dv7t HDTV Tuner

Hey all,

I just ordered the dv7t, and paid the extra $100 for the tv tuner, thinking it was cool to have it integrated. But I've heard that the signal is incredibly choppy, making it almost unwatchable and therefore a waste of money. Is that true? Is that just for the HD channels? Anyone use this enough to give some details on this? Greatly appreciated, thanks!

 

When I first used the antenna, the HD channel (only 1 here) was very choppy. I upgraded the video drivers from laptopvideo2go.com and it is no longer choppy at all.

I am very happy with the TV tuner. I just use it with a coaxial cable.

 

1 channel of HDTV? Does the built in tuner not support clear QAM in additon to ATSC/NTSC? If that is the case, I wouldn't recommend that anyone pony up for the built in tuner but instead save their money and buy a 3rd party ATSC/NTSC tuner that does support clear QAM. Clear QAM is a great solution for getting local HDTV channels without any antenna issues by only paying for basic/lifeline cable.

 

my 1st dv7t had the integrated tuner and i noticed that video was choppy, so i returned that unit.

i got another unit w/o the tv tuner and bought a happauge 950Q usb tuner stick. it comes in today. i cant wait to test it out.

somewhere buried in the dv7t owners thread are a couple of people's experience with the tuner and they say they've had no problems with it at all.

 

Thanks for the replies guys, guess I'll have to wait and see how it works.

If anyone else has any other info to share, please do.

 

I thought I saw somewhere on this forum that someone did get QAM with it. The problem is that I am living in a dorm on campus and there is only 1 over-the-air HD channel (PBS) and no HD channels through cable, just NTSC.

 

I have the TV Tuner on my DV7t & it does support QAM, ATSC & NTSC. When I used an antenna, I noticed the video was choppy. But I configured it to receivet HD through QAM & it is very smooth (I have comcast which transmits local channels through QAM).

 

Maybe I'm a little behind the times in this area - but what is QAM, and how is it different from an OTA HD signal? I have quite a few HD channels in my area, and I also have Cox Cable with the HD package - so are you saying that I can get both the OTA HD channels as well as the Cable HD channels through the integrated tuner?

 

Here's a quick definition from Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QAM_tuner

"QAM stands for quadrature amplitude modulation. In North American digital video, a QAM tuner is a device present in some digital televisions and similar devices which enables direct reception of digital cable channels without the use of a set-top box."

Basically, you can receive unencrypted digital cable channels through your normal coax connection. Typically, only the local HD channels are available using QAM & not all cable providers broadcast anything over QAM since it is free.

The DV7t has a QAM tuner built in. But, a key item to remember is that most of your non-local HD channels are encrypted, so you're out of luck recieving those on your laptop.

 

i got my happauge 950q tuner yesterday and only had time to test out OTA signals... and i was a little dissappointed. i experienced the same issue which i had with my 1st dv7t - that had the tv tuner built in... the singal was pretty choppy but clear... LOL... and, oddly enough, the least choppiest of all the channels was a spanish channel. LOLOL.

i could not stand the choppiness so i turned it off after like 5 minutes of use. all the broadcasted stations which i could recieve, including two HD ones, all were choppy as hell =((((

im going to plug my cable tv line into the tuner when i get a chance and see if the quality differs any.

one thing i realized though is that you can not get TV-on-a-pc to come nearly anywhere close to tv on a tv. LOL. so much setup and crap involved, it's too much to do something so 'simple.'

 

You configured what, your dv7t's tuner? What exactly did you do?

 

I also want to know how this works.

 

It's been a month since I set everything up, so some of this is from memory. First, make sure you have your coax cable connected to the laptop.

Here's how to get QAM....
1. Open QuickPlay
2. Click the TV icon
3. On the Title Bar, click the little 'gear' symbol (next to the ? mark).
4. In the list, select Run TV Setup Wizard
5. Select QAM under "Select TV Source"
6. click "Auto Scan for TV Channels now"...be prepared becuase this could take 10-15 mintues.

To get QAM Channels, in the main Quickplay screen, select "HP Digital Tuner." It show a "spin" symbol for a few seconds & then display the channel. BTW...the channels are setup sequentially (1,2,3,4,etc) , so the QAM channel numbers will not be the same as you would see on the TV (89.1, 100.2, etc).

Just use the channel up / down on the remote or sceen to change the channel. I get about 9 channels (all local Digital / HD channels).

Also, you cannot receive QAM via Windows Media Center. Only HP Quickplay.

I hope this helps.

 

Thanks. I didn't even think of using quickplay.

Too bad I don't get any QAM channels on campus...

 

has anyone tried installing an internal thirdparty ATSC tuner on their dv7t? what can you recommend? im not too familiar with the brand options out there. will any mini pci-e tuner work w/out compatibility issues with the laptop?

thanks

 

I got the hp tv tuner integrated and i was able to get like 4 HD channels in my region (there are the same that my samsung hd tv could get), but the included antenna is not very good to get these channels. I had to connect it to another antenna that is much bigger and better positioned in order to get the best reception and i found that the channels improve their signal.

I use the tv tunner to record some movies and shows and it works pretty well. Just the first at the begining is hard to found the correct angle of the antenna in order to get better reception.