Hauppauge offers TV playback PCI card

Offering a PC-based alternative to the set-top box-makers that offer instant replay 'time-shifting' of live TV broadcasts, PC card vendor Hauppauge is gearing up to release its personal video recorder, the WinTV-PVR PCI card, next month.

Offering a PC-based alternative to the set-top box-makers that offer instant replay 'time-shifting' of live TV broadcasts, PC card vendor Hauppauge is gearing up to release its personal video recorder, the WinTV-PVR PCI card, next month.

The product allows users to record programmes onto PC hard disks as Mpegs and offers the instant replaying of live TV.

Ideal Hardware, one of Hauppauge's UK distribution partners, is also sole distributor for optical media specialist Traxdata. Yehia Oweiss, managing director of Hauppauge, said he was hopeful of a partnership with Traxdata.

Eddie Moore, business development manager at Ideal, said the product should do well if it offers high output quality and a logical user interface at the right price. He agreed that a possible tie-up with Traxdata would be a "good opportunity" for the vendor.

WinTV-PVR is a PCI add-on that connects to either cable TV or a TV antenna. It displays live TV in a resizable window on the PC screen while simultaneously allowing the recording of Mpeg 2 compressed TV to the PC's hard disk.

The time-shifting feature offers a "one-touch pause" control, which allows users to scroll back through their programmes, watch missed bits and scroll forward to catch up to real-time broadcast.

Meanwhile, rival ATI will next month launch its All-In-Wonder 128 Pro graphics card incorporating time-shifting and pause and control functionality. The features will be included in ATI's latest version of its multimedia centre version 7.0 software, called TV-on-demand.

The product is also to be made available free of charge to current All-In-Wonder 128 Pro owners.