Hardware Bistro

Product: Box W7 Lite
Manufacturer: AverMedia
Supplied by: AverMedia/LinkCraft
Price: 96USD/RM350
Launch Date: Oct 2008

 

Today we are glad to introduce you a new brand that arrived on our door step; AVerMedia. AVerMedia is not a new brand and indeed it was founded in 1990. Our first review sample from AVerMedia is AVerTV Box W7 Lite which delivers fantastic TV enjoyment and HD quality to users. Let us have a deep dive on this interesting product.

 

Company Profile

AVerMedia Technologies is a global player in the design and manufacture of presentation and multimedia products. Founded in 1990, AVerMedia's ideology has remained consistent - to turn advanced technology into innovative commercial products at affordable prices for consumers worldwide. In 1997, we were proud to become a public listed company in Taiwan.

AVerMedia has, from the day of founding, always maintained the mindset of being a "Farmer of Technology" - a solid foundation married with practicality and strong fundamentals in growing our core business. We have achieved to bcome a global leader in the field. Today the AVerMedia Group staffs over 1050 employees, with more than 300 R&D engineers to propel our insistence in innovation and quality, which have been widely recognised and in 2009, AVerMedia has already garnered two CES Innovations Design and Engineering Awards.

We are committed to enriching entertainment experience and promoting effective communication among people. At the same time, we strive to be a responsible corporate citizen worldwide by practicing these commitments.

 

Features

- Watch TV on Widescreen Monitor with VGA Interface (4:3 / 16:9 / 16:10)
- Transparent / Resizable PIP
- PIP Mode Support Resolution up to 1920x1200 60Hz
- Auto Power-off
- 2:2 Pull Down (For PaL only)
- Progressive Scan
- Color/Edge Enhancement
- 3D-Motion Adaptive De-interlace
- LCD/CRT Monitor, PDP and Projector Support
- Light/Contrast/Hue/Color/Sharp adjustment
- Video Pause

Specifications

Input Signal
- VGA
- A/V（RCA）
- S-Video
- PC Audio
- Analog RF
Output Signal
- VGA
- Audio (Speaker or earphone)

System Requirement

PC：LCD/Plasma monitor with VGA* (D-Sub) input
Projector：With VGA input
※ AVerMedia AVerTV BoxW7 Lite functions only with the TV system of the country it is manufactured for and originally distributed in.
※ AVerTV BoxW7 Lite supports D-Sub input only

  

 

Package & Contents

 

AVerTV Box W7 Lite comes with a small packaging box which is attractive and colorful. All the features, specifications are written all over the packaging box; fully utilize for media purpose. The inner packaging is pretty simple, everything are arranged and placed nicely and the AVerTV Box W7 Lite is kept inside a bubble bag for better protection purpose.

 

Accessories that come along with AVerTV Box W7 Lite are user's manual, power adapter, remote control, VGA cable, audio cable and an AVerMedia logo sticker. The user's manual is a very complete manual with three languages; English, Thai, Vietnamese and the traditional Chinese version can be downloaded at AverMedia website.

 

The power adapter is a 100-240V auto switching adapter with output 5V, 2A and 10W. A VGA cable and an audio cable are given to connect AVerTV Box W7 Lite with computer and output devices like monitor and speaker; we will discuss the installation process in later chapter.

 

AverTV Box W7 Lite

AverMedia has couple of TV Box products and AVerTV Box W7 Lite is an analog TV box which supports PIP mode up to 1920 x 1200 60Hz resolution on widescreen monitor with VGA interface (4:3/ 16:9/16:10). The transparent PIP feature allows users to watch TV program while doing other computer tasks simultaneously; multi-tasking. Besides that other great features of AVerTV Box W7 Lite are Video Pause, 13-channel preview, color/edge enhancement, 3D-motion adaptive de-interlace, progressive scan and etc.

AVerTV Box W7 Lite is one of them among the latest TV Box series from AVerMedia; Super, Genie and Lite. The differences between them are shown above with the comparison table and AverMedia did a good job here where users can compare all their products through their website easily; just by few clicks.

 

What is TV box for and what capabilities of it? Basically TV box works as an external TV card where it is not only able to watch TV program through a computer but also can be functioned independently. Working independently is a great feature where it can minimize the setup cost and able to work even without a computer. AVerTV Box W7 Lite comes with a black small rectangular box with the dimension of 5.7" x 3.8" x 1" (L x W x D).

 

On the top panel of AVerTV Box W7 Lite, there are total 7 buttons (VOL-, VOL+, CH-, CH+, MENU, SOURCE & POWER) to access and control the device flawlessly even without the remote control. On the front panel under the power button, there is an infrared sensor for the remote control purpose; a red LED will be lighted up once this device is powered on.

 

There are plenty connectors at the back and right side of the AVerTV Box W7 Lite. At the back, the connectors are power in, audio out, audio in, VGA out, VGA in and antenna while S-Video and Composite Video connectors on the right side. Hopefully other famous video connectivity will be included for next models such as DVI, DisplayPort and HDMI.

 

The remote control of AVerTV Box W7 Lite is a 40-key full size remote control which is bulky but for functional wise, such remote control is absolutely wonderful and perfect for easier controlling. This remote control is powered up by two AAA batteries and 2 Japanese batteries are included as well by AVerMedia.

 

Installation, Testing & Performance

During the first time setup of this AVerTV Box W7 Lite, we were keep on looking for the installation CD for driver and software as this is required for most of the hardware but this is something different with AVerTV Box W7 Lite as neither driver nor software is required; is that weird but fantastic? Basically the software and driver were preloaded inside the TV box and it is just using the computer as a media to display its program. For the hardware installation or you may call it as cable installation can be referred back this user's manual; everything is explained clearly.

Here is our setup and everything is simple; should only take couple of minutes to get everything done. For the full completion setup with VGA output (a normal computer display; LCD or CRT), all the connectors at the back need to be connected. However as we mentioned previously AVerTV Box W7 Lite can work independently just with a set of speaker and monitor will do; VGA Out and Audio Out connectors can be ignored.

Connection: Computer -> AVerTV Box W7 Lite -> Display/Speaker

Once the setup is done then it's time to power on this device and if the display shows nothing then user can play around with the source to display the right video format; toggle between TV/Video and PC display. The GUI is very user friendly where it is easy to understand and nothing complicated here.

Some other basic setup can be adjusted such as brightness, contrast, color, tint, sharpness, noise reduction and etc. BTW before start scanning the TV channels/frequencies, an appropriate country must be set in order to setup correctly such as PAL-M, PAL-N, PAL-BG, PAL-DK, or NTSC-M; we selected Malaysia.

After that it's time to scan the frequencies to get the TV program loaded or set; either by channel scan or all frequencies scan. The channel fine tune is used to slowly adjust the frequency until the TV reception is clear enough. Favorite channel can be reprogrammed for easier to remember.

Other setting likes OSD position which allows user to display or move the TV window accordingly within the computer viewable screen and OSD transparency allows the TV window display accordingly; something very similar in Microsoft Window Vista. Two languages are supported by AVerTV Box W7 Lite at this moment are English and Traditional Chinese.

 

Test Bed:

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E8300 @ 2.83GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3
Heatsink: Titan Fenrir
Memory: 4GB 800MHz DDR2 Memory
Hard Drive: 250GB 7200RPM 8MB Seagate
Graphic Card: OEM Nvidia GeForce 9800GT 512MB
PSU: Arctic Cooling Fusion 550R
Router: TRENDnet TEW-639GR
Optical Drive: DVD RW HLDS
Monitor: Dell 22" Wide Screen LCD
Speaker: Edifier R501
Operating System: Microsoft XP Pro SP2
Benchmark Software: Prime95
Ambient Temperature: 27 Degree Celsius

TV box basically is an external TV card so let us talk about its reception which is the major function for such device. Overall we found that the TV reception of AVerTV Box W7 Lite is good and stronger compare with our small USB TV dongles that we have tested previously; signal is as clear as TV but of course a standard and good TV antenna is required. The 13-channel preview is a bit lagging but this can't be avoided and similar situation happens on other TV card devices as well. Some other enhancements of AVerTV Box W7 Lite like OSD transparency, resizable PIP, progressive scan, 3D-motion adaptive De-interlace and video pause are working perfectly which is useful when selecting a TV box/card/dongle.

 

Conclusion

Overall, we are satisfied and impressed with AVerTV Box W7 Lite with its simple, flexible user interface and great result. Besides that AVerTV Box W7 Lite can work independently just with a set of monitor and speaker which able to reduce the setup cost without having a PC. For a less than 100USD TV box, AVerTV Box W7 Lite does offer something quite interesting and reasonable price; provided analog signal is still supported by the your living country as most of the countries have or are going to transit from analog to digital transmission.

 

Pros:

* Small device with fantastic results
* Can work independently
* Software, driver are not required
* Simple GUI

Cons:

* Antenna is not provided

Thanks to AverMedia & LinkCraft for providing this sample for us to review.

Only registered users may post a comment.

There are currently no user submitted comments.