Thread: DVB PCI cards

Hi,
I am looking to buy a DVB card for my computer. Been looking at the Technisat SkyStar HD2 card but after reading the owners manua it does not mention anything about USALS. Anyone have it installed in their computer?
Thanks,
Scott

I did some Googling and it looks like it doesn't support USALS. Most of what I saw was in forums, though, so I emailed Technisat a few hours ago. I'll let you know if/when I get a response.

Is there any specific reason why you want to use that card?
Also, what are you system specs (operating system, processor, ram, etc.)?

I was thinking of building another computer for the TV to have both a FTA
receiver card and aTV tuner card in the same box. My current ATSC tuner is a Samsung and is a piece of junk. I am looking for a FTA card that does motor
drive and Diseq 2.0. Any suggestions? The SkyStar hd2 will not do motor drive and is Diseq 1.0 based. Not good for my application.
Thamks,
Scott

You can use a PC card in connection with a fixed dish, or perhaps slave it from a USALS capable box. Let the standalone box do the dish positioning and blind scanning, then let the card do the interesting stuff like decoding odd signals.

I agree with colbec on using a regular STB receiver and slaving the PC off it. That will be much easier to get setup. I would suggest the Coolsat 6000 myself.

You'll be able to move the dish reliably with the STB and get familiar with the PC software. Once you're comfortable with the PC software you could leave the STB in standby and use the PC software to move. USALS support is more about the software than the hardware on PC cards I believe. Since the USALS "Goto X" message is just sent via the DiSEqC encoder on the board.

The question is do you want just DVB-S/QPSK or do you want DVB-S2/8PSK also? I use a Twinhan 1020a for DVB-S and a TBS 8920 for DBS-S2. I just recently got the TBS 8920 so I haven't used it much yet, except with TSReader. I use my STB to move the dish.

I would suggest figuring out what software you're going to run and find out how well it supports USALS and then what cards work best. Of course I suggest getting a card that works with TSReader.

The TBS 8920 works with TSReader *via* DVBDream tuning the card. It is a little bit clunky, but works. I have not tried using USALS under DVBDream to move the dish, but expect I will eventually.

Originally Posted by gillham

The TBS 8920 works with TSReader *via* DVBDream tuning the card.

Could you elaborate on that in small details?

Finding cards that are actually for sale seems to be the hardest thing. I am looking at a TBS 6920 because they are available on [well known auction site] at the moment and because it is listed as supported on linuxtv dot org. Has anyone tried this one?

Originally Posted by zamar23

Could you elaborate on that in small details?

If you email the manufacturer they will send you a beta source file for TSReader. But the source file (basically the TSReader "driver" for this card) doesn't do any tuning, it just reads whatever the card is tuned to. The program DVBDream is used to configure the satellites and tune to a specific transponder. Once you have it locked in DVBDream you switch over to TSReader and it will decode the transponder like normal.