Your notebook is portable, and your TV can be too. For just £27, you can plug in a USB tuner and watch, pause and record live TV. Plus, all DVB-T tuners can handle HDTV broadcasts as and when they become available – all you need is the right software to receive it.
Software is one crucial aspect of any TV tuner and Pinnacle’s PCTV USB Stick is bundled with a good example of frustrating software. You don’t get the full Pinnacle Media Center application, just TVCenter, and the settings are accessed from a separate Settings icon on the Desktop. Plus, you have to go there to scan for TV channels and, rather than the EPG being turned on by default, you have to enable it in the options.
Sadly there’s no support for Windows MCE, the remote control wasn’t very responsive, the main TV interface has too many cryptic icons and is designed to be used with a mouse rather than the…
