DirecTV Tuners with Windows 7?

After years of stringing Media Center users along from XP Media Center to Vista Media Center to the much-less-then-expected Fiji we've been told that Microsoft's Media Center would be getting a Cable-Card-like DirecTV tuner.

Fast forward to now where Ed Bott discovers a DirecTV HDCP-20 USB Tuner driver.  This doesn't necessarily mean there is a HDCP20 device even created at the moment but the discovery of the driver and the earlier announcement of h.264 support in Windows 7 certainly does improve the odds that we'll see such a device sometime after Windows 7 is released late 2009 or 2010.

There is no doubt that if this is true and this device arrives and delivers as is hoped, it will make an immediate impact on the HTPC world.  Still, if you're more about getting Satellite or Cable digital/HD channels on your HTPC here and now - check out the Hauppauge HD-PVR along with SageTV, BeyondTV or GBPVR.

via Ed Bott's Microsoft Report