Hauppauge Digital is now shipping its WinTV PVR-500 dual-tuner TV card in the UK. The new PC card, designed for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 (MCE), allows users to watch one channel whilst recording another, or to record two channels simultaneously.

Previewed in the Autumn at the launch of MCE 2005, the new card is now in production and initially available built into Media Center PCs from Elonex, Scan and Evesham. It is expected to be available as an OEM upgrade later in the year.

The WinTV-PVR-500 contains two complete TV tuners, each with their own hardware MPEG encoder (to reduce CPU overhead) and Nicam stereo decoder. In addition, the card has a composite/s-video plus stereo audio input to connect to and record from VCR, camcorders or set top boxes. A stereo FM receiver is also built into the card.

>> Hauppauge - Official website of Hauppauge