TV Tuner - Express Card or USB?

I know the Express Card generates heat inside the laptop but is it significant? I'd love to not have to carry around a USB device but if it makes a big difference I will. Any suggestions for a unit?

Thank you!
Matt

 

Express card long shot. your computer should be able to disperse any heat the express card creates... USB is slow, but now... express card is quite fast. there will be a big difference between the two.

 

No, there won't. USB 2.0 is more than fast enough to handle the 20Mbps HDTV datastream. ExpressCard tuners do dump a significant amount of heat into the notebook chassis and these notebooks could use better cooling to begin with.

I've had good luck with my OnAir GT HDTV USB tuner. Newegg usually has a good price on them. Great support.

 

Have you ever had one yourself? Express card gets HOT AS HELL after even 5 minutes. USB if it has the same features as express card.

 

I have to agree with Brian. The increased bandwidth from an express card doesn't affect the quality or speed of streaming high def videos. The main contributor for viewing quality HDTV is the software and the position of the antenna (unless you connect it to your cable box). As for heat, both the express card and USB TV tuner will get very very warm, and since my expresscard slot is immediately underneath the palm rest, it does make it quite uncomfortable to use the TV tuner while surfing or word processing. Personally, I'd just use a USB TV tuner. Carrying a USB device around shouldn't be too much trouble since many are just the same size as a flash drive.

 

That one looks really nice... is there any difference between the mobile and the standard one?

I guess I don't mind it being USB too much since most of the time it would be used at home, I just love the idea of it being internal and not having to plugin, plugout. But if heat is an issue and I'm going to have to plugin the cable or antenna anyways, I might as well go USB.

Thanks for all the input!

 

besides heat: wouldn't external USB actually be better, since it uses hardware decoding, and thus won't suck up cpu resources?

 

I prefer an external USB as an express card would be inside of the laptop chassis. The outcome would be, the express card will likely to produce an extensive of heat which may warm the interior of the laptop.

 

I have recently bought a LifeView ExpressCard LV9H Hybrid and as it produces much heat, i made this easy cooling mod. using some mosfet tiny-coolers. The result is discernible.

 

I prefer USB

Main drawback with express card is a habbit of leaving it in and sticking out the laptop. I have seen so many PCMCIA cards come back snapped when the user put the laptop into a case and it got rough treatment on the card.

USB is fine for all HD formats and speeds so you will not notice any difference with them (I even think the eCard versions use the USB headers rather than the PCIe in the slot). I have 2 USB TV units running off my laptop each pulling in a 26Mbps channel for subchannel decoding.

 

I'm thinking about just doing Slingbox Pro HD... or HD homerun... might be worth the extra 100 200 bucks

 

haha that's great... you're no joke!