Inspiron 660 incompatible with internal TV Tuner cards and possibly many other PCIe cards

Follow-up:

Per Dell's technical support recommendation, I reformatted the hard-drive and re-installed the Windows 7 operating system.  Per their instructions, I only installed the LAN driver from the Dell driver disk.  I then downloaded and installed the latest Chipset drivers from the Dell website.  The HD reformatting was required because the latest Chipset drivers would not install in place of the existing older Chipset drivers.   This did NOT correct the problem.  I am now spending all of my time re-installing programs and backed-up files and trying to remember various software settings and configurations.

Not giving up; I ordered a HVR-2250 TV Tuner card from Dell (after they assured me that it would work).  Thankfully, it was immediately detected and works great.  I did notice that the original HVR-2250 card was marked "REV C3F2" while the newest one from Dell is labeled "REV C4F2" (note 3 versus 4).  I contacted Hauppauge to ask them about the problem.  Their reply was: "The older revision will not be recognized on newer motherboards which use Gen2 or Gen3 PCIe slots."  I  have been unable to find anything related to the PCIe revision compatibility on the Hauppauge web site.

I believe that the Dell Inspiron 660 has Gen2 PCIe slots (because it uses an Intel B75 Chipset).  I thought that the various PCIe revisions are supposed to be backward compatible so that older PCIe v1.x cards will still function in motherboards with later generation 2.0 slots.

At this point I do not know if the problem is with the previous three TV Tuner cards (from two different manufacturers) or the Dell Motherboard hardware or the Intel Chipset or drivers.

Hi Eclectic-Dean,

Good to hear you've resolved it.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, indeed.   Dell Technical Support called me again to follow up on the problem.

They wanted the part number and revision code from the first Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 card.  During the conversation I learned some more information:

* The BIOS (& Driver software) is unique to Dell and is NOT the same as the Motherboard's (or hardware) OEM software.

* Only the products purchased from Dell are guaranteed to work with the Dell PCs.  Products from other vendors (even with the same model numbers) may not function properly.

It is too bad that Dell paid to replace my motherboard (and I wasted several days of my time) since the cause of the problem appears to be an incompatibility with how the Dell BIOS handles some older PCIe-1.X cards. 

I must say that I am impressed with how much effort Dell has made to make sure that I am eventually satisfied with their product.  Hopefully Dell's Technical Support will use this experience to help other customers when they have problems moving their older PCIe TV Tuner cards to their new Dell PC.

Glad Dell was able to help you sort out this problem.

And thanks for posting the details you learned while exploring the fix. :emotion-21:  Your info will certainly help other users who have reported issues with TV tuner cards.

There seem to have been a number of issues with PCI-e cards, aside from tuner cards, when Intel switched to newer generation processors and chipsets.  Guess the PCi-e card manufacturers didn't keep up. :emotion-5:

Received a defective HVR-2250 today.  Got apologies from customer support, tech support, etc.  No assurance that the replacement will work.

The replacement HVR-2250 arrived late last week.  Inspiron 660S will start up with the card installed in either slot.  The PC will NOT start with the card installed in either slot if I shut the PC down and then try to start it.  Nothing happens when the power button is pushed.  I have removed and installed the card several times paying close attention to getting a good connection and installing the mounting screw.

I allowed Dell Tech Support to "remote in".  The card could be seen on the device list so they thought their job was complete.  I'm going to give them one more chance.

I think the software is not fully installed because I want to use the WinTV software and I didn't have the $9.95 disk from Hauppauge.  Hauppauge tech support didn't think software is the issue.  He thought it is a Dell-Hauppauge hardware conflict.

You may have a motherboard problem.

Thanks for getting the wheels turning...the PC started with card installed after being shut down for 20 minutes.  It did not start after being shut down for 180 minutes.  This might suggest, among other things, a heat related problem with the junction between the motherboard and card slot.

On the other hand, the PC starts up from cold when I install the card and then push the start button.

When the PC won't start I have always responded by removing the card and then starting it up.  I'm going to try pulling the card and reinserting it before pushing the start button.  Maybe there is an intermittent connection in the slot or on the motherboard that is not heat related.

Thanks again!

Third Hauppauge HVR-2250 did not work.  Computer won't start with it installed.  Waiting on reply from tech support to discuss changing the motherboard.  Maybe I don't want TV on my PC after all.

I have a 2250 that's MANY years old. It has the Rev B1F2 label. The whole reason I bought a desktop is so that I could watch TV on it. Do I need to switch back from Dell to get this to work?

I have a 2250 that's MANY years old. It has the Rev B1F2 label. The whole reason I bought a desktop is so that I could watch TV on it. Do I need to switch back from Dell to get this to work?

1. Do you know if there's a driver for whatever version of Windows you're running?

2. Have you checked the manufacturer's site to see if there are any firmware updates for your card?

3. Assuming there's a driver, you may have to install the card to find out if it will work in your desktop...

pci-e x1 cards version 1.0 do not work in pci-e version 3.0 slots because the system will not clock down the bus to 1.0 speed.   Furthermore Windows 8 secure boot and 64 bit windows 7 will not ever load drivers that are not both 64 bit and WHQL Certified.