With a powerful machine set up but without any time to play games on it, I’d rather be entertained whilst doing work and that could involve music, videos online, or Television. Not a lot of people have a TV in the same room as their Desktop PC and if you are like me, you’d choose a Desktop PC to have in your bedroom over a TV any day of the week. The good thing about a PC is that you can do practically anything with it. I have decided to magically put TV into it with a PCI-E BGT3630 card by BlackGold Technology.
With my house going under refurbishment, the key things a technology geek needs are a fully Ethernet connected household (need 2 connections in your room if you are like me), an Aerial for Television in every room and a Satellite connection in every room. Thankfully, I had “specced” this out and this is what I got. With the BGT3630, I can make use of this and I must say, it handles it beautifully! Here is what is so cool about it:
- You can watch Digital Terrestrial (DVB-T/DVB-T2) and Digital Satellite (DVB-S/DVB-S2) all in one at the same time! And you can watch Cable (DVB-C)! I haven’t tested DVB-C and I believe it uses the same port as the DVB-T.
- The beauty about it is that you have access to all the free-to-air channels both on Freesat and Freeview including the HD channels which essentially makes it a Freesat HD and Freeview HD box. (Speaking from UK)
- If you have Windows Media Center (preferably the Windows 7 version) then you can utilise the amazing Media Center driver to take full advantage of what I would say is a redundant feature on most Windows machines. BlackGold also provide Linux drivers.
- It’s got low profile fittings for thin cases for those creating a Media Center machine.
- It also acts as a capture card for Composite RGB and Component connections so you can put your old school set top boxes should you feel the need to.
- It also has a remote control input should you wish to extend your experience of watching TV.
- The packaging is tiny like a brand new mobile phone. But like a brand new mobile phone, it brings a lot of goodness.
The only negative thing which I could say, but it isn’t really a major issue is that you have to go online to acquire the correct drivers for the BGT3630.
Would I recommend the BGT3630? If you have the set up ready in terms of Aerial and Satellite connections & a pretty powerful PC, then yes! In terms of price, it is around £105 which is a nice price for such an advanced piece of hardware.
*Image is Copyright & Trademark BlackGold Technology
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