I fiddled with the HVR-850 for quite a while, but just couldn’t get it to work. However, upon connecting the HVR-850 via the standard coax cable connection to my antenna and then scanning for over-the-air channels in Windows Media Center, the device wouldn’t find any channels.
DIY TV TUNER FOR PC INSTALL
I plugged it in to my PC, and Windows 7 recognized the device right away, no driver install needed. Unfortunately, the HVR-850 unit that I received was DOA. (Note: This model isn’t compatible with some other types of TV signals such as “Clear QAM” from a set-top cable box for that, you’d need a higher-end tuner part like the HVR-950.)
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I paid about US $55 for mine (and as of the time of this writing, it’s going for $55 shipped on Amazon). This tuner is compatible with over-the-air HDTV (ATSC) signals, and is certified to work with Windows 7. It also enables Windows to record broadcast TV like a TiVo or similar DVR device – with no monthly fee! (There are some free software packages for Linux that have similar functionality, but Windows is my preferred OS, so I decided to go with Microsoft’s software solution.)Īfter doing some research, I decided to purchase an HVR-850 USB-connection PC TV tuner by Hauppauge. Doing this on a PC running Windows 7 enables the ability to be able to watch live broadcast TV on the PC monitor. I found a a pretty good overview video from Microsoft describing what it takes to hook a TV tuner card up to a PC. Having gotten free HDTV via my DIY antenna working nicely, I decided to purchase a TV tuner and try it out with my existing PC running Windows 7 (and therefore also Windows Media Center), before making the full investment in a complete set of parts for a new HTPC.
![diy tv tuner for pc diy tv tuner for pc](https://www.gearnews.de/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/diy-recording-pc-teaser.jpeg)
To see a list of all posts in this series, click here. This is the second in a series of posts I’m writing about an HTPC (Home Theatre PC) build that I recently completed.