[mythtv-users] Hauppauge cards...

[Chris Zinkula]

I just want to get some things straight before I order a Hauppauge
card for my MythTV box.  So maybe a few people here can help out
there.  Also if one of the below cards just doesn't work with MythTV
please let me know as that's the purpose of getting the card (of
course... ;)).  Also the FM radio feature is of no interest to me as I
don't listen to the radio.

WinTV-PVR 250:
Has a single coaxial input which I would use for video recording. 
Also has a s-video and composite video input which I would not use. 
This also comes with a remote (which would work with MythTV installing
the appropriate drivers and such).  However there is no video out but
I could use my current vid card that has s-video out to send video to
the TV (Raedon 9600 SE, 128 MB ram).  Has hardware encoding to MPEG-2.

WinTV-PVR 350:
Pretty much the same as above but instead of having s-video and
composite inputs there is an s-video/composite/audio out (via a
cable).  Also this card has hardware decoding (only MPEG-2).

I think these two cards are my best options.  Although if there is
some other card that I should get please send the recommendation.  I
would anticipate that I will most likely compress most of my video to
some other format than MPEG-2 (although I don't know until I get
there).  Therefore I'm not sure the hardware decoding would do much
good.  My DVD's that I own that I am putting on the MythTV box will be
encoded to the default "good" setting which I don't think uses
hardware decoding on its way out either.

Would it be worth the extra money to get the PVR-350?  I'm not sure
I'd use the features but I'd rather spend the extra $60 if the general
populous uses them as I'll probably end up using them too.  Is there a
benefit I'm missing?  My current system is a P4 2.4 HT with 512 MB of
RAM.  Hard drive space is small right now (I want to get everything
working before I invest in tons of HD space) but 200 GB HD's are
roughly $100 which isn't a big deal.

Thanks for any helpful suggestions.  If there is more information
needed I'd be more than happy to provide it.

Chris