Tv tuner card help

tonyfillony

Hi All ,
I am planning on getting rid of sky.Im looking for some recommendations for a tv tuner card for my HTPC. Currently I am running windows 7 and XBMC. Preferably i would like the one card that will be able to revieve all the saorview channels as well as the freeview channels(bbc, itv etc). I would also like to be able to record one channel while watching another , so any suggestions would be appreciated.
cheers

tonyfillony

doing a bit more googling
Am i correct in saying that i need a DVB-S2 card for freeview and a DVB-T2 card for saorview?

Tea 1000

I don't think you need a T2 card for Irish channels, I think a T card will do. But the DVB-S2 card is needed for most of the HD free-to-air channels, so that's worthwhile.
I have a BlackGold card with two S2 tuners and 2 T tuners. Works well. You can get the RTE channels via satellite, but you'd need two LNB's at the dish. If you had that done, you'll get away with only an S2 card in the PC. But I don't think TV3 is available via satellite yet. It's called Saorsat as opposed to Saorview.

tonyfillony

Tea 1000 wrote: »

I don't think you need a T2 card for Irish channels, I think a T card will do. But the DVB-S2 card is needed for most of the HD free-to-air channels, so that's worthwhile.
I have a BlackGold card with two S2 tuners and 2 T tuners. Works well. You can get the RTE channels via satellite, but you'd need two LNB's at the dish. If you had that done, you'll get away with only an S2 card in the PC. But I don't think TV3 is available via satellite yet. It's called Saorsat as opposed to Saorview.

Is this what you ave?
http://shop.blackgold.tv/epages/BT3159.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/BT3159/Products/BGT3602

Tea 1000

tonyfillony wrote: »

Is this what you ave?
http://shop.blackgold.tv/epages/BT3159.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/BT3159/Products/BGT3602

I have it's predecessor, the BGT3600, which is the same except for the T2 part.
It works well, I had a Pinnacle card before that which was also good, but the Black Gold is quicker at changing channels.

Johnboy1951

I use TBS cards ...... TBS6280 for DTT and TBS6981 for Sat.

Drivers are available for both Win and Lin, so using either OS the cards should work.

Also the cards are capable of making the full content of the mux/transponder available ...... which means that for me, with a twin DTT card all Saorview channels are available at the same time to multiple clients (probably depends on the back end in use).

In the case of the Sat ...... the full contents of the two tuned transponders are available to all clients.

I believe such functions are available on the Blackgold cards also ...... but last time I checked there were no Linux drivers for the 3600 despite many many promises. In fact that card was my first choice.

I am in the process of moving the cards to a Linux based server at present, so am very happy that I went for the TBS cards for compatibility.

tonyfillony

Cheers lads, can you tell me is there any advantage in using cards instead of one?

Johnboy1951

tonyfillony wrote: »

Cheers lads, can you tell me is there any advantage in using cards instead of one?

all eggs not in one basket?

I do suggest if using multiple cards that you consider sticking to one manufacturer ..... much easier to manage drivers etc without concerns about one interfering with another.

tonyfillony

going to have to go down the single card route, I oly have yon pci -e on my motherboard , looks like i'll prob be getting BGT3602

tonyfillony

a part from the bgt3602 is there any other card that offers both dual dvb-t2 and dvb-s2

Johnboy1951

tonyfillony wrote: »

a part from the bgt3602 is there any other card that offers both dual dvb-t2 and dvb-s2

Not that I found ..... but I did not do exhaustive searches.

There is an option for USB connected tuner/s such as the Qbox from TBS ...... and no I am not pushing for TBS just mentioning the only other options I considered

meep

tonyfillony wrote: »

going to have to go down the single card route, I oly have yon pci -e on my motherboard , looks like i'll prob be getting BGT3602

I use the Octopus /DuoFlex system from Digital Devices and this might suit your needs;

http://www.digitaldevices.de/english/Octopus_PCIe_Bridge.html

It's a single PCIe card that allows you plug in up to 4x tuner cards, each with twin tuners. This means you can have a maximum of 8 tuners in your system on a single slot.

You can also mix and match the expansion cards to have DVB-S2 or DVD-T tuners combined.

I use these in a windows 8 pc with MediaPortal and find it to be rock solid for Freesat and Saorview.

I've ended up with MediaPortal having spent may years with a variety of systems including SageTV, JRiver Media Centre, Plex and XBMC.

MP is the only one I've found that integrates live tv with all the usual videos/movies/music playback and allows me multiple synched clients etc. I've been using it for about 6 months now and am planning to ditch SKY at the end of this year.

See my blog here for a bit more detail: http://mediaserver8.blogspot.ie

Johnboy1951

meep wrote: »

I use the Octopus /DuoFlex system from Digital Devices and this might suit your needs;

http://www.digitaldevices.de/english/Octopus_PCIe_Bridge.html

.....

See my blog here for a bit more detail: http://mediaserver8.blogspot.ie

I had a quick read of some of your blog ..... interesting and informative

I have a related question which I hope you can help with .... I quote:

Obviously, you can't view more live channels than you have physical tuners, but it's progress.

The present set up I use allows multiple clients to view any/all channel/s on the tuned transponder/mux.

The above quote appears to imply that your set up allows only one channel to be available from each transponder/mux that is tuned.

I would be grateful if you could clarify, thank you

meep

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

I had a quick read of some of your blog ..... interesting and informative

I have a related question which I hope you can help with .... I quote:


The present set up I use allows multiple clients to view any/all channel/s on the tuned transponder/mux.

The above quote appears to imply that your set up allows one one channel to be available from each transponder/mux that is tuned.

I would be grateful if you could clarify, thank you

Hi

Unfortunately, I don't know the definitive answer to this. I've always assumed that all clients can access all transponder channels put I've never really pushed the system to its limits.

I'll set up a few simultaneous recordings this evening to see what happens.

meep

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

I have a related question which I hope you can help with .... I quote:


The present set up I use allows multiple clients to view any/all channel/s on the tuned transponder/mux.

The above quote appears to imply that your set up allows only one channel to be available from each transponder/mux that is tuned.

I would be grateful if you could clarify, thank you

So I did a test last night.

Through MediaPortal, I set up simultaneous recordings on RTE Two HD, TV3 and 3e while watching TG4. All of these are on Saorview Multiplex 1 so I can confirm the card supports multiple channel access when they are on the same transponder/mux.

Hope that helps

Peter

Johnboy1951

meep wrote: »

So I did a test last night.

Through MediaPortal, I set up simultaneous recordings on RTE Two HD, TV3 and 3e while watching TG4. All of these are on Saorview Multiplex 1 so I can confirm the card supports multiple channel access when they are on the same transponder/mux.

Hope that helps

Peter

Thank you for taking the trouble to check!

Yes that clarifies things for me.

Thanks again

hernie

meep wrote: »

I use the Octopus /DuoFlex system from Digital Devices and this might suit your needs;

http://www.digitaldevices.de/english/Octopus_PCIe_Bridge.html

It's a single PCIe card that allows you plug in up to 4x tuner cards, each with twin tuners. This means you can have a maximum of 8 tuners in your system on a single slot.

You can also mix and match the expansion cards to have DVB-S2 or DVD-T tuners combined.

I'm just building a HTPC for the first time. If you were to pair the Octopus Duo with a DVB-S2 and a DVB-T2 how many physical PCI slots would you need in the case? Two, maybe three?

meep

Hi

The octopus card itself is a half-height PCIe x1 card and will occupy one slot.

You can then connect up to 4x tuner cards to this. These additional cards DO NOT require to be connected to PCie slots - they tether to the the octopus with a ribbon cable and require a power connector.

Each card is half height and they come with full-height rackets that allow you stack two together.

Therefore, in your scenario, the octopus base card would be plugged into a PCIe slot and, say, the DVB-S2 card could be stacked on top, still occupying one slot.

The DVB-T2 would then be positioned in another nearby slot but does not require physical attachment to the motherboard. So, if you had an mATX MB in an ATX chassis, you could have bracket mounts that are not associated with PCIe or PCI slots - these would be ideal.

Make sense?

hernie

meep wrote: »

Make sense?

Yes that makes it clearer thanks. I was thinking combining these 2 together which would just take up 1 slot:

Cine S2 DVB-S/S2 Dual Tuner

DuoFlex C/T Twin Tuner

Looks like they should work together but not sure. What type of power connectors do they need?

meep

Yes, looks like the would work but like you, not sure. Might be worth sending them an email?

The power connecters are the 'floppy' ones - the small plugs that you usually find alongside Molex ones.

hernie

Yeah I'll find out before buying. They are a bit pricey compared to other makes like DVDSky and TBS though.

Bogger77

Hi Meep,
where did you buy the digital devices tuners from?
Their own online store or elsewhere, I'm looking to buy Cine 2 + duoflex dvb-t\c\t2 bundle

Thanks
C

meep

Ordered it from digital devices directly.

Good luck with the project.

hernie

I ended up buying DVBSky tuners from Amazon. I'm using them with a trial version of TV Source from DVBlogic to stream live tv around the house.

Would anyone recommend any other good backend for Kodi? I've heard NextPVR is supposed to good.

Bogger77

meep wrote: »

Ordered it from digital devices directly.

Good luck with the project.

I've everything but the tuners ordered

asrocks mini-itx board from amazon
i5-5675C chip via work
Raven case and psu from silverstone coming from overclockers
ram, ssd and M.2 card from memoryc.com
blu-ray drive from amazon

:-)

meep

hernie wrote: »

I ended up buying DVBSky tuners from Amazon. I'm using them with a trial version of TV Source from DVBlogic to stream live tv around the house.

Would anyone recommend any other good backend for Kodi? I've heard NextPVR is supposed to good.

I've been through a few of them (NextPVR, MediaPortal etc.)

The best I've found is ArgusTV, though it supports series record, this is not yet implemented in Kodi.

Johnboy1951

hernie wrote: »

I ended up buying DVBSky tuners from Amazon. I'm using them with a trial version of TV Source from DVBlogic to stream live tv around the house.

Would anyone recommend any other good backend for Kodi? I've heard NextPVR is supposed to good.

I use the tvheadend backend exclusively. Very solid.

I can stream on any device on the LAN from it using VLC + HTSP plugin, or a local Kodi install.

tvheadend is not simple to set up initially ...... be warned