Kworld PlusTV Dual DVB-T PCI-E TV card

Conclusions

So, you may have gathered that our experience with the Kworld PlusTV card wasn’t exactly all that it could be hoped for. The software was poorly documented and poorly designed, the driver support is non-existent and compatible with only Windows XP and Windows XP Media Center Edition as far as we can tell.

The aerial meanwhile was insufficient for our purposes and the remote control, while responsive and versatile enough, felt cheap and ‘flubbery’. Yeah, say it enough and it becomes a word.

So, is there anything to like about the Kworld PlusTV card? Well, it did actually let us watch TV despite all our problems with it, which one could argue is all you actually need from the device. However, if we’re sacrificing time and PCI-E slots for a digital TV card then we’d really want to use the system to its fullest and we won’t let a device simply get away with doing the bare minimum unless we’re paying a bare minimum for it.


The price for the card was a little difficult to find as the official website was effectively useless. Eventually however we managed to find a UK price of £69.98, though the US price continued to evade us. Putting a price this high on a card which, as we’ve said, only offers the bare minimum of actual performance and which suffers so badly from poor interface and corners which have been obviously cut.

True, the card is low profile and it works fine with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 without any fiddling, giving multiple recording and viewing options in a single card, but the lack of Vista and Linux support and the high price cripple an otherwise decent product. There are arguments for its good points and arguments for its bad points but ultimately, we, TV Freaks, were left wanting just a little more from the Kworld PlusTV card.

• Ease of Use
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Features
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 5/10

• Performance
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• 7/10

• Value
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Overall
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

What do these scores mean?