TV tuners???

Student Lounge College Life
1

<p>Anyone know how these work? I'm thinking I don't really want to buy a tv...I'm living in a single room the size of a walk in closet and space will be tight...</p>

<p>How do these work with the cable tv connections in dorm rooms? Or do you not use your room's cable connections and have to get your own channels with the internet? </p>

<p>Do they slow down and mess with your computer enough to make buying an actual tv a better idea? What's a good kind of tv tuner to get? Aaand my computer screen is a flat panel lcd screen, anyone have any experience watching tv on that type of screen?</p>

<p>Sorry for the million questions lol. Any info would be appreciated, as I'm obviously pretty clueless at this point.</p>

2

<p>imo waste of money</p>

3

<p>I was considering getting a tv tuner and i was wondering the same thing and then i saw how much it cost (i think like almost $200 if i remember correctly)..and im like its not worth it might as well get a small 13 inch and save any mess-ups with the laptop.</p>

4

<p>I have a ~8 year old TV tuner card in my desktop PC at home - a lot of the new ones have USB connections. Basically, you just plug in your cable TV connection into the TV tuner and use the software to watch TV. Some of the new tuners even come with remotes. The software I have allows me to shrink the window down to just a couple of inches and keep it "always on top" so I can surf online while watching TV and it works great for me. If you plan on multitasking - having a dozen windows open on your PC while watching TV - then watching TV on the computer might get annoying. Also, it'll be impossible to watch TV while playing a full screen game etc.</p>

5

<p>If you get a tuner, be sure to order online. I recommend tigerdirect, as they have a good selection and great prices:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?CatId=1427&%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?CatId=1427&&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Frankly, I don't know what the first two posters were talking about. You save money and space by getting this instead of a TV, so why not?</p>

6

<p>just get a small tv. It will be alot easier and more accessible.</p>

7

<p>
[quote]
Anyone know how these work? I'm thinking I don't really want to buy a tv...I'm living in a single room the size of a walk in closet and space will be tight...</p>

<p>How do these work with the cable tv connections in dorm rooms? Or do you not use your room's cable connections and have to get your own channels with the internet?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>It works pretty much the same as a tv set as far as getting reception goes. The internet stuff doesn't require a tuner card! (I'm not sure about the legality of that stuff as some have been shut down.)</p>

<p>
[quote]
Do they slow down and mess with your computer enough to make buying an actual tv a better idea?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Not really unless you have a below average computer or one that's messed up enough already. It could and should work very well (see the market for Media Center Edition PCs).</p>

<p>
[quote]
What's a good kind of tv tuner to get?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>It's fairly inexpensive and easy to add the tuner card. Check out newegg @ <a href="http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Order=RATING&Page=1&N=2010380047+1148510222&Submit=ENE&Nty=1&SubCategory=47%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Order=RATING&Page=1&N=2010380047+1148510222&Submit=ENE&Nty=1&SubCategory=47&lt;/a> .</p>

<p>
[quote]
Aaand my computer screen is a flat panel lcd screen, anyone have any experience watching tv on that type of screen?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>You may have a problem with viewing angles and such. Otherwise, it's great! Ever watch a DVD on a computer? It's kinda like that.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Sorry for the million questions lol. Any info would be appreciated, as I'm obviously pretty clueless at this point.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Nah..</p>

8

<p>I got mine for about $75 and it works well. It also lets you download video, and you can save it to your hard drive, CD, or DVD, so its kind of like TiVo. I like having a small card instead of a heavy TV and VCR.</p>

9

<p>If you have a slow laptop, you should not use a usb tv tuner card as the additional processing that the image requires will slow your computer down even more.</p>