Does anyone watch TV on their Thinkpad?

[Purcy]

I've been looking at the WINTV USB module that plugs into the USB of your laptop, then you connect your TV cable to the other end. They also one with FM radio option. If you watch TV, how do you access it?? Thanks in advance.

Moderator edit: Moved from T2x/T30

[joester]

I've actually got one of these. They're OK, but the resolution isn't the greatest.The image on mine is a bit fuzzy, but it was on the bargain table at my local electronics shop with "as is" on the box. No software, and no idea if it worked. I got it for an amazing offer of $5. Internet provided the software (Hauppage! makes them)

FM radio.... Not on mine.

As you may have guessed, the cable or air antenna connects to the USB device, and there are two programs you can use to view TV, They are basically the same, but the skins are quite different. Most of the controls are onscreen, and there are a few hotkeys for volume, channel and stuff like that.

The USB version has S-video and RCA inputs as well. My only complaint is that the thing gets rather warm. It's never failed me, but it does get warm.

For what my opinion is worth, I wouldn't pay full price for one unless you don't mind keeping the image small so the resolution is tollerable. I had mine set up to have TV on a second screen, but the image bugged me when set to full screen. Maybe a new one wouldn't have the resolution problem? I don' know.

Joe

[rkawakami]

One thing to consider (at least I am for now) is that the FCC has decreed that in February 2009, good-ole' analog television is to cease. This date has been pushed around a couple of times since a law was passed in 2005 so it is not fixed in stone. Whenever the conversion does takes place, it will mean that all "over-the-air" television transmissions will be digital, rendering most current hardware incompatible. However, if you get your local TV stations from a cable system, then you can probably ignore this message. I doubt that the cable companies would (further) alienate their subscribers by insisting upon the discontinuation of analog signal delivery. Doing so would mean that the viewer needs to buy a new digital-capable TV or buy/rent a converter box.

If you can live with the idea that you will have to replace this receiver in a couple of years (if you are using it ONLY to receive signals from an antenna), then enjoy it for that time. Otherwise, take a wait and see approach. I'm hoping for a PCMCIA card capable of receiving hi-def digital TV signals, RDS information from FM stations and the new HD radio system. So far, I don't know of any that can even do TWO of those things.

[Purcy]

Thank you both for your ideas and thoughts. Ray, I agree about the digital TV thing, for some reason I thought that conversion was to happen this year. We had to replace our TV this past spring and the salesman told us that there were only two models available that were not HDD tv's!! We did buy a nice sony 36" analog TV but when that conversion takes place I am sure we will buy a converter box.

As far as the TV tuner for the PC, it was just a new toy for me I am sure everyone on this board will know what I am talking about. No real need for it, I just thought it was cool. I saw one of the Hauppauge's on ebay for $9.

Edited: I wanted to add that I recently listened to a concert broadcast on a radio station's website over their live HD stream (on this T22) and it was breath taking, so much clearer than regular radio.

[rkawakami]

<snip>>... it was just a new toy for me...

LOL! I completely understand that! I've been looking for a PCMCIA card (would consider USB too) that can receive FM radio and decode and display the station's RDS (Radio Data System) signal. Most of the local FM stations around me use this system for sending out artist and song title information. My main use would be to identify songs for contests .

Yes, I know that you can usually get this information from the station's own web site. And the RDS information being broadcast is not always correct , but I think it would be a "cool" addition to have for a laptop. I can think of a couple of ways that I would like to "hack" such a setup...

Many times the radio stations I listen to (or that have good prizes to win) announce something about the contest in the early morning, say around 7am. I'm not usually up that early, so I've been using a clock radio programmed to go on at that time and a digital voice recorder, which can also be programmed to start recording at a specific time. It would be neat if I could have the laptop wake up, launch the radio program, record the show for a specified amount of time and then shut off.

(edit: Oh yeah, one other thing... that DTV/ATSC/NTSC/FM receiver has to operate using a PIII 1Ghz CPU. In other words, a T23.)

[Purcy]

Oh boy, I'll bet your house is just one big playground Thankfully my husband loves to experiment with new computer toys too; and is gleefully composing music from his electronic keyboard right into PowerTracks Pro on his PC. He is still amazed when it plays back what he just played into it. So many wonderful (and super fun) things these computers do for us.

Hey, I hope you win a contest soon; thanks for letting me know about the CPU limit for that TV attachment, I'm only at 900mhz

[jruschme]

... thanks for letting me know about the CPU limit for that TV attachment, I'm only at 900mhz

Actually, the old USB/TV adapters based on the Nogatech/Zoran USBVision (Happauge WIN-TV/USB, etc.) don't require all that much CPU. I've comfortably run one under Linux on a 600E with a 366mhz PII and under WinME with a Celeron 400mhz.

Granted, this is just basic TV watching. Depending on what software is bundled with the adapter, it may require more CPU for features such as saving to AVI file or even DVD.

[egibbs]

I do watch TV on my T42p, but with a somewhat different setup.

I have a WinTV 150 card in a desktop in the living room, and connect to it with the TP over ethernet. I use BeyondTV (rather than the crappy Hauppauge software) on the desktop to manage recording and serve the streams, and a BeyondTV client of the TP to connect to the beyondTV server on the desktop. Sage TV can also do all this.

This all works rather well, so much so that I really don't have to do anything other than clean out old recordings every time I fill up the terabyte of storage I've set aside for recorded shows.

One thing to consider - the WinTV cards include a hardware MPEG-2 encoder which takes a lot of load off the CPU. I'm not sure the USB version includes the hardware encoder.

Ed Gibbs

[mysbca]

I'm not sure the USB version includes the hardware encoder.

I've just bought the Hauppauge WinTV HVR-950 USB stick. It definitely does not have a hardware encoder. My 2GHz T43 runs at 90% CPU for over the air HDTV. The digital picture is really good with occassional stutter. I don't have a clear line of sight to the transmission towers in San Francisco, too many hills.

[Purcy]

I just found this USB2 kit, but it says you can use with USB 1.1, and it says it includes a built-in mpeg2 encoder. They seem to have quite a few different kits.

http://www.hauppage.com/pages/products/ ... rusb2.html

[egibbs]

Looks like a good option, but if you are considering using it with USB 1.1 I would urge you to think again. That might be painful.

At DVD quality I run about 2 GB per hour of TV. Not sure how long it would take to transfer 2 GB over USB 1.1, but I'm sure I don't want to find out.

Ed Gibbs

[Purcy]

Agreed Ed, transfering files to and from my flash drive to my hard drive is quick enough, but there are not that many and the sizes are just photos and things. I truly did not consider the files size transfer rate of the DVD file using my 1.1 USB. Thanks for your help.

My dear husband is going to record a few months of Seinfeld for me on his DVD recorder and I can then watch them on my laptop whenever I want. It is on a cable station here for an hour every week night. I'll be happy with that.