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[Agent_J]

ASUS TV TUNER
http://usa.asus.com/products/vga/tvfm/overview.htm

ATI TV Wonder VE
http://www.ati.com/products/tvwonderve/index.html

AVerMedia UltraTV PCI 300
http://www.aver.com/products/tvtuner_UltraTV_PCI_300.shtml

Compro VideoMate TV
http://www.comprousa.com/products/vmtvpvr.htm

HAUPPAUGE WINTV-GO
http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_go.html

Kworld XPERT TV-PVR 878
http://www.kworld.com.tw/asp/pindex.asp?id=5&pid=7

LifeView FlyVideo 2000
http://www.lifeview.com/flyvideo2kfm.html

MSI TV@nywhere Master
http://www.msicomputer.com/product/netpc/netpc_detail.asp?model=TV@nywhere_Master

which one would be the best for capturing from a cable tv connection and VCR with good picture quality and small file size?

[DocLotus]

Hi  Agent;

Out of all of them I would not get any of them.

Let me explain.

I have been using TV in my computer since the days of Win 3.1.  To date I have had eight TV tuner cards from many manufacturers and have had the best luck with the ATI All-In-Wonder combination video card / TV tuner.

It seems that a separate TV tuner always left me short-changed in one way or another.

To date, I am on my third ATI A-I-W (currently the 9600 Pro with a wonderful FM radio and TV tuner).  They have all worked so well that I don't even look at anything else anymore as I know I will be disappointed as in the past.

[Agent_J]

I don't have a lot of money to spend on an ATI AIW though and if I got an older one, it would be a downgrade for me which would be bad since I'm a gamer

[DocLotus]

Ok then, the ATI TV Wonder Pro...
http://www.atitech.ca/products/tvwonderpro/index.html

Or better yet, the ATI TV Wonder Pro with remote control...

http://www.atitech.ca/products/tvwonderproremote/index.html

I would stay away from the ATI TV Wonder VE as it does not have stereo sound plus there have been some other issues with it.

[yorri]

I have the ati tv wonder pro and am not happy with the quality...it is ok but sucks if you want DVD quality.

But if you don't have the money for something better like  (9600 or 9800 and a hauppage pvr250, then you have no choice)

[DocLotus]

Hi again Yorri;

DVD playback.

This is another area where the ATI A-I-W video / TV cards are very good at.  They have both software and hardware DVD decoding so they perform very well on DVD playback.

I'm still using my old Creative DVD player from many years ago that originally came with a large DVD decoder plugged into an ISA card.

When I upgraded my motherboard the last time two years ago there were no ISA slots, only PCI, so I could no longer use the Creative DVD decoder card.

I first thought that I would have to buy a new DVD player but then remembered that ATI A-I-W cards have hardware and software DVD decoder built in so I decided to give it a try.  Guess what?  The Creative DVD player runs better with the ATI A-I-W then it ever did with the Creative DVD decoder card.

[yorri]

But that is why I own a separate ATI card, to get excellent DVD playback.  The DVD decoder is built into the video card and not the TV card.

If you search the net for products that are built for tv recording (SageTV, BeyondTV etc etc), they will all push the HAuppage PVR250MCE.  IT has the best tv decoder chip (Philips something or other). and hardware Mpeg encoding...this is very important otherwise all the work will be placed on your CPU.

You can also wait until companies start using the new ATI theatre 500 PRO chip on their tuner cards which is supposed to be the best tv viewing experience yet (upgrades it to near HDTV quality) but it was just announced Sept 14th and noone is shipping as of yet although Sapphire has their product page online now.

I have a friend who upgraded to the pvr250 card and there is no comparison of quality...just be away that tv software can be configured a million different ways and they don't all come with the best setting by default.

I found that Media Center has decent default settings and that is what I am using until I hear about the results of the ATI chip.  If it does what it says it will do, then I will buy a tuner card with that built into it otherwise I will upgrade to the PVR 250.  Then I will upgrade to the ATI 9800PRO so that I can enjoy the new VMR9 features that are available through Direct X 9 that only 9800 Pro and up can do 100% without problems (9600XT is fine but some people complain it can't do all the features stably)