Do TV Tuner Cards require cable?

[Snookslayer]

I'm thinking of installing a TV Tuner Card. Looking at pictures on Newegg, I see in the back of the $60+ models a coaxial cable. I assume you're supposed to connect your wall cable to that... (and it may or may not work depending on my cable provider's encryption, based off what I've read).

But I was wondering how it works with over-the-air channels? Can you just plug in a rabbit ear antenna? If so, can those channels be recorded?

Have any tips or suggestions on buying/using a tuner card?

 

[Paul NZ]

Depends. I use a DTV / digital tuner here. For our local TV. Its not scrambled or anything tho. It's UHF.

Just plug an aerial into it, (obviously you have to scan for channels), its all go. Or the mini-aerial it came with.

On this one the mini aerial is actually better than rabbit ears. This is whats in this

http://avertv.avermedia.com/Product/ProductDetail.aspx?Id=507

And yes you can either use the program above for recording. It will also work in windows media center.

And you can record with that too. But whether you can edit it after if you use MCE is another matter. I think it records in ts format which most or all programs dont understand lol.

The program that comes with this tuner I think records in MP4

But you can also get dual or quad tuners. Which will let you get satellite. Obviously you may have to have a sub to watch it. Or Satellite / UHF in the one tuner

 

[Snookslayer]

Wait, you plug a "digital converter box" into the card in order to make it work?

I assumed the card converted to digital on it's own, and only needed some kind of antenna.?.

 

[Paul NZ]

No this tuner is USB. Plug it into a port, install drivers, Windows may install them. Run the program / connect aerial scan for channels. Watch TV.

Everything I would say is in the tuner. With satellite just connect the cable, scan for channels voila TV

Nothing else needed, it's either USB or a PCI card

There's no digital converter box or anything else involved

Obviously you need an aerial for UHF or dish for satellite to get the channels

DTV is just an abbreviation for the tuner. It doesnt mean you have to add anything extra to get the channels

 

[Snookslayer]

Gotcha. Thanks.

Any particular program you recommend to use the TV Tuner? Is there something already installed on my Windows 7 Professional or do I need to download something? Or perhaps a program comes with the TV Tuner?

As you can tell I don't know a dang thing about these tuners, but I'm on the verge of getting one so I'm very interested in how people use 'em.

 

[Paul NZ]

If you have Media center that should pick it, then all you have to do is scan for channels.

And you can watch it with that. Or it may come with a program, when you buy the tuner. Or whatever site (for the tuner) may have the program for it