Need a TV / FM Tuner/Recorder? Add a Pinnacle Systems PCTV Pro to your PC.
Written: Jan 01 '02 (Updated Mar 08 '03)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Includes TV tuner, FM tuner, video capture and editing, and includes a wireless remote
Cons: Hardware and software compatibility issues on some systems,
The Bottom Line: Assuming the Studio PCTV Pro is compatible with your system, this card is an excellent, inexpensive route to adding a TV/FM tuner with video capture functionality to your system.
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| nc10's Full Review: Pinnacle Systems Studio PCTV PCI TV Pro Tuner Vide... |
WHAT IS THE Studio PCTV Pro?
The PCTV Pro is a stereo TV and FM radio tuner card for your PC, manufactured by Pinnacle Systems. The card installs in a PCI slot in your pc, and allows you to watch television on your monitor. The PCTV pro does NOT replace your video display card, but works with your video display card by sending the TV image over the PCI bus of your computer to the display card, "overlaying" a scaleable TV image on the display generated by your video card. Some of the video cards the PCTV Pro works with include 3dfx cards, ATI Rage, Rage Pro, Rage 128 and Radeon cards, and the Nvidia TNT and Geforce cards. The PCTV Pro can also record shows to your hard drive for later playback, capture still images, and tune in FM radio stations.
"In the box" is the Studio PCTV Pro card, a remote with 2 AA batteries, a serial port infrared sensor for the remote, an audio loopback cable for routing the audio signal from the TV card to an input on your sound card, one CD enclosed in a white envelope containing installation and application files, and an easy to follow 40 page quick install guide.
The Studio PCTV Pro was purchased for $30 after a $20 rebate, from our local Compusa, as one of their week long specials. The PCTV Pro typically sells for $50-$60.
INSTALLATION
As with many video display cards, installation starts with installing the hardware prior to the software. The PCTV card is installed in an open PCI slot in your PC. After closing up your computer's case, the TV antenna input, is connected to a coaxial connection o the back of the PCTV card. One end of the included audio loopback cable is then attached to the audio output of the PCTV card, and the other end is inserted into the "line in" or "microphone" input jack on your sound card. NOTE: The audio signal must be routed through your sound card. An FM antenna is connected to a second coaxial connector on the PCTV card. If you desire to use the PCTV card to capture video from a VCR or other video source, there is also a composite video input and S-video input on the PCTV card.
To use the remote, the infrared sensor must be plugged into a serial port. The cable is about 6' long, allowing you to attach the small (1/2" diameter) infrared sensor to your desk, monitor or cpu case using the included adhesive fastener.
After you start your computer back up, Windows 95, 98, ME, and presumably XP, will detect the new hardware, and try to install new drivers for the hardware. At this point, the PCTV Pro cd is put into the cdrom drive, and you "point" windows to the cd using the "add new hardware" dialog boxes.
Software installation starts by requesting the serial number on the back of the quick install guide. You then can follow the "typical" installation which installs all of the software on your c drive, or follow a compact or custom installation which allows more control over what software components are installed and to which drive. The software then proceeds to install smoothly, and adds a PCTV folder, and icons for watching TV (TV Vision) and video editing (Studio) to your desktop.
Assuming that you had a free serial port and used it to install the infrared sensor, the software then detects which serial port the sensor uses and sets up the software appropriately. You also have the option to select the serial port manually. After installation, the infrared remote software starts each time you start up your PC, and adds an icon to the system tray.
Finally, the installation routine checks to make sure you have the correct Microsoft DirectX drivers installed (vers 6 or better), and then asks to reboot your PC to finish the installation and open the product registration screen. The quick start guide also includes instructions for installing the software on Windows NT or Windows 2000 systems.
After installation is complete, the PCTV Pro software runs a check to see that everything installed correctly, and checks your system for compatibility by running display tests on your screen. Assuming you "pass", you can then set up the TV and FM tuners by scanning for active channels.
DOES THE TV CARD WORK?
Yes. I first installed the software, TV tuner card and remote on on a system that included an Abit motherboard, 1.1 GHZ Athlon processor, 128 mg ram, Soundblaster Live, ATI Radeon (32mb) video card, network card, two 8G hard drives, and usb connections for a Nomad II mp3 player and internet camera, running Windows ME. The installation proceeded smoothly, and everything works as advertised. The TV signal is provided by our local cable system, and the tuner can access all 50 or so channels. The video quality was not great, similar to broadcast television, and does not match the picture on our TV sets. I do consider the quality to be adequate, as we usually run the TV in the background while surfing the internet or participating in online chats, and looks fine full screen, once you are more than 6 feet or so from the monitor. Up closer you notice "noise" on the screen. Audio quality was good. The TV window can be sized from a small window in the corner of your screenk, up to a full screen window. The remote works as expected and looks like a standard tv remote. There are a few buttons on the remote that have no function, and those that do are not all clearly marked. However, for the most part, the TV tuner has worked flawlessly on this system.
The TV tuner software package also includes a "scan" feature, quickly taking snapshots of all channels, displaying 16 at a time, which is a nice channel surfing feature. The "VCR" feature of the tuner will "capture" (record) in three different quality settings, "best" (320 X 240, 30 frames/second, about 40 mb disk space/min of video), "better" (320 X 240, 15 frames/second, about 20 mb disk space/min of video) and "good" (176 X 120, 15 frames/second, about 6 mb disk space/min of video). These videos are in uncompressed "avi" format, and require a LOT of disk space. "Good" quality is too poor to play back full screen, but ok in a small window, and 15 frames/second seems a litte "jumpy" upon playback. "Best" is adequate for full screen playback, but requires a huge amount of diskspace.
I tried out the Studio editing package, but found it to be unstable, occasionally locking up my computer, and suggest those who are looking for video editing/encoding sofware look elsewhere (I suggest the free program "Virtualdub" at http://www.virtualdub.org/index)
Having good luck with this card, I purchased another PCTV Pro to be installed on a second computer, a system that includes an Iomega ZipCD 12 X 4 X 20 CD Writer, ASUS motherboard, 750MHZ Athlon processor, 128 mg ram, Soundblaster Live, ATI Rage Fury Pro video card, and 45 gig Maxtor hard drive, HP printer, Visoneer scanner, network card,and usb connections for a Nomad II mp3 player and Kodak digital camera, operating under Windows ME. Although the installation went smoothly on this system, the TV tuner causes the system to lockup after a minute or two. I have installed the latest video card and sound card drivers, latest motherboard bios, and made sure the tuner card had a dedicated IRQ, to fix this problem, with no luck thus far. I also tried installing an ATI TV tuner card on this same system, with the same results. From reading the message boards on the Pinnacle Systems web site, and messages in newsgroups, a few other people have reported lockup problems, often with ASUS motherboards with Via chipsets. I was finally able to get Avermedia's TV card, a AverTV Stereo Desktop TV PVR to work quite well on this system. If you buy a TV tuner card, try to purchase it from a store with an liberal return policy and save the receipt.
Support
Online techinical support on the Pinnacle Systems website (www.pinnaclesys.com) was pretty good, although I have not been able to get anyone to help determine how to get the card to work well in my second computer system. There is an active message board which is sporadically monitored by knowledgeable Pinnacle employees, as well as email support, online FAQ's and a download area for software and driver updates. Updated drivers for the PCTV Pro are very hard to find. When I recently upgraded the system in which this TV card is installed to Win XP, it took me over an hour to find and understand how to upgrade my software from version 4 to version 5.1 (ver 5.1 works with XP, 4 does not). I finally found a link and vague instructions posted in one of the message boards, but a direct link is not provided in Pinnacle Systems download area on the support page. (I finally found these instructions in the message board, in case your card did not come with the latest drivers:
How to install PCTV 5
First take the card physically out of the PC then uninstall all PCTV software.
Do a search (via start) for PCTV, Pinnacle, and Studio. Then delete all of these folders.
If you have any captured material, then leave it there.
Now go on the internet and go to www.jv16.org and download the program called regcleaner. Download and install this program. Now you start Regcleaner a screen will come up which looks like a spreadsheet in this list you tick everything with: Pinnacle Systems. Also go to backup and delete everything with Pinnacle Systems.
Once this is done, shutdown pc and insert card back into the PC. Cancel if new hardware is found.
....Do a clean install of both the
"Web installer PCTVrave 5.01" and the "5.1" patch at this link...... (my addition in bold): http://www.pinnaclesys.com/docsupport1.asp?division_id=1&langue_id=2&product_id=103&
product_name=PCTVpro&page_id=62) Make sure that PCTV is closed and not running while installing the update.
Make sure that PCTV is closed and not running while installing the update. Reboot the PC. )
Should you buy this TV Tuner card?
Yes. Having used both the ATI and Pinnacle Systems tuner cards, I find that both are acceptable alternatives, provided they are compatible with your system. The PCTV Pro includes a few more features (FM tuner, and infrared remote). If the PCTV Pro works on your system at all, it works well, and is easy to use. Picture quality will not match your TV, but is adequate for casual use. Installation is not too difficult, but should be done by an experienced PC user who is comfortable with opening and adding cards to a PC. The PCTV Pro will likely need a dedicated IRQ, the latest video and sound card drivers, and the latest version of DirectX to work well. The remote will require an open serial port.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 30
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