First the hardware...
Inside you'll find a neatly packed
bundle including tons of cables, remote control, WDM, video card, install
guide, and even a couple of AAA batteries. The egg-crate handles the heaviest
bundle for a video card I have come across easily, not allowing components to
rattle around.
Here are close-ups of each of the
components.
Here you see the possible connections of
the Personal Cinema VIVO module. Ports include the CATV/Satellite coax input,
S-Video in and out, composite in and out, Audio out (to the sound card in
this case), and the control cable connection over to the video card. Unlike
many VIVO cards out there, the jumble of cables can be permanently tied down
AWAY from the back of your PC.
There is a new connector in-between the
Twin-View CRT connectors. This is the umbilical over to the VIVO module. The
card itself was tagged as a VisionTek MX400 64MB VIVO.
Full feature remote, you bet. It has a
numeric keypad and a four-direction touchpad. The remote has a power button
for both WinDVD and WinDVR.
The WDM module houses the receiver for
the remote. The module has a red LED that confirms reception of commands from
the remote. Range on the remote was more than I could test in the computer
room. Like I mentioned before, the batteries are included. Commands like
record, pause, and menu are all available.
The hardware is imperative to the
Personal Cinema, however the software makes it live. Next up, we will install
the hardware and the software and start pushing buttons.
Next Page: Making It Work
