The back sports the USB, power, and coaxial cable connections. There is no power adapter, only a power to USB cable. This has an advantage for notebook users, since the dual USB connections make the unit more portable than a large power brick. Whether the unit could have been powered over a single USB connection is something only the Diamond engineers will understand, especially since most users will just plug them into the same hub that shares the same power limitation.
The image clarity is good, but pixilated. Some anti-aliasing or just a slight blurring overlay or filter would have helped a lot. It should be noted, and with no real surprise, that the PVR does not support HD inputs or output, most likely due to bandwidth limitations. The picture quality on the ATI card was clearly superior, but of course the ATI solution is entirely different in many respects and not a fair comparison.
The next component is the Snapstream Firefly remote. The receiver plugs into a third USB port. So choose one remote and stick with it. The remote itself is ergonomic and comfortable to hold. The thin plastic feels a little flimsy and did not give us the impression that it could take more than a few drops.
The remote has buttons for all the standard universal commands, such as numbers, DVD navigation, play control, and device selection. The PC mouse can be operated via the remote, using the directional buttons and mouse click buttons.
Because the directional buttons are four separate buttons, navigation can be tiresome for anything but the simplest tasks. One thing to note is that the Firefly remote is not a universal remote. It will not control your stand-alone DVD player, cable box, etc. With that in mind, it might be better to get a great learning remote and the Firefly, and teach the high end remote the missing PC commands.
This not only makes things easier by allowing one remote for your home theater and PC, but it avoids any confusion in volume levels. In other words, pressing volume up will increase the volume in your DVD application, but your system volume may not be set high enough when the DVD application is set to maximum.
Until next year's CableCard -based systems come out, which will give you digital-cable-quality images, you're stuck with the current generation of hardware. Unless you are watching TV on a huge plasma where image defects are more apparent, the Diamond XtremeTV card provides an acceptable image; it's no better or worse than we've seen from other external tuners or the majority of internal TV tuner cards.
Dan Ackerman. The Good Plenty of connection options; great software package; includes cables. Credit-card-style remote may not appeal to some; IR blaster not included; typical TV tuner image-quality problems. They're portable, easy to set up, and most importantly, don't require cracking open your computer case to install. While the device's image quality doesn't match that of the best internal TV tuners, casual viewers will be hard-pressed to spot the differences, and the Diamond XtremeTV offers one of the better software packages we've seen.
No time indicators. Brain-dead navigation. No upgrades from Arcsoft--ever. Pros: Good picture quality. Ability to utilize most of the features using the included remote such as turning the TV on or off and switching between TV, Radio, and Video.
You can even shutdown the PC with the remote. Cons: Unit gets hot enough to nearly burn your hand. Lots of lag. Every 10secs the picture stops for a sec and resyncs. Sometimes the audio starts getting choppy for no reason, progressively gets worse, and then stops altogher. Restarting software usually fixes it.
Connected my dvd player and the video signal is lost every 5 seconds yet the audio remains. When using the remote there is a big delay from the time you press the button until the software actually responds to the command. The DMRC01 remote is very thin and cheap.
The plastic feels like the door flap on an old floppy drive. You can only be a few degrees off from pointing the remote directly at the unit.
It's difficult to know if you've pressed the membrane keys hard enough to send a signal to the unit. Inability to just have the TV picture on your screen and resize it to your preference. Software is a resource hog.
Overall Review: I'm sure this unit works fine with a really high end PC. I've tried all kinds of tweaks and different drivers but the performance of the tuner remains the same. I blame the software it comes bundled with because even that is choppy when you open just the software.
Thanks to Newegg for always delivering products fast, well packaged, and in perfect condition!!! Pros: With "Total Media 3" upgrade, it should work almost anywhere in the world. It seems to work good enough for off air to mpeg2 recording.
If upgre. Cons: Does get hot, but not that hot. Probably want to buy the Arcsoft Total Media 3 software. Needs a fairly strong signal, but they all do. Overall Review: For International buyers, this looks like a great product. Seems to use the Conexant CX chip, which maybe what most others use too.
Pros: USB tv tuner with hardware mpeg encoder.
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