How to Pick the Right TV Tuner for Your DIY DVR

You can pay a monthly fee to your cable provider for a time-shifting DVR, but if you prefer control and flexibility to DRM and, well, that monthly fee, you can roll your own DVR with a TV tuner for your PC.

So you've set up a geeky media center that non-geeks can actually use, but you still have a separate method for watching and recording live TV. If you'd like to consolidate your devices, a TV tuner is the perfect add-on for your media center. We've briefly discussed TV tuners before, but the state of modern television can make the buying process a little overwhelming. There is no one-size-fits all solution to buying one, so we've created this guide to sorting out whether a TV tuner is right for you, and how to go about buying the right one.

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