HDTV Wonder - Recommended?

[BRH]

I currently use a TV Wonder VE card along side my Radeon 9700 Pro.
This combo works fine, but now the HDTV Wonder has caught my eye. I
have a number of questions that I hope someone who has actually used
ththe HDTV Wonder videocard can answer:

1. Does the over-the-air HDTV antenna really work?
2. How likely is it to pull in HDTV broadcasts in Richmond, VA?
3. Do the PVR features really work?

My system is an Athlon XP2100 with 1024 Megs Ram, Radeon 9700 Pro,
running WinXP Pro. Any comments on how well the HDTV wonder will run
with this system would be appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[Bill Crocker]

Here is a review of the product, at Tom's Hardware:

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/video/20040917/index.html

Search Google also! There are issues.

Bill Crocker

 

[T Shadow]

I currently use a TV Wonder VE card along side my Radeon 9700 Pro.
This combo works fine, but now the HDTV Wonder has caught my eye. I
have a number of questions that I hope someone who has actually used
ththe HDTV Wonder videocard can answer:

1. Does the over-the-air HDTV antenna really work?
2. How likely is it to pull in HDTV broadcasts in Richmond, VA?
3. Do the PVR features really work?

My system is an Athlon XP2100 with 1024 Megs Ram, Radeon 9700 Pro,
running WinXP Pro. Any comments on how well the HDTV wonder will run
with this system would be appreciated.

Thanks!

1. Yes, but think of it as a very good set of rabbit ears performance wise.
2. I'm receiving stations 30-40 miles away but have added a Radio Shack
amplifier to the antenna. No mountains in west Ohio either so YMMV.
3. Yes the PVR works. In fact when running DTV player you cannot turn it
off.

Your system should be sufficient but you probably wouldn't want to have
anything else running while receiving HD content.

HTH

 

[J. Clarke]

I currently use a TV Wonder VE card along side my Radeon 9700 Pro.
This combo works fine, but now the HDTV Wonder has caught my eye. I
have a number of questions that I hope someone who has actually used
ththe HDTV Wonder videocard can answer:

1. Does the over-the-air HDTV antenna really work?

It looks to be a Zenith Silver Sensor, which is pretty good as small indoor
antennas go but they don't go very far.

If you already have a good outside antenna it will almost certainly work
better. If your residence was built with a foil vapor barrier then an
indoor antenna may not work at all.

2. How likely is it to pull in HDTV broadcasts in Richmond, VA?

Depends on how much power the broadcaster is using and how far away you are
and in what direction and what the surrounding terrain is like. If it's
fairly flat and he's using a decent amount of power and you're not too far
off then it should work fine. If there are hills or buildings or something
else that's going to cause a lot of multipath it may be a different story.
While there's nothing magic about HDTV that makes it need anything special
in the antenna department, most broadcasters are transmitting HD at much
lower power than analog, so you may need more antenna to pick it up.

3. Do the PVR features really work?

Haven't tried the HDTV Wonder, the Dvico Fusion, which is a similar concept,
works reasonably well. You might want to go over to
<http://www.avsforum.com> and search on "HDTV Wonder"--there's a good deal
of discussion of it over there, at one time there were some software issues
which may or may not have been resolved.

My system is an Athlon XP2100 with 1024 Megs Ram, Radeon 9700 Pro,
running WinXP Pro. Any comments on how well the HDTV wonder will run
with this system would be appreciated.

The Dvico works reasonably on my system with similar specs--it should be
able to handle the HDTV Wonder. Don't plan on doing much else during HD
reception though.