Verdict: Don't forget to keep your mouse and keyboard handy

AVerMedia is another company with a long history in the TV tuner and PVR market. The company has been supplying products since the days of analogue tuners, which relied upon MPEG-1 software encoding (which required a powerful CPU) to digitise the incoming signal. But its current crop of products is much more polished. The AVerTV Hybrid+FM straddles the old world of analogue and the new digital realm, with a tuner capable of receiving both signals, though not at the same time.

As the name suggests, the built-in FM radio is the AVerTV's unique feature. This is seamlessly integrated alongside the TV tuners and analogue video inputs within the AverTV software, so you don't need to use a different app to tune in. AVerMedia manages to squeeze all of these inputs into the low-profile AverTV Hybrid+FM card by using a breakout cable for the IR, and analogue video and audio connections, although no low-profile bracket is supplied in the box.

However, AVerMedia takes the same approach with the Hybrid+FM as that of Hauppauge and Compro. Although an IR remote is supplied, you can't operate the software entirely using just this. You can change channels, adjust the volume and even call up the EPG, but you need to resort to the mouse to set up recordings, making the remote a trifle academic. You can also schedule the software to simply tune the TV to the channel at the scheduled programme time. Like all of the other products in this Labs test, the EPG gets its information from the DVB-T signal, so an EPG isn't available for the analogue tuner, and no online alternative is supplied. Unfortunately, AVerMedia isn't supported by online TV guides such as TVTV (www.tvtv.co.uk).

The AVerTV Hybrid+FM is a perfectly good tuner, as long as you're happy to use it at a desk with a mouse and keyboard to hand. But you won't be able to relax on the sofa and operate it as you would a set-top box. With many of the key functions well beyond the abilities of its remote control, and a software interface you won't be able to see from a distance, the AVerTV falls well short of our media PC dreams.

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