Sunwin PCTV

This is an external TV tuner device that connects directly to your monitor. You don’t have to turn on your PC to watch TV.

The monitor gets plugged into the TV tuner, which in turn connects to the computer. Even the speakers can be connected directly to the TV tuner device. Not only that, but you can also connect your DVD/VCD player or camcorder through the S-video or AV ports provided. Overall, it’s a great accessory to have for your PC. At first look, the device looked quite tacky. It didn’t have an instruction manual, but was easy to work and didn’t need much time to figure out. The connections were quite straightforward and didn’t need any drivers to work. It even comes with a fully-featured remote control that can be used for all the settings starting from tuning channels to controlling the brightness, and it works from a long range too. 

Using the device is quite simple. The monitor’s display changes to a TV screen the moment you turn on the TV Tuner. This convenience also comes at the cost of some other features you get in internal TV tuner cards. Since it is not software controlled you cannot have the TV playing in a window while you are working. It will only work full screen. Also there is no way you can capture video from your camcorder or RF using this.

In a nutshell, it’s a good buy at the price, but lacks the windowed play and capture functionality of an internal TV tuner card.

S N   A   P   S   H O   T
Price	:	Rs 3,000
Key Specs	:	No facility for capture or windowed play
Contact	:	Fortune Marketing, New Delhi.
Tel	:	26465880/72491/61421.
E-mail	:	akhilesh@fortune-it.com

Geetaj Channana