Product Reviews

A USB TV tuner is one of those PC upgrades that should deliver maximum enjoyment with minimum hassle, and if you're looking for one you'll be spoilt for choice. The thumb-sized Ultimate stands out in a number of respects. Not only can it feed live TV to your PC, it can also stream it over your WiFi network.

We had no problems setting up the Pinnacle: install the 'quick start' software, plug the device into a spare USB socket, connect an aerial and you're done. Unlike with other Pinnacle products, we were pleased to find full user guides included as PDF files. As expected, the included indoor antenna picked up DAB radio but was all but useless for

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digital TV. With our outdoor aerial, pictures were vibrant and detailed. You get an electronic program guide (EPG) and timeshifting - the ability to pause and rewind live TV - which works well. A full remote control is also included.

Where the Pinnacle really shines is recording. We were able to save direct to DVD or to a USB memory drive, with three quality settings; 'long play' provided adequate picture quality while preventing a single episode of Newsnight consuming all our free hard disk space. There are also options to convert video for an iPod or Sony PSP, and you can watch one channel while recording another.

If your PC is on a wireless network, you can stream live TV to up to three other PCs. That could be handy if you have another computer away from your main PC or aerial point, or want to take your laptop around the house and watch TV on it (with the Pinnacle stick plugged into a desktop PC). Channel-hopping, recording and timeshifting can all be controlled from the receiving PC.

Playback and recording requires at least 20GB free hard disk space, and streaming needs a PC with a dual-core processor. We'd recommend at least 1GB of RAM. As long as your PC can cope, the Ultimate works well and is great value.