USB tv tuner with ATI Radeon all in Wonder PRO 9800

[David Bradbury]

I've just bought a new PC with USB tv tuner and ATI Radeon all in
Wonder PRO 9800 but on a channel search I find absolutely nothing -
just static. I live in London in the UK so presumed reception would be
okay. Has anyone had similar problems? Any solutions?

 

[patrickp]

I've just bought a new PC with USB tv tuner and ATI Radeon all in
Wonder PRO 9800 but on a channel search I find absolutely nothing -
just static. I live in London in the UK so presumed reception would be
okay. Has anyone had similar problems? Any solutions?

This is becoming a perennial - it's well past time M$ started warning
people updating their DirectX installation about this, since it
affects everyone running non-NTSC-M tuners (i.e. almost everyone
outside North America with a tuner in their PC) under W2K and XP, and
has been this way for a year now.

I would presume you're running the current DirectX version, David -
DX9.0b. This breaks NTSC-J, PAL and SECAM tuners in W2K, XP and
Windows Server 2003 - all M$' current PC OSs. M$ have issued a fix,
but it's hard to find - and only on the US microsoft.com site, not the
european ones, where it's needed.

Go to
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...6d-e177-4a0e-91d0-b4310675b02b&displaylang=en
for the fix. Then keep an eye out for people posting the problem and
save me the trouble, please!

Hey, I was just looking at the DirectX download page. The hotfix has
now made it into the top 5 DirectX downloads. Hopefully, that'll make
it a little harder for M$ to continue burying it...

patrickp

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[David Bradbury]

Thanks Patrick. I tried this - I can still only get two tv stations,
with quite poor reception. Odd as I have my TV tuner plugged into my
external roof aerial. Any other ideas?

 

[patrickp]

Thanks Patrick. I tried this - I can still only get two tv stations,
with quite poor reception. Odd as I have my TV tuner plugged into my
external roof aerial. Any other ideas?

Does your signal work Ok with a conventional TV, David? What part of
London are you in? Not all areas get good reception, despite the
transmitters being in South London.

patrickp

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[David Bradbury]

Yes, normal TV through my television is very good. I'm in East London.
I'm going to try putting a signal booster between the aerial socket
and the PC as I read that televisions have their own boosters built in
which could be improving a weak signal there but obviously not by the
time it gets to the PC. I'll let you know. Thanks once again for your
help.

 

[patrickp]

Yes, normal TV through my television is very good. I'm in East London.
I'm going to try putting a signal booster between the aerial socket
and the PC as I read that televisions have their own boosters built in
which could be improving a weak signal there but obviously not by the
time it gets to the PC. I'll let you know. Thanks once again for your
help.

Yes, I would doubt that AIW reception is actually as effective as most
TVs, David. The much higher resolution quality of any decent
videocard/monitor over any TV (except HDTV, I guess) often shows up
flaws in the TV image that a TV would just cover up.

However, you can get the opposite problem: when I lived in Brixton
(you can actually see the transmitter towers from there), my TV
reception was very poor 'till I realised I was actually getting a
signal that was too strong: once I attenuated it, it was perfect! a
lot of North London needs optimised aerials, and AIR there's a
separate transmitter somewhere (can't recall where) for parts of SE
and E London because reception can be so poor.

I get cable now, so I don't worry about reception quality any more! I
use a VIVO card and I can just put a video feed straight in from the
box; audio comes straight from the box, too.


<snip>

patrickp

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[David Bradbury]

Hi. I tried putting a signal booster between the roof aerial and the
PC and this improved detection of channels so that I've now got all
terrestrial apart from Channel 5. Quality is okay, not great. I'm
thinking of getting this little gadget to get Digital TV.
http://www.iwantoneofthose.com/PCDITV.htm

Or would you recommend another option?

 

[David Bradbury]

Also forgot to say, the four channels I've found: audio is slightly out of sync.

 

[patrickp]

Also forgot to say, the four channels I've found: audio is slightly out of sync.

out of sync for capture or playing?



patrickp

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[patrickp]

Hi. I tried putting a signal booster between the roof aerial and the
PC and this improved detection of channels so that I've now got all
terrestrial apart from Channel 5. Quality is okay, not great. I'm
thinking of getting this little gadget to get Digital TV.
http://www.iwantoneofthose.com/PCDITV.htm

Or would you recommend another option?

No idea about the PCDITV, I'm afraid. This is going to replace your
current USB TV tuner, is it? As far as quality of picture is
concerned,it may have to do with the higher picture quality of your
monitor showing the shortcomings more, as I said before.

I seem to recall that you had to make sure you had the right kind of
aerial for Channel 5 in North London many years ago and, of course, to
make sure the C5 signal is not conflicting with a VCR output etc.
Probably not so critical now: most VCRs tune to a higher frequency so
the conflict doesn't arise, and aerials probably are always the
correct type.


patrickp

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