PVR-500 liveTV freezes PC

[reboot]

Some versions of Cyberlink don't work properly, even with overlay. This can give you hard locks. (it's happend to me).
Try any other video decoder, and/or try VMR 9 (hopefully your Duron can handle it with whatever video card you have).

[jakerella]

dang.

Thanks for the update. I'll keep up in that thread and update if I make any progress.

[bgowland]

Hmm? I have that VIA chipset set but I am using 3 -PVR150 on MSI K8MM-V MOBO without any problems! I was so happy when it pickup the 3 cards without hanging like my P4 VIA did on BIOSTAR MOBO U688D

If you have a look at the thread link I posted, you'll see at least a couple of guys swapped their 500s for 2x 150 and things were fine. It isn't the 150 chipset that seems to be the problem - it's whatever else is on the 500 that 'glues' them together as far as I can tell.

[bgowland]

dang.

Thanks for the update. I'll keep up in that thread and update if I make any progress.

Sorry - as I said, I wish somebody would prove me wrong or even better - Hauppauge and VIA would work out a software solution to fix the problem.

Cheers,
Brian

[jakerella]

Yeah, wordt part is, because its a mini-ATX board, I have only one PCI slot to use. So the double 150 option is out. Other suggestions??

[bgowland]

Yeah, wordt part is, because its a mini-ATX board, I have only one PCI slot to use. So the double 150 option is out. Other suggestions??

You could always try the USB route - I haven't tried it myself but the GB-PVR main page mentions a couple of USB devices that are supported.

Cheers,
Brian

[jakerella]

After much thought and attempting to please the wife, I have decided to contact PCAlchemy to exchange the PVR-500 for a 250 (and hopefully a rebate). I may look into the USB tuner if I get the 250 working nicely. Thanks for all the help, I wish I would have read that other thread on the Hauppauge forum just a hair sooner.

*sigh*

[bgowland]

I can sympathize. Apart from the frustration of swapping the card around in different PCI slots and a different machine (where it worked fine) etc.etc. I lost money on selling my original mobo secondhand and the replacement one (which thankfully solved the problem) was twice the price of the first.

Good luck with the 250.

Cheers,
Brian

[jakerella]

In case anyone is interested, the 150 is working great... tweaked the GBPVR settings a bit to get better performance (usually between channel changes), but otherwise my first PVR is up and running smoothly.

I split the cable line at the wall and sent one line to the PVR and one directly to the TV. This lets me watch TV the 'old-fashioned' way while I record on the PVR. Its not perfect, but it works.