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Television Media

Low Cost HDTV Cards 69

Posted by CmdrTaco from the I'll-take-me-one-of-those dept.
Dozer writes "TerraLogic's new Janus-based HDTV cards allows a PC user to get some excellent HDTV without draining the wallet. The cards will do line doubling and handle AC3 audio, all for less than 10% of the cost of an HDTV set..." So I want that, Linux support, and then HDTV broadcasts of every sci fi movie ever.
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Low Cost HDTV Cards

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  • When this card is supported for Linux, I'm buying it post-haste. Now I know why I bought a 19" .25mm monitor!
  • Posted by Dean Townsley:

    Several above posts follow the line of "but what good is HDTV if it's not on a 60" screen?" So what I want to know is: does anybody have any info on maximum angular resolution of the human eye with 20/20 vision? or maybe comfortable angular resolution? Surely there is some info on this somewhere. This is the same sort of analysis that led to CDs being 16-bit 44kHz and CRTs having three colors, because those specs pretty well match what humans can sense.

    Without this info it seems clumsy to discuss whether or not HDTV on a small set is wasteful or not, as I certainly don't know the viwing distance intended for those 60" sets. -- Note the comfortable angular resolution would set the viewing distance for a given pixel size. Maybe this is actually a better statistic: some relation between comfortable viewing distance and dpi.

    Just fishing for useful info I haven't had a change to look around for.
    -Dean
  • Posted by Mike@ABC:

    I have a TV tuner card, and while I certainly use it quite a bit, the picture quality isn't all that great once you get it up to near full-screen size.

    I've also seen HDTV programming -- the image quality is intense, especially on the big HTDV screen that I viewed. But once the screen is smaller, I personally feel the difference is less pronounced.

    Now slap it on a 15" monitor...? I just don't see the benefit. Maybe I'm wrong, and someone out there is willing to enlighten me. Otherwise, I'll keep my ATI tuner card.

    Besides, once everyone stops transmitting analog signals and goes strictly digital, the PC and TV will have converged anyway. :)
  • Does this mean that a PC with this card will be cheaper than a TV set?

    And what about standards? Is there one standard for HDTV, or several competing standards?


  • For your first question, look at the ATI All-In-Wonder 128. I believe Sharky Extreme [sharkyextreme.com] did a review of it, including its MPEG-2 capture abilities.
  • Think wall-filling, crisp beautiful display. Seriously, these are not that expensive these days, and they are certainly less than people are paying for those massive HDTV's (most of which are rear projection screens, and much cruddier in terms of display.

    This is what I plan to do anyway. Not to mention the possibility of playing Descent on the thing... zowie!
  • I bow to your superior electronics knowledge

  • Well, I'd suggest installing some sort of surge protector along any analog wire coming into your system. I'm from Florida, and I've seen tons of modems be reduced to pretty but worthless fiberglass boards.

    So I'd say, install a circuit breaker along the line for the antanna.

    BTW, other than for applications that are small in size or voltage, why use fuses? A conspiracy by the fuse companies? Breakers are so much better, in that they can be reset, rather than having to be replaced with nails

    x_x


  • we have all this in France already, for years!
    Canal + [cplus.fr] offers a lot of canals via satellite (there's not a lot of cable in France) in numeric 16/9, France 2 [france2.fr] also have a FranceVision numeric 16/9 hdtv for years... the olympic games of Atlanta was the first events on FranceVision IIRC.
    --
  • Now, if only they'd start making 60" monitors with 1280x1024 resolution (or maybe 1600x1024 for movies!),

    You're asking for too little.
    Try 16:9 aspect ratio at 1900x1000 (ish)

    Yes, I saw that today. Mitsubishi HD-1080 16:9 series... very _VERY_ crisp. Very very expensive. ($9000 + $1500 for HDTV input plus god knows what else... probably near 15k) But it's a nice 65" monitor.

    --Dan

  • .... I want it for the AC3 digital out! And the line doubler... Dream system is to hook a system with that pup to a projector and have 100" of DVD fun....

    And maybe HDTV would be nice someday...
  • The long awaited integration of TV sets and computers is coming. However, it won't be all the new features you'll get that will drive the change. It will be cost.

    Have any of you looked at the cost of HDTV tuners? In addition to an HDTV-capable TV set, you have to buy a ~$1500 converter! Well, now you'll be able to get it for under $300. And a line doubler, to boot! Stand-alone line doublers cost $2000 by themselves.

    Now, if only they'd start making 60" monitors with 1280x1024 resolution (or maybe 1600x1024 for movies!), I'd be happy. Of course, this is coming, too. Just wait until it's cheaper to put 8 million transistors into an LCD than it is to grind optics for a TV. Yes, cheap, large screens integrated to computers are on their way!
  • All I need now is to find out which BBC programs are broadcast in HD!
  • Just let them run 'An Unearthly Child' in that format, and move on from there... At least those PAL lines won't be chopped anymore as in NTSC. Only problem is, video is still a monster to compress. Maybe one 25-minute episode could be MPEGed onto a $1.50 CD, but at even $30 per 2.2 GB Orb and a limited xfer rate of 12 MB/s, that won't due. Panisonic L-101U (?) still cost the same per media, but are at least 5.2GB, double-sided and optical. How about Sony/Philips DVD-RW? Still not a full-capicity DVD writer though. And Goddess only knows how much an MPEG-4 encoder card/software would go for! I mean, even if we're not Film Pirates (We're not, right! :), writable DVDs would be great for home movies and such. I guess it's just a matter of time...
  • Their website is at http://www.teralogic-inc.com [teralogic-inc.com].

    I looked quickly and couldn't find a release date, but it's probably there somewhere.
  • Naah, I have a DVD player hooked to my computer, and even as it features line-doubling and the picture is _very_ sharp and clear when I look those movies in the monitor, it is just too small and I always watch movies via TV, even as the quality is worse. Oh yeah, I have only a 19 inch monitor, and at work my fellow got that 24" wide-screen monitor - it is still too small, though that's quite neat already. I wouldn't get one even if it cost only $50 as long as my monitor is smaller than 32" wide-screen. FWIW, I'd wait 2.35 to 1 aspect-ratio TV:s, buy one and hook my DVD player to that. Or, if you have the dough, just get a good data projector (those which you can get at no less than $15 000)...
  • There's a huge difference between NTSC and a digital signal. NTSC is a kludge, pure and simple. It was never designed to be a color signal, but they graft a separate color signal over the orignal black and white. It's amazing it works at all, but the quality varies wildly. "Never Twice the Same Color."

    Expect much better color fidelity out of HDTV, especially coming off of a screen that isn't a picture tube.

    Jon
  • The FCC has given each broadcast station an extra channel for broadcasting digital (either DTV or HDTV--their choice). Broadcasts will be carried on both the analog channel and the digital channel for the next seven to ten years (It was supposed to go to 2006, but broadcasters want it pushed back a few years.) Then all analog broadcasts will stop, and the FCC will reclaim the spectrum allocated for regular TV broadcasts.

    In other words, they can and will make every TV obsolete within the next ten years.

  • Actually, I run the exact same configuration, except with a $3 antenna, and the picture is really damn good.
    --

  • NTSC broadcasted over the airways will be obsolete, but your TV set will not be. You'll be able to buy and inexpensive HDTV tuner box and hook it up, much like people do with cable boxes now.

    Note that most "High Definition" TV broadcast will actually be at the same resolution as normal NTSC, there'll just be more (free) channels over the airwaves.
    --
  • As I recall, that 1920x1120 (or some such weird number) for "native" HDTV broadcasts.

    A *lot* of pixels.
  • If you've ever seen a movie running at 1380x1154 (strange res, I now!) in 16-bit color you would realise how truly beautiful it is. I once viewd a demo prog that did this. It was simply marvelous, and far beyond any T.V. set. (This was on a 14" inch display.) A smaller display increases the sharpness; the image felt photographic.
  • I've been saying for years that HDTV compatable tvcards would be the "killer app" that brings on the real merging of TV and computer. ...and for exactly this reason. HDTV costs a lot because the screens need to be high res. Computers already have screens that match HDTV resolutions, the problem is even the big computer screens are small for TV, but for those who want HDTV just to be the first on the block a 25" computer monitor and a TV card are the cheapest way to go, especially if you consider the fact that the monitor will get use as a computer monitor as well as a TV. Further, I think that when "real" HDTVs get to be cheap people will start to use them as computer monitors. I mean who wouldn't want a 40"monitor to play quake on? (that doesn't do "free anti-aliasing" :)
  • +++In case you didn't know, the Creative DVD kits that run about $200 include line doubling software and composite and S-video outs. Oh AC-3 audio too. +++ But that only works for the DVD because it doesn't have S-video or Composite INPUT! The HDTV card can line double your VCRs' output, your cable TV, your satelite dish, your external DVD, LD...
  • Sometime in the middle of the next decade, broadcasters will stop using non-digital formats and will go all HDTV (at least that's the FCC requirement; they're doing pretty slow, so no telling what the requirement will actually end up as). After that, you'll have to buy a converter to see broadcast tv on your non-digital set.

  • That's right, circuit breakers (and fuses) are worthless for surges. Before they pop, they let through way to much juice. Pop! goes the circuit behind them. On the other hand a good surge supressor clamps down alot faster, but instead of interupting the current spike it shunts it off in a different direction. A common method is to shunt the spike to ground, and hold the difference between the line the spike comes in on and ground to a reasonable voltage difference. Note: in a surge condition a spike can and will raise the ground's voltage significantly, however the circuit is spared because the voltage between it's ground and the line with the spike are held within reason. Problems do arise when you have many different devices interconnected, each with its' own ground. If a surge comes in and the circuitry can't get all the devices to agree on a ground, then devices may be dammaged where the grounds don't match. To get around this one tries to place all linked devices on the same electrical circuit. Failing that, one then goes to isolation circuits.

  • I use a 14" Commodore 1702 monitor attached to an old VCR with no antenna. It pulls in UHF with no problem and the VHF is viewable but slightly snowy. I figure the quality of my hardware doesn't need to be better than the quality of the information it displays :)

  • In case you didn't know, the Creative DVD kits that run about $200 include line doubling software and composite and S-video outs. Oh AC-3 audio too.

    I'm about to get one, to have video out to my TV, but I think it only runs on Win98.

    http://www.soundblaster.com/mmuk/dvdrom -6x/ [soundblaster.com]
  • If I recall correctly, the average human eye can resolve about 300 lines/inch at a range of 10 inches. (This may be where they came up with the resolution numbers for printers).

    Assuming a 60" (diagonal) screen is 50" wide (to simplify the math), that'd be 15000 lines at 10", or 750 lines at 200" (about 16.5 feet) viewing distance. 750 lines equates to 1500 pixels (alternating light/dark), so a 60" HDTV viewed at ten or 12 feet probably is pushing eye resolution limits. About the same as a 15" monitor viewed at two to three feet.
  • Can a driver be incorporated into the Video for Linux project?

    Will these companies reveal the workings of their cards?

    I want to use it with X and Linux.

    A "yes" to the first question depends on a "yes" to the second.
  • Forget about the HDTV tuner in this thing, I can live without that for another few years, I'm going to have to buy one of these for that line doubler. A stand alone line doubler costs over $2000 right now!

    Now I'll be able to hook my PC up to that video projection system, and get a 120" TV that is watchable. Sweet.


  • One of these cards + 30 GB removables = some pretty snazzy AVIs that I could make.
  • maybe it's just me, but people still use things like 19" TV's. Ive never particularly cared for TV (unless I'm bored), so anything bigger than 19" is kinda unnecassary. But DVD looks pretty nice on my 17" monitor, so when I get tempted to watch something I'd do it on my computer.
  • HDTV freaks me out -- it's too damn clean! looks kinda cheesy.

    give me that filmic grainy look of a bad tv signal anyday!
  • There is one and only one HDTV standard (which specifies several video formats). The Federal Communications Commission determines which signal formats are allowed to be transmitted over the air waves.
  • As long as Rob gets what he wants (described in that last line) I'd be happy too!

    Sounds awesome!
  • The recommended minimum size display for HDTV is 60". I saw HDTV on a 33" display and it isn't worth it. Heah, you have a great picture, but you're missing the whole experience.

    Also, as for the line doubler, there arn't very many line doublers out there that look good. Most of them introduce all kinds of artifacts from de-interlacing.

    In the next couple of years, the price of HDTV projection displays should come down significantly. There's some new solid-state technology coming out, both TI's micro-mirror stuff (which some Japanese companies are copying) and reflective LCDs (very different than other LCD technology). Right now the reflective LCD technology sounds the most promising. As for the plasma wall screens, the color on them is too washed out and they put out too much heat (if you look carefully you'll find a bunch of fans in those displays).

    I have a high-quality line-quadrupled AV system hooked up to a 19" CRT right now, running 1440x960 until I get my 33" monitor fixed. It is no comparison to a 33" TV for entertainment purposes. It's no fun watching a movie when you need to sit 12" away to see the detail.

    It will be a couple of years until HDTV is ready for prime time. When it comes, nobody will want their old TV sets or converter boxes.

    I pity those people walking out of Price Club with their brand-new 60" NTSC projection TVs.

    Also, HDTV should be able to interact nicely with computers, since more than audio and video can be included in the signal. For example, you could click on an object and bring up more information or treat it like a URL.

    -Aaron
  • The problem with a 19" or 13" HDTV is that it would be a total waste of money. For one thing, the CRT would not be able to take advantage of it
    (an expensive 19" CRT might, but who sits that close to their TVs). For the smaller sets, DTV is more than adequate.

    Yeah, a 32" HDTV set looks awesom compared to a 32" NTSC TV, but why bother with all the extra expense involved. In a year you'll be able to get a 33" HDTV set for a bit under 3K. The problem is that it is like scaling a 32" TV to a 13" TV. It just looks too small. It's the detail. With all that extra detail it's like looking at a movie from twice as far back as the back row of a theatre. You keep wanting to get closer. If I had an HDTV card I'd have my eyeballs about 6" from the monitor (and be dying of eye-strain) watching a movie. I know, I've been watching line-quadrupled TV & DVD on a 19" SGI monitor and I looked at a 33" HDTV set a start-up company is coming out with. Yeah, the picture looks incredible and very sharp, but I'd much rather have a good 32" TV any day. It's such a different experience to see HDTV on a big screen. HDTV on a 10' screen is breathtaking.

    As for an HDTV card for the PC, how many monitors can handle 1920x1080? For most of us this exceeds the dot pitch by a fair amount. Even if it matched the dot pitch, I'd have to have my eyes 3" away to see the detail.

    I guess if you just want to watch TV on your PC all day the card is fine. But for watching HDTV all the time on a PC monitor I just shudder.
  • This is what I'm planning. There's some new technologies such as reflective LCD's and the micro-mirror stuff from TI that should make these projectors much cheaper. Right now reflective LCDs look the most promising. BTW, these are totally unrelated to active-matrix or your typical LCD technology.

    I saw Descent on a 10' projection screen. All I can say is it's a totally different experience.

    Think about it, you could sit back in that easy-chair and code away without having a CRT in your face. That will reduce a lot of eye-strain.

    I expect that within a couple of years the price of these new generation projectors will fall to under $2K and possibly to around $1K.
  • Can a driver be incorporated into the Video for Linux project?

    Will these companies reveal the workings of their cards?

    I want to use it with X and Linux.
  • >You know, you can't just obsolete every TV set in the nation and tell people "Oh, you have to upgrade your set or not watch TV anymore."

    Actually, that is the FCC plan. However, a converter box will make the TV useful again (and of course VCRs aren't going away that soon.) If PC converter cards are $300 now, the converters should be pretty cheap once they're mass-marketed. Even on a regular set, the digital picture should be an improvement over analog broadcasts.
  • Actually there are a half dozen formats being used for DTV and HDTV. All of the HDTV sets will support all of the formats, but the broadcasts will vary. Some of the networks will broadcast in 1024i (1024 lines, interlaced), but mostly just for football games and other high-profile events. Most of the broadcasts will be 640i or 640p. I haven't heard of anyone willing to use the necessary bandwidth to broadcast with the best resolution available (1024p).

    And, oh by the way, the Japanese HDTV is entirely different. Theirs is actually analog.
  • Here are some I found:

    TeraLogic [teralogic-inc.com]
    Hauppauge Computer Works [hauppauge.com]
    BTTV page [uni-koeln.de]
  • While HDTV looks extremely clean, it's a total waste unless you have a 60" display, which is the recommended minimum size. HDTV projection displays will come down significantly in the next couple of years due to some new non-CRT technology coming down the pipe which are solid-state. The new technologies can easily reproduce the HDTV resolutions and beyond.

    The other big advantage of HDTV (which a PC monitor will not take advantage of) is the 16:9 aspect ratio, which means that all HDTV broadcast and recorded movies will be wide-screen.

    HDTV on a 19" CRT is not much comparison to even regular TV on a good 32" set from an entertainment perspective.

    How can I claim this? I have a very good line-quadrupled DVD setup currently running 1440x960 through a 19" monitor (until I get my other monitor fixed). If I'm only a couple feet away it looks great, but that's no way to enjoy a movie. Of course, HDTV is a big improvement over the line-doubled/quadrupled NTSC. Also, for regular TV if the line doubling is not done properly there are all kinds of annoying artifacts that show up due to de-interlacing. Most de-interlacers I have seen have this problem to varying degrees, the exceptions being Snell and Wilcox ($30,000) and a Phillips unit (DVX8000 - $5K) and some units based on a chip from Genesis.

    As for combining HDTV and a PC, they're a perfect match in many ways. The HDTV format allows for more than just plain audio and video to be transmitted. I.E. you could click on an object on the screen and get more information on it.


    As for recording HDTV, the latest specs I've seen are 3 1/2 hours of HDTV on a VHS tape or 7 hours of DTV, and since it's digital there should be no quality degredation.

    Now, instead of running HDTV on a PC monitor I'd love to be able to hook my PC up to an HDTV monitor and play Quake on a 60" screen at 1920x1080!

    -Aaron

  • Will regular TV sets become useless? (Score:3)

    by Raetsel ( 34442 ) on Thursday April 15, 1999 @11:17AM (#1932810)
    Every TV channel is allocated a certain slice of the spectrum. What we don't think about much is the fact that the current signal does not use the full allocation! HDTV will use the full allocated bandwidth, and is slated to replace(!!!) the current broadcast signals several years past 2000. (I don't know the exact date.)

    What does this mean?

    1. HDTV is digital, current broadcasts are analog. There is no compatability.
    2. The FCC has given up on the idea of 'backward compatibility' in this case.
    3. You will have to replace your TV, or purchase a receiver that'll feed an analog interpretation of the digital signal to your old TV
    4. Manufacturers can no longer use the unused portion of the TV channel spectrum for medical telemetry.

      1. This caused a problem in (Houston?) Texas when a HDTV broadcast test was performed. The local hospital's wireless medical telemetry equipment (heart monitors and the like) suddenly stopped functioning due to the obvious overwhelming interference!
    Standards do get replaced. We don't use spark-gap transmitters for obvious reasons. Television is about to evolve, hopefully for the better. I just hope that we won't be getting up-close-and-personal with Dan Rather's pores.

    Now, let's look at this from the cable company's point of view. Their carrying capacity is based on the currently used bandwidth, not the allocated bandwidth. When HDTV comes along, they're not going to be very enthusiastic about carrying these new, fatter signals. Remember, on one HDTV channel allocation, a station can transmit 3 'standard' (525 line) broadcasts or 1 'high-definition' broadcast. In Connecticut, TCI has their 'digital cable' offering. The channel numbers go all the way up to 800. Not by any stretch of the imagination are all of them used, but with HDTV clogging their pipes, the number of channels that they can offer will drop drastically. I don't think that TCI will be exactly happy to drop pay-per-view channels in order to transmit the 'new and improved' Public Broadcasting.

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