to work finally. Tmieshifting is very cool but again takes up lot of CPU power. The picture quality is quite impressive although not HDTV quality. Overall this is good value for money and would recommened to buy. Reviewed by: atz413 from NY on Apr 4, 2005 Rating:  Experience: 3 Months Strengths: Makes decent captures from video sources. Tech support is helpful. Weaknesses: Bundled software sucks bigtime. Tech support is helpful, but not as knowledgable as perhaps they should be. Summary: Got this about three months ago, and I couldn't get it to work properly. I have a P4 2.8GHz pc with 1GB memory, over 300GB storage and a 256MB NVidia GEForce 5200 video card. I also have a 21" BenQ flat panel monitor. This product (at least in my case) seems to be very picky about the video drivers, and I had too many problems, to the point where I was going to return it, but I checked the NVidia website last week and finally! they had an updated driver, which I was able to use to get the product to work. And I had to use the analog signal from the video card, instead of digital. So, although I have been able to capture my videos to my hard drive, I still haven't been able to burn a DVD. The software starts to "analyze" the MPG file(s) and hangs about half way, and that's about it. Pinnacle Tech support is not much help, as they seem to want to sell you their Studio product.