Review: Hauppauge WinTV-HVR 900

A dual-format analogue and digital TV tuner, but it's expensive

The Hauppauge WinTV-HVR 900, like the Terratec Cinergy XS, is a hybrid analogue/digital tuner. Its aerial comes in three screw-together sections; the rubber-covered magnetic base, a large loading coil and a wire aerial.

The aerial assembly stands 35cm tall. This is fitted with a standard coaxial cable that is 0.7m long. Conscious of the mechanical risks of plugging large USB devices directly into laptop USB ports, Hauppauge provides a short USB2 extension lead.

The Hauppauge WinTV software looks a bit daunting and rough around the edges compared to some of the applications shipped with other tuners in this test, but it does have some useful diagnostics.

Immediately following installation, WinTV 2000 opens Channel Manager. This application has four tabs; Scan, Sources, Devices and Channels.

Selecting the Devices tab allows you to see that the WinTV hardware is plugged into a suitable USB port and recognised, by listing all the available device abilities, such as analogue tuner, DVB-T tuner and so on.

Before you can use the WinTV-HVR 900, you must scan for available channels. If the aerial signal is too weak, the software may well get stuck permanently in scan mode.

The main viewing application is WinTV 2000, which has a number of control buttons for program select, channel browsing, still snapshots, audio level and so on grouped to the left of the video window.

Hauppauge also includes WinTV32, which is a simpler viewing application with fewer options and controls; Scheduler, which handles scheduled program recording as a separate application; and Primary, which controls basic display and mpeg playback options such as overlay mode and hardware motion compensation.

The WinTV-HVR 900 is dual format and has high signal sensitivity, but no remote control. The software components are comprehensive but not well integrated.

This article is part of a group test of miniature USB TV tuners. Others are:
Intro and Editor's choice
Freecom DVB-T USB Stick
Hauppauge WinTV-HVR 900
KWorld DVBT-350U
MSI Mega Sky 580
Pinnacle PCTV USB Stick
Terratec CinergyT USB XS