External or Internal? Which is Better?

[Greg Smith]

Generally, does an external capture card produce better quality captures than an internal card? Any thoughts on this? I think that my Hauppauge HVR-1950 (external) card produces slightly better captures than my Hauppauge HVR-1600 (internal).

[pcostanza]

I notice no difference in quality between my HVR2250 and HVR1600 vs. my HDHR though by external, you mean USB.
Maybe more testing is in order.

[whurlston]

On the digital side, there should be absolutely no difference since there is no encoding. The only thing that would matter is the tuner sensitivity to prevent dropouts.