External or internal tv tuner?

[flame_of_recca]

what the advantages/disadvantages of external and internal tv tuner card? pls fill me in :)

[raj]

let's see now:
External Tv Tuner:
Pros: Doesn't eat ram, can watch TV Without switching pc on since it directly connects to Monitor and a power input
Cons: Can't record TV shows, no FM in most cases, poor Channel Reception, Hogs space

Internal TV Tuner:
Pros: can record TV shows, FM radio present, Good OEM software bundle, great support for Windows XP Media Center Edition.
Cons: Hogs CPU and Ram, Capturing quality not up to makr unless a Hardware incoder in present on TV Tuner CHIP it self.

Hope that helps:D BTW I recommend you go for Internal TV Tuner, from Pinnacle or Aver Media.

[GamaVeda]

raj did a good job of expressing the differences. I only differ on one issue in regards to the external capture device. raj, I'm not entirely familiar with the external tv tuner card you are referring to. The tuners I have seen on the market utilize USB as their means of connection to the PC and they generally do capture video onto the hard drive of the PC that they are attached to.

From my experience, the external capture cards are a bit limited in the resolution and basic quality of the images that can be capture as a result of the relatively low bandwidth going through the USB port. I purchased a Hauppauge brand external USB capture card years ago. It was a pain because, at the time, USB. 2.0 wasn't out yet so the amount of bandwidth that could be handled was incredibly minimal. I replaced it with a good solid internal Hauppauge Win-TV Pro.

flame_of_recca, if you go the external route, make certain you are aware of its bandwidth limitations. However, I concur with raj, that internal is the way to go if you're interested in capturing video.

[flame_of_recca]

Yah the sole purpose of me purchasing a tv tuner is to capture videos. Thanks for the help guys its very clear to me now! :)

[raj]

Hauppauge Internal TV tuners cards are a good options, but they aren't availble here, also, they cost around Rs.5,500/- but there performance is exclent, since they Decode video via their On-Chip Decoder.
@GameVeda: i was actually talking about TechCom Cards, they don't capture video, since PC is not on, and thus they can't write on Hard Disks, besure to purchase a TV Tuner with Time Shift Feature and IF you can, get one which has a RF Remote for true Couch Potato expirence:D