PVR-500 bad quality, questions :(

[Loomy]

Hi there. First time HTPC builder here, using GBPVR because it appears to be the best and least flaky of the free PVR softwares My problem is ugly quality from the PVR-500.

I am using a new PVR-500 on an Athlon 2500+ system outputting to an older 32" CRT. I'm testing the cable quality by moving the cable back and forth from the TV to the computer that outputs to the TV via S-video.

The computer video output from DVD or other high quality source looks great.

But the cable video output from the PVR-500 looks worse than the cable video output from the the tuner built into the TV. It looks more blurry and appears to run at a different frame rate.

Is this normal? Is the quality of PC TV tuners still not as good as tuners built into televisions?

Or is there something I need to tweak? Like the cable quality in my house, or the drivers for the card, or something else?

I tried the beta and normal drivers on the website. I tried changing the temporal feature with a hauppauge tweak tool, but it either made things too blurry or too low framerate.

Please and thanks for the help

[stustunz]

check the recording settings for mediem under edit where you added the tuner in config (medium) is the default so change that
set the sharpness to the right with tweak tool
the picture you get should be close to as good as the tuner
it will always be slightly softer(blurry)thats how they seem to be
s video is not the best connection

[moymike]

I sent my first PVR-500 back and the second was almost as bad as the returned one. So I call Hauppauge and they had me try a different driver, which gave much better results, but still couldn't touch the quality of my TV tuner. At the time, I also had a PVR-150 installed, which matched the TV tuner quality.

Hauppauge had me send them the PVR-500, and like three weeks later I got it back all fixed up. I can still see a slight difference between the PVR-500 and the PVR-150, but it's negligible.

From all I had read at the time, I figured if I purchased another PVR-500, I'd probably have to send it to Hauppauge for 'tweaking' again. First thing though is to get them on the line and see if anything can be done via drivers or settings.

[Ted the Penguin]

they also changed the chipset in the recent 500s to a cheaper one, and people say that the difference is obvious. I dont know what the change was to/from, but it used to use the same one that is in the 150, and now it doesnt.

[-Oz-]

Its very obvious. Tell Hauppage to check which chip you have. They'll allow you to RMA the new chip for the old one.

[Loomy]

check the recording settings for mediem under edit where you added the tuner in config (medium) is the default so change that
set the sharpness to the right with tweak tool
the picture you get should be close to as good as the tuner
it will always be slightly softer(blurry)thats how they seem to be
s video is not the best connection

I want to thank you all for the quick answers. I'm going to try this stuff and then talk to hauppauge about the hardware model.

I did research before buying the pvr-500, but I didn't hear this stuff... I guess because the hardware has been changing and people have different expectations.

[Ted the Penguin]

hmm, I remember seeing people complaining about the new chipset at newegg, maybe they pulled them

[-Oz-]

yea, newegg had all the complaints. The old chips were good, then they had new chips and they sucked, but then, recently, they went back to the old ones.

So, if you got it from a new shipment you'd have the old chips on the other hand if it was in stock and the company had been storing it you'd have the "new" chip and thus the problem.