Dell's XPS 420 to Feature CableCard TV Tuner

Dell has announced that they are going to add a digital cable tuner to their XPS 420 computer, just like the previous release, the 410, featured. The XPS 420 workstation comes with an ATI TV Wonder digital cable tuner that adds an extra $180 to the final price per system, less than half the price Sony has imposed for their TV Tuner series.

The Dell pick is a common cable tuner, chosen to add as less price load as possible to the system. Performing dual tuners sell for about $360 each and allow receiving both digital and analog signals as well as recording one channel while watching another. AMD is currently holding the monopoly on the Cable Tuner market, so the prices for digital tuners are not likely to drop too soon.

The CableCard solution has also been adopted by HP in their HP Pavilion Elite series. Sean Paterson, lead product marketing manager in the North America Consumer Computing business at HP says that the ATI TV Wonder digital cable tuner solution has worked for them:

"HP has worked very closely with CableLabs to test and implement a CableCard solution on our HP Pavilion Elite series. We have been offering the ATI TV Wonder external cable tuner + Internal ATSC/NTSC tuner since April 07. This option is available on our Pavilion Elite series and is one of several ways for consumers to enjoy HD content on their PCs. Along with our Blu-Ray and HD-DVD options consumers can also record over-the-air HD with our standard internal tuners. In addition, consumers can purchase the external digital tuner and enjoy HD and Premium channels from their cable providers.

Demand for HD drives and CableCard tuners have been growing consistently since launching these technologies. CableCard tuner sales is a small percentage of our overall sales; however we have seen strong interest from consumers that are enthusiastic about watching and recording HD content on their HP media center PCs. As demand for CableCard tuners grows we will expand our offering to other HP products and continue to offer this solution at a competitive price in the marketplace. We will also look at future CableCard technologies as they become available. Currently the m9000t and the d4996t are both certified products with CableLabs and have the external TV tuner as an option."