I’ve had the USB version of TV Wonder for a while now, and use a splitter I bought at the 99 cent store. My cable modem is just as fast as always and I’m watching 3rd Rock while typing this. I think ftg may mean well in giving his warning, but his know-it-all tone is annoying! Besides, I’m doing exactly what he’s screaming about, and no harm has come.
I too would like to know what the heck was on cable in the 1950’s. Answer that ftg.
According to How Stuff Works, Cable TV was invented in 1948, when :
What was on cable? Just the major networks, of course. The only advantage of cable was that you could get stations that you couldn’t get with your antenna alone. The page goes on to say that :
That way, people could watch broadcast networks from other cities, in addition to their own.
Also, for the people interested in watching/recording TV on their computers, it’s worth noting that TV tuner cards won’t give you very good quality. There’s a lot of EMI in your computer that interferes with the tuner and gives you a fuzzy picture.
A better solution is to use your VCR as the tuner, and run either s-video or RCA component cables to your TV card. You’ll have to change the channels on the VCR if you do this, but the picture will be much better. Even if you do that, though, I’ve found the colors of TV displayed on my monitor to be washed out and dull-looking compared to watching it on the TV. YMMV, I guess.
Whoops, I was going to include a link, but forgot.
VCDhelp.com has a good bit of information on video capture, as well as a database comparing the pros and cons of various capture cards. I’ve spent many, many hours scouring that site and its forums.
pkbites, that’s what I’m talking about. People like to make mountains out of mole hills. Or, they’re trying to inflate themselves.
I’m just saying that I, certainly, would like the ability to view all the channels that I’m paying for with my cable system on my computer and be able to tune to each channel with the click of a mouse, while I work on a Word doc or the Internet, etc.
Frankly, I see the future being that a tv is really only a computer monitor. By the same token, the telephone as a piece of peripheral hardware. All tethered to a main pc (or server if you’d like). The tuner or (receiver) is moved from within the tv (or cable box) and into the computer. Also, telephone (over IP) comes through the pc and can be manipulated in all kinds of ways (ex. much like email, filter out incoming calls from certain area codes and/or extensions. Running phone log kept in a file on the pc, etc) I don’t know, maybe I’m getting ahead of myself.
The crisp cable signal must have really looked good on all those black and white sets back in the 50’s 
We got two, count 'em, two channels. A small town (pop. 250) low in a gulch 200 miles and a mountain range from the nearst big city.
The Western USofA had cable systems all of the place early on because of the distances and mountains. Astoria OR was the first town wired for cable by 1950 although there are competing claims in Washington and Pennsylvania.
The reason people are asking this is because ???
What TV Tuner card are you using? I’ve never notice decreased quality from my card. Granted, it may not be noticable since I’m using rabbit ears on my computer. I get an almost identical picture if I run my TV through my video card as opposed to just using my TV. Although the card cost more than the TV did, so component quality in the TV is probably an influencing factor here.
Because knowing is half the battle. Go Joe!
For the record I too have a cable modem and I used a splitter to hook it up to the modem and tv tuner on the pc. Never had a problem and the picture looks very good.
Actually, the site says that cable looked terrible back then to most viewers, basically due to the number of signal amplifiers needed to prevent the signal from attenuating. The amplifiers also amplified the noise on the line.
I’ve tried 5 different ones (bought 4, borrowed 1), all with similar results. The one I’m using now is a Leadtek Winfast TV2000XP. I’m not saying the picture is unwatchable or anything (otherwise I wouldn’t have the card) but I have the coax line hooked up to the TV card in addition to the RCA cables, so I can switch back and forth on my PC and see the difference between the tuners. It really is quite a difference. Also, my PC is right next to my TV, so I can compare the two side-by-side. Turning up the saturation on the video card gets the colors close, but not quite there, even when going through the RCA cables.
My picture comes from an analog cable source.
Also, the general consensus in the video capture community is that all TV tuner cards are, for the most part, created equal, and all that’s separating a $300 card from a $50 card is the software included with it. Since I like to capture with the freeware VirtualDub (or shareware iuVCR when WDM drivers give me a hassle in VDub), that’s not an issue and I go for the cheap cards.
Note that I’m talking about TV cards here, not the hardware encoders that can cost up to several thousand dollars.
From what I understand the cable modem recieves and sends on specific channels on the cable. These chanels are reserved for upstream and downstream communication and they are the only ones that the modem can receive. You can change which channels are used but would only want to do this if you moved and kept your equipment. The splitters supplied are high quality splitters and normally do not have filters in them.
If your house has too many splitters in it the cable company should set you up with a new line from your computer to your cable drop. Maybe even run a new drop from the main cable line if there is too much interference.
I know this is probably too much information but I figure something should come from loosing a job at a defunct cable internet service provider.
I actually split my cable from my cable to my tv tuner and I get both cable internet and I watch tv when I surf. I have the all-in-wonder ATI 128 bit card with tv tuner. Hope this is the answer you are looking for.
I’ve got TV Wonder (the USB version) it’s $70 in stores but I got one for $40 on Ebay. I used a splitter from the 99cent store to split the cable signal. One cable goes to my Time/Warner Road Runner modem, the other to the TV Wonder USB device.
I can watch tv and surf the web all at the same time if I want. I have 99 channels and the picture is crisp and sharp. My RR internet is lightning fast. There are no conflicts. I did not need to use special splitters or use special cables. There are no problems with my set up. I have cable tv and internet on the same monitor.
I just don’t know what all these problems are some of you are talking about.
Try TV Wonder USB! It’s superb!
There is indeed a filter that is put on the cable box outside your house. What the filter does is “filter” out different frequencies of signal coming into your house. For instance, basic cable comes into the house at a set signal, the different tiers of cable tv service come in at other frequencies and the cable internet connection comes in at yet another frequency. Now that is at demarcation and the techs put the filters on when you are installed. This is why if you didnt have a tv subscription with your cable company and only had internet, you couldn’t just split the signal and get free cable tv. But as someone else said, the cable modem, “translates” the cable signal to be appropiate for internet usage and not tv.
But, the opposite appears to be true. I wasn’t going to say as I’m still sort of investigating this but, it would appear that, if you have an active cable account and your cable company offers internet service, all one needs to do is hook up their cable modem, and they’re web surfin’ like it’s noboby’s business. There doesn’t seem to be the need to “sign up” with the additional fees. It cost $30 per month extra for Internet “service” on top of the $60 or so for basic cable here in New York. One could knock down their cable bill by a 1/3 by not setting up an Internet account which would be used just for an email account.
But, I could be wrong. Nevermind. It’s another issue anyway.
If you’re just watching TV and not capturing it, something like this would probably be the best solution. Since the tuner is outside the computer case it’s not subject to as much interference as it would be inside.
However, if you’re into capturing video and want to obtain the best results, USB is out. Rather than capping straight to MPEG or Divx, you want to use a semi-lossless codec like HuffyUV, then convert to MPEG later. It’s a longer process, but it allows the computer to “think” about its calculations rather than spitting them out on the fly and will produce a far superior MPEG in the end.
A HuffyUV stream will usually be on the order of 30-35GB/hour. USB 1.0 simply can’t keep up, and from what I’ve read there are still no USB 2.0 TV cards out there. You also want to use a 7200RPM hard drive if you can, because the 5400RPM models will drop frames.
Also, if you use the PCI TV card/RCA cable method, you can capture VCR tapes and anything else you can view on your TV (I’ve even captured myself playing Final Fantasy IX on my Playstation just for the hell of it). This could be a good solution for someone looking to convert home movies from a VHS camcorder to MPEG Video CDs that are playable on most DVD players. All you need is a decently fast computer (over 750MHz), a TV card, and a CD burner.
See the vcdhelp.com site I linked to earlier for more details on all of this. It’s really quite interesting.
FWIW… my Comcast signal comes in from the utility pole where the filters are. Evidently my connection is NOT filtered from the utility pole, since I receive all of the “basic” cable, for which I do not pay (i.e., I do pay for the internet), and besides which I have DirecTV. The cable is split with a $4 Radio Shack splitter to feed the bedroom TV, and continues on to the office where it is split with a similar Radio Shack splitter to feed my monitor as well as the cable modem. No problems at all, and if I want to watch fuzzy cable (like when I’m too lazy to brush snow off the antenna) it’s available. I imagine it’s possible I don’t get maximum throughput on the cable, but what I do have is incredibly fast so it’s not enough to notice.