TC Cards.

Unregistered.

I don't know anything about them.
I want to use this (or similar) as a monitor AND to watch TV via NTL digital.

Or am i better off going for one of those TV's that can be used as monitors?

Nevertheless, I would like to know more about TV cards

Jonathan

Get a monitor with a tv tuner cris, don't bother with a tv card.


A DVB-C card won't work with NTL Digital because of the encryption used. The 3 alternatives are to go with either a DVB-T or DVB-S or an analog card just used as a capture card.

The quality of the analog card depends on its capture resolution. Higher the better obviously. Chances of finding one with SCART in is very slim, so you'll have to get a SCART to either 3 RCA or S Video and 2 RCA.

DVB-T or DVB-S mean sticking an aerial or satellite dish on the roof.

Solitaire

Or running extra cables down from an existing one

Wonder if it'd be possible to get Freeview on a Sky dish? The new ones do all come with quad LNBs, and most people (i.e. those who don't use Multiroom) will have two of them unused...

Unregistered.

Solitaire wrote: »

Or running extra cables down from an existing one

Wonder if it'd be possible to get Freeview on a Sky dish? The new ones do all come with quad LNBs, and most people (i.e. those who don't use Multiroom) will have two of them unused...

So what are TV cards used for? Besides allowing one to record/do other stuff onto their hard disk etc?

Solitaire

TV cards turn your PC into a TV viewer/recorder - the only thing you need is an appropriate signal source (aerial, dish, cable etc.) to plug in

Unregistered.

Solitaire wrote: »

TV cards turn your PC into a TV viewer/recorder - the only thing you need is an appropriate signal source (aerial, dish, cable etc.) to plug in

So, I definately don't need one if I have a TV cum Monitor instead right? Seems a bit daft (almost) that they're still around !

Solitaire

Er, wrong... that monitor you linked to is a monitor, not a telly... :P

Even if you did get a LCD TV it would need a coaxial input to put your signal source into, and that would be limited by what the TV can interpret itself (i.e. terrestrial or digital) so if the source was a satellite or cable you'd need to hook them up to their respective receiver box and then run a cable from the box to the telly instead. Plus unless it has some kind of uber-Picture-In-Picture mode you could only use it as a TV or a PC monitor, not both at once!

If you want satellite or cable on your PC's screen without a receiver box thingy you need the appropriate type of TV Card for it (i.e. PAL for terrestrial, DVB-T for digital, DVB-S for satellite and DVB-C for cable), and even then you'd be limited to FTA (Free To Air) stuff - getting a card to view proprietary, encrypted content (i.e. Sky/Chorus) is far trickier and said organisations kinda insist on you only using their proprietary receiver box anyway! :P

Unregistered.

Solitaire wrote: »

Er, wrong... that monitor you linked to is a monitor, not a telly... :P

Even if you did get a LCD TV it would need a coaxial input to put your signal source into, and that would be limited by what the TV can interpret itself (i.e. terrestrial or digital) so if the source was a satellite or cable you'd need to hook them up to their respective receiver box and then run a cable from the box to the telly instead. Plus unless it has some kind of uber-Picture-In-Picture mode you could only use it as a TV or a PC monitor, not both at once!

If you want satellite or cable on your PC's screen without a receiver box thingy you need the appropriate type of TV Card for it (i.e. PAL for terrestrial, DVB-T for digital, DVB-S for satellite and DVB-C for cable), and even then you'd be limited to FTA (Free To Air) stuff - getting a card to view proprietary, encrypted content (i.e. Sky/Chorus) is far trickier and said organisations kinda insist on you only using their proprietary receiver box anyway! :P

A telly it is so!

Solitaire

No it isn't :P

But that's not a problem so long as your NTL box thingy has a HDMI output... hook the monitor up to NTL with a HDMI cable and the PC using good ol' DVI.

If the NTL box doesn't have any HDMI, DVI or VGA-out then you're sunk... a real telly has Scart, RGB/Composite, Component and/or Coaxial inputs too :P

Unregistered.

Solitaire wrote: »

No it isn't :P

But that's not a problem so long as your NTL box thingy has a HDMI output... hook the monitor up to NTL with a HDMI cable and the PC using good ol' DVI.

If the NTL box doesn't have any HDMI, DVI or VGA-out then you're sunk... a real telly has Scart, RGB/Composite, Component and/or Coaxial inputs too :P

WAIT. Your confusing me. I haven't got the tv yet, why wouldn't it have coax, scart etc? What I need is a TV with a DVI or VGA input. Sound will be routed towards an amplifier.:D