This veritable Swiss Army knife of the PC TV world will bring to your desktop the wonders of both analogue and digital terrestrial TV, FM radio plus digital satellite.

And as if that wasn't enough, the remotely controllable HVR4000 is compatible with the 'S2' variant of DVB-S, thereby facilitating hi-def satellite reception. An analogue video input also makes video display and capture (albeit with software video compression) a possibility. Nominally FTA only, the HVR4000 can be upgraded with the CI reader that Hauppauge is, at the time of writing, about to launch.

Another new Hauppauge product is the WinTV Nova-HD-S2, essentially a stripped-down (and thus more affordable) version of the HVR4000. Gone are the video input and terrestrial tuners - this simpler card is satellite-only. But the DVB-S2 compatibility is retained (thus the 'HD' part of the name). The only other DVB-S2 capable product Hauppauge sells at the moment is the HVR4000. As with this product, the Nova-HD-S2 can be upgraded for pay-TV reception with the aforementioned CI 'dongle' and benefits from a remote control. It's also supplied with the same Cyberlink PowerCinema application, which features DVD and media playback in addition to digital TV.

Connectivity

Connections are minimal. The backplate -accessible from the rear of the PC after the card has been slotted into a spare PCI slot - sports an F-connector for your dish and a 2.5mm connector that's intended for use with the supplied infrared 'remote eye'. This attaches with a metre or so of cable, so that it can be positioned for reception of the commands issued by the handset. There is no IF loopthrough output on this card which, to our surprise, is sparsely populated by components. Bearing in mind what it can do, the screened tuner that's built onto the card itself is tiny. The optional CI reader will plug into a USB socket; no connection on the card itself is required.