What capture devices are you using?

Just a quick question to ask what hardware you are using for your captures?

The main reason I'm asking is that the drivers for my primary satellite devices are incompatible with the latest build of Windows 10 and so I'm in a position of sticking with an old build (and I don't know how long Windows will let me do that) or upgrade to new equipment. The chances of new drivers being issued is nil by the looks of it.

So...

DVB-S2:

1xTeVii S660 (no new driver)
1xTeVii S662 (no new driver)
1xPCTV 461e (unstable when recording renderless in DVBDream)

DVB-T2:
1xHauppauge PCIe Quad HD
1xAverMedia Volar T2

HDMI Capture:
1xHauppauge HD PVR 60

DVB-T/T2 - Hauppauge WinTV-dualHD.

DVB-T2

HD HomeRun Dual Tuner (Ethernet)
Hauppauge WinTV-Dual HD, Pinnacle PCTV 290e, August T210 v1 (USB)
Raspberry Pi DVB-T2 Tuner uHAT. (SPI and I2C via Pi's GPIO)

DVB-S2

TBS Dual tuner PCI-E interface (can't remember the model - must be at least 8 years old)
Telestar Quad Tuner SAT>IP (Ethernet)
Techinsat Sky Star HD2 (USB)

They are running on a mix of platforms - some Windows, but most mainly Linux (mainly running TV Headend)

If you want a very cheap and neat DVB-T2 capture solution a Raspberry Pi Zero or 3A+ with the TV uHAT is a nice little project. (I'd use a cheap USB OTG Ethernet adaptor with the Zero for real-time viewing as the Zero W's WiFi is 2.4GHz 802.11n only and not great)

I'm currently using the TBS5520SE USB card, it's not the cheapest available but it supports all the terrestrial, cable and satellite standards. If you're in to the satellite side of things it also supports more advanced features such as PLS and multistream when used with compatible software.

If you want a cheap, self contained solution for terrestrial I second noggin's suggestion of a Raspberry Pi with the new TV uHAT.

For info - the (ancient) Technisat Skystar 2 HD USB also (unusually) supports PLS/Multistream (though not ACM/VCM AIUI) By chance the chipset they used is compatible - which can be very useful for receiving the French and Italian DVB-T transmitter feeds that are on satellite.

I need to find some Linux support for that outside of TV Headend though (as I'd like to get MuMuDVB or DVBlast or TSDuck working with PLS stuff to create a UDP TS or similar - ideally to remodulate onto a DVB-T carrier)

TBS historically have had terrible official Linux driver support - and instead the CrazyCat media_build has often been better ISTR. Is the 5520SE well supported in Linux? If it is that combination of standards makes it quite compelling

** EDIT - looks like crazycat has worked on it - so definitely going to have a look **

I'm currently using it on Raspbian with TV Headend without any issues. The Linux drivers aren't really easy to setup, they're supplied as source code on GitHub, so you have to do a git pull and compile them yourself, but once you've got past that they seem to work well. The user guide on their website does provide full instructions (for Ubuntu at least).


I will admit however I only use it for basic Freeview and Astra 28.2 tuning on Linux, so I can't say how well the more advanced features work. For anything more advanced I've always used plugged it in to my desktop running Windows 10.

I tried that and connected it to my Linux receiver it worked beautifully when it worked on 5w.

Interestingly the Digibit R1 SAT>IP tuner I've been using for a while (which has 4 x DVB-S/S2 tuners in it and 4 x LNB inputs - but they are matrixed to the tuners to allow for additional flexibility) has PLS support too if you run the third party axe minisatip firmware. Takes a little bit of fiddling through the source code (I looked in the minisatip and TV Headend sources) to work out what the PLS SAT>IP parameters are for the PLS stuff - but it works surprisingly effectively for the French and Italian stuff on 5W.