| Avertv Hybrid Volar Windows Mtvhvmxsk Only $53.99 @ Amazon   Rated 4 of 5 Stars by 186 Buyers!   |
Avertv Hybrid Volar Windows Mtvhvmxsk
I’ve been using Media Center on a WinXP tower since 2004. My HP unit came with a built in tuner which could only accept analog channels and the 2004 version of MC that came with it only supported ordinary def TV. As the years passed, I was eagerly anticipating for a release of Media center that supported HD programming. Once that took place on Windows 7 (and maybe perchance I necessitated to find a tuner card that would work with it.
Over the years I would check release selective information on new merchandise and read when it comes to one sad experience after another when it comes to the failure of available HD tuner cards on the market and issues when it comes to firmware, drivers, configuration settings, etc.
Knowing that most new engineering needs a few years to get the bugs out, I didn’t purchase and waited. The last few months had me itching to attempt and in the long run set up a HTPC (Home Theater PC) systems When it comes to video quality, my assumption was that I’d get better performance from a PCI internal tuner card in a tower. Thing is, I don’t have a new Windows tower but I do have an inexpensive netbook running Windows 7 Home Premium. As there’s no way to install an internal tuner card I’m limited to using an external USB tuner. After reading the reviews on Amazon, I decisive the Volar Max was my best bet (and at $55 I figured I could only go so wrong).
I remember going through error and configuration issues with Vista and XP in the past, the idea that this small flashdrive-sized gizmo was going to grant me to tune in analog channels, digital channels as well as actual hi res HD seemed suspect at the very least. I was dreading the thought of experiencing the common whole night investment of becoming a new peripheral up and running on Windows only to have it not work well.
I plugged the Avertv in the USB slot and it found & installed it is driver mechanically and quickly. It then gave me the option of installing it’s own tuner/viewer software. I declined in favor of Media Center.
Now I can’t say how this thing works with any other OS’s but, with Windows 7 Home Premium, the Avertv Volar Max blew my mind. My laptop is connected to an LCDTV- I fired up Media Center, which found the Avertv right away. I selected it, went through the channel scan (like any tv) and was observing outstanding quality analog & digital HD tv within minutes. It WORKED! And not only that, it worked without my having to do any manual installations or configurations. Windows media center rocks (and IMHO blows away Apple in this peculiar specifi The picture and sound seems as good as any HDTV tuner I’ve seen built into HD televisions. I hooked up my HP Media Center IR remote and might now flip through channels, set DVR recordings, play music, etc. from my couch.
Maybe this shows my age, but I thought any kind of decent solution tuner hardware necessitated to be relatively huge in size. That this tiny unit does so much, so well and so effortlessly is immensely impressive.
The age of HTPC’s is definitely here is
I bought this as a 2nd TV tuner for my Win7 media center computer, because such a great deal of TV shows I watch regularly have time conflicts. And I wanted a tuner that could receive ClearQAM channels, which my built-in tuner doesn’t do. This was perfect. I purchased an Avermedia tuner for my parent’s computer and they’ve been very happy with it, so I chose this over such a great deal of other brands.
The install with Win7 was finelooking effortless. Plug into a USB port, plug my TV cable into it, and Win7 installed the driver (no software comes with it, and it’s not needed). I opened Windows Media Center, it saw the 2nd tuner, I set up my channel guide listings, and now I may record 2 shows at the same time, with one of them in hi-def. It’s fantastic. I seldom watch a TV show when it’s in truth on, and have gotten employed to shows recorded in SD…it’s such a treat to watch things in HD now!
I was a small irritated when I saw the recent price drop, but dug around and found that a rebate was available whether or not you look on the list of sellers, and go down to Amazon.com being the sellers So now I’m only a buck behind. Now I’m very happy with the price, the product, and the comfort of the install!
I purchased this product expecting it to be something I would use to stay clear from arguments over the TV. I figured the picture would be just OK. I was wrong. I don’t even bother with the television anymore. I have 2 displays on my PC, so I may watch TV on one while doing stuff on the other. I may record shows when I’m away or too busy with life. It’s great. The quality of the picture is incredible. I think I’m going to buy another, so I may have genuine DVR functionality on my PC! When it arrived all I had to do was attach the cable feed and plug it into a USB port. Windows 7 installed the drivers and when I opened media center, media center walked me through the rest. media center took when it comes to 15 minutes to scan through all the stations I get and setup, but then it was done (and that includes downloading a 2 week program guide for my cable provider.) I was genuinely impressed, even surprised at the simplicity and quality of this products Highly recommended!
I have owned one of these for over a year now. The tuner and picture are excellent. I even have it working on a Linux netbook. I like to watch TV in a little window on my screen while I’m waiting for my contestant to finish his turn in our internet games.
There are two caveats you need to acknowledge before you get this widgets The included software for XP boxes is not very good. It works, but the interface is annoying and not very intuitive. whether or not you use MS Media Center (comes with Windows 7) you won’t have any issues.
The second thing is over the air reception. You may buy a tiny telescoping antenna for the tuner (this version does not include the antenna in the box.) It works fine for the UHF frequencies (even at 50 miles in my case), but even after the digital conversion such a good deal of stations still broadcast in the VHF frequency range even even altho their signals have been converted to digital HD. This is indispensable because it requires a much longer antenna to receive VHF properly. For these stations the little included antenna plainly won’t work unless you are very close to the transmitter. whether or not you may hook the receiver to a rooftop antenna or a huge set of rabbit ears you will be fine. If you don’t have either of those go out on the web and look at numerous instructions on how to build a dipole or folded dipole antenna yourself. It’s simple and only takes about $5 in components from any electronics store. That’s what I did. I live 50 miles from the transmitters and I may get all the VHF and UHF stations in my area without any upset using my home built antenna.
I obtained my tuner five days after I placed the order. It was packaged well and arrived in perfective condition thru U.S. mail. My computer scheme is a Lenovo W510 running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit (i7 820QM processor; 8GB memory; 128GB SSD), and I use an external HDD for info storage (Western Digital Elements 2TB).
The “Installation Guide” provided with the tuner is rather basic, but it accurately guided me through the steps to install the tuner using Windows Media Center. Since there is no further and added software required (no CD or other media needed) to operate the tuner with Windows 7 and Media Center, the installation was rather less sophisticated It involved attaching the tuner to a USB port on the computer (a seven-inch USB extension cable is provided); connecting a coaxial cable (not provided) amidst the F-Type coaxial connector on the tuner and the cable TV outlet on the wall (no cable box is needed, even for HDTV); permitting Windows to configure and install the principal device driver when the TV tuner was recognized; starting Windows Media Center and proceeding through the remaining configuration and set up procedure for the TV tuner.
The entire procedure of installing and setting up the TV tuner with Windows Media Center required around 30 minutes, and much of that time was spent waiting for the channel scans of cable TV signals to finished There were a couple ambiguous areas in setting up rectify Media Center options, but that is unrelated to the TV tuner. Since this was my introductory experience with any PC TV tuner, as well as with Media Center, I had to learn assorted new things simultaneously. own “neural network computer” does not operate as expeditiously as it once did — since I am 68 years old. However, it proves that if an old guy as I am can install and use this device so easily, it require to require little effort for the young tech-savvy generation.)
I have utilized the tuner only with cable TV, so I cant verify how it performs with a regular TV antenna for over-the-air digital TV broadcasts.
The TV tuner has performed flawlessly. All of the difficulties that I have experienced relate to set up within Windows Media Center. Again, that is independent of the peculiar TV tuner being used. For example, I had to enable various digital cable channels by going into Tasks–Settings–TV–Guide–Edit Channels. For such a heap of reason, even even though the channels were in the list, galore of them did not show a “check mark” to enable them. were equal analog channels for most of the “missing” digital channels, and possibly that is the way Media Center functions.) There were in addition a few digital, as well as analog, channels that were not found. Perhaps that is a function of how Mediacom (our cable TV operator) works since all of the “unrecognized” digital channels were in a contiguous group. It was a simple routine to add those channels in Media Manager by selecting Tasks–Settings–TV–Guide–Add Missing Channels.
The Program Guide that was downloaded automatically during the installation procedure is great. It makes it very simple to set up recording schedules for programs, and it is as well easy to updated For those missing digital channels, which I enabled, it was a simple process to map an equivalent analog channel’s program schedule to the similarity digital channel. was done in the “Edit Channels” by selecting “Edit Listings.”) After that editing, both the analog and the digital channels were displayed in the Program Guide with the rectify program times and descriptions. a individual did not want both analog and digital channels shown in the Program Guide, either one could be deactivated by clearing the “check mark” described in the paragraph above.)
Bottom line — I highly commend this tuner with Windows 7 and Media Center!
UPDATE: I have been using the tuner for several days now, and it proceeds to carry out perfectly. The area around the F-type coaxial connector on the tuner gets very warm (hot) at times, and I have been concerned that this may impact the longevity of the tuner. Hopefully, there is not sufficient heat buildup to harm the device.
I have recorded several TV programs for later viewing. Using a Displayport to HDMI adapter Premium Black DisplayPort Male to HDMI Female Adapter, which I in addition purchased from Amazon, I am competent to view the recorded programs on my Toshiba HDTV. This combining has provided an inexpensive multimedia HDTV DVR scheme that functions in virtually each way as I had envisioned.
UPDATE (August 31, 2011): I have now applied this tuner for over seven months, and I have experienced NO troubles whatsoever. The heat buildup around the F-type coaxial connector has proven to be a non-issue. I have employed the tuner endlessly for hours recording HD TV broadcasts, and I have nearly filled a Western Digital Elements 2 TB external hard drive with data.
Since my introductory review, I have had the prospect to use the tuner with analog over-the-air TV broadcasts (received from a translator in the mountains of western Montana). I can now report that this tuner works well with those “ancient” signals, using a 75-ohm coaxial lead-in from an outdoor antenna. I simply had Windows Media Center scan for TV signals, and it found all the channels that we are capable to receive on our television set. One issue (unrelated to the tuner) is that the analog translator broadcasts do not provide the “Program Guide” for Windows Media Center, so any scheduled recording of programs must be set up manually. This tuner still proves to be an magnificent product (for both cable TV and over-the-air broadcasts)!
I would have liked to give this USB TV tuner more than the 3 stars I’m giving its It does work with Windows 7, but not all that easy to set up if you have DirecTV like I do. DirecTV has a discerned tuner box and that was the rub I had trying to get this to work with Windows Media Center. If I went through the normal setup prompts in media center (if I had satellite, an external box, etc) I would get an error message about IR hardware not being detected. So after much looking on the internet for a solution I found that I had to lie to media center to get this TV tuner to work. I had to say I just had antenna TV with no distinguished tuner box. That makes the TV listing downloading feature from media center worthless, and that would have been a much having little impact way to set a timed recording. I wish this TV tuner had its own discerned software with it, like some internal TV tuner cards I had in my desktop computer 5 or so years ago. When I do record something the picture quality is beauteous good, but again I have to set it manually which is kind of a pain. This is a fair substitute to having a separate DVR, which is why I wanted a TV tuner anyhow. The price has dropped some $20 on this product since I bought it is Despite the problems I had installing it I’m glad I was capable to find a solution and don’t regret buying it is
I purchased the MAX KIT which comes without software or antennae. I have no idea how the unit operates over the air. I connect to Eatel Fiber Cable in Southern Louisiana. I have their usual non-digital cable.
I purchased this unit with hopes of using it with an older Medion PC upgraded to Windows 7 as PVR (Personal Video Recorder) only. The complaints I have read about the unresponsiveness of the tuner to channel selection and commands, I know has more to do with the computer than the tuner. While the AverTv did connect and drivers load on the Medion, there were multiple issues with my older computer. The introductory onboard graphic adapter could not handle Media Center and Media Player TV graphics. I plugged in a 2005 ALL-IN-WONDER graphic card I had salvaged from another computer which limited the graphics problem but I found that Media center was very sluggish. The AverTV module worked to a general degree but not what I had hoped for.
I then installed the AverTv on my new Quad processor 64 bit Win 7 machine with 6 GB of RAM, 1 TB drive, and everything became very responsive. There are some delays but these are barely noticeable.
The video is not the best for my analog cable channels but very good to excellent for the HD digital channels. I am not certain why but Media Center TV Guide was not capable to find the half dozen free HD channels I obtained I had to write them all down and enter them manually. I guess QAM’s have two types of encoding – 64 and 256. I had to decide that Eatel uses 256 by trial and error.
One thing I found out about the Media Center guide and TV recording was that selecting a series while seemingly handy can be obnoxious if that series is having reruns aired on other channels. I do not need nor want 25 old episodes of NCIS recorded each week off the two further and added channels that air the series.
Also since the Media Center could not find my digital channels, the guide did not list the programming for those channels. If the HD channel is an HD version of an analog channel that Media Center found, you can tell the guide to duplicate the programming from the analog channel to the HD channel. This needs to be done every two weeks when the guide is updated.
Now recording a series is definitely out of the question for me because when the series appears at the same time as it would for duplicate programming, it selects the initial channel which for Eatel is the analog channel – not the HD channel which has excellent playback.
I am satisfied with the AverTV & Win 7 Media Center for my first experience with PVR. I will in all likelihood get a unit that decodes in hardware for a second channel and keep the AverTv so I can record on one and watch on another.
I’ve been waiting to get a TV Tuner for a while now, and after much research and review reading, I decided on this one.
So I got it, connected to my laptop ran Windows Media Center, went to the TV option and Scanned Channels. After 5 minutes, started looking at HD channels.
That’s its Quick + easy.
Notes: No antenna is included nor is software (drivers or TV viewing viewing but personally, I already had an antenna and employed Windows Media Center as Software. No drivers where asked, Windows 7 did that on its own.
HW: HP Laptop
OS: Windows 7
RAM: 3GB
VideoCard: 128MB (shared)
The AverTV tuner worked fantastic for me. I have used it on two dissimilar laptops, both running Windows 7. It installed effortlessly in both cases. It works with a cheap RCA antena as well as when I hook in cable tv from the wall. I’m using Windows Media Center which in addition has been great.
The reason I tried this product was to be competent to use my laptop as a DVR, and it does that well. I was able to down grade my cable to a less expensively package to get rid of the DVR I was paying for with my cable suppliers Recording using my laptop as the DVR works great, peculiarly the high def channels. The quality of frequent def is similar to what I see on my common def TVs.
I in addition bought a device that connects my computer to my frequent def TV and a Windows Media Remote. Those both work finelooking well, though the quality of the effigy on the TV is not as good as viewing cable directly. It works fine for watching movies. I’m able to pause live TV from my couch using the remote.
I’ve also connected my laptop to my son’s hd TV and the pictue is wonderful.
I entirely commend this productions