Does a TV tuner card with wireless networking exist?

[Goldmund]

I'm getting a new laptop soon, and I was wondering... It would be cool if there were an external TV tuner that takes TV cable in, and instantly converts it to MPEG format, and sends it out via wireless Ethernet to stream on the laptop. That way you could watch TV without actually plugging the laptop into the TV cable.

Does anyone know if something like this exists?

Thanks!

[Liberal Veteran]

1. Just so this doesn't drop like a rock....

The technology exists to do it and you could probably rig something, but tv tuner cards are notoriously bad when it comes to satellite/cable signals because of the technologies the providers use for scrambling.

[Goldmund]

2. hm... How are they bad?

I actually don't own a TV, but only watch it on the computer. I've had no problems with my TV tuner card. I still use the satellite box and keep the card on a single channel.

[Liberal Veteran]

5. Exactly the problem you describe....

If you want to change the channel, you have to change it at the source rather than having the tuner card do the job of changing the channel locally.

[Goldmund]

6. But isn't that the same as a regular TV?

Technically speaking, if you have satellite, you always change channels externally, and use your TV as a glorified monitor, right?

[Liberal Veteran]

9. Yes, but usually it is less intrusive because the box is in the same room

...as the tv and it's just a matter of clicking the remote.

If you are laying in bed watching Oprah vs Jason in Outer Space and decide to flip over to Days of Our Nights, you gotta crawl your butt out of bed and change the channel there.

Keep in mind, this is not my complaint about tv tuners, it's pretty much the constant I read about in review after review after review about them (the lack of ability to change the channel locally because of the cable/satellite box).

[Goldmund]

11. Oh, gotcha

That's never been a problem for me, because my computer is in the same room as the satellite box, so I can still use the remote. So I never found out whether Jason actually gets Oprah in the end.

[Liberal Veteran]

12. Jason actually gets Oprah in the end, but only on the Spice channel....

:)

[Kellanved]

3. AFAIK no

There is software that streams TV into the network, but nothing that comes in a simple box.

On Edit: There is something like that as an hack for certain European Digital TV decoders. Maybe there are US decoders/tuners with an Ethernet port that can be convinced to forward the MPEG stream they receive as well.

[Goldmund]

4. Do you know what the software is called?

[Kellanved]

10. any Streaming Server that can use a capture device should do the trick

VLC, for instance:
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

[Hokie]

7. Check ATI

You can put a TV tuner card in a desktop and use that as a server to supply other PC's across the network. The other PC's have to have ATI video cards.

[Goldmund]

8. Will do, thanks

[AndyTiedye]

13. You Can Run a Mythtv Server on a desktop with tuner cards

and connect to it wirelessly from your laptops.

http://www.mythtv.org

[Goldmund]

14. Sounds great

but alas, it requires Linux...