Philips/NXP SAA7130/7134 PCI analog TV and capture cards
A large family of PCI analog TV tuner, composite/S-Video capture, and hybrid DVB cards built around the Philips (later NXP) SAA7130, SAA7133, SAA7134, and SAA7135 decoder chips. These boards were ubiquitous in consumer PC TV tuner products from roughly 2002 through 2010, sold under brands like Hauppauge, AverMedia, Pinnacle, LifeView, and many OEM clones.
recommendation
Worth keeping but documenting its niche because the hardware is firmly legacy: PCI analog TV tuner and video capture cards built around Philips (later NXP) SAA713x decoders, mostly sold through about 2010 and not replaced by any single newer in-tree driver. Upstream maintainers are still fixing real bugs (a memory-leak fix was queued for stable as recently as 2026), so the code is not abandoned, but new deployments are rare and the audience is people keeping older capture rigs and DVB hobby setups running.
repository signals
sources
- lore.kernel.org
Recent upstream bug-fix traffic exists for this driver in 2026, with a memory-leak fix tagged for stable.
- docs.kernel.org
Kernel documentation describes saa7134 as the driver for saa7130/33/34/35 based capture and TV boards.
- docs.kernel.org
Current kernel docs still list many supported legacy PCI TV/capture boards for saa7134, indicating broad legacy-board coverage rather than a single modern product line.
- cateee.net
LKDDb shows CONFIG_VIDEO_SAA7134 remains present in current kernel series and identifies Philips SAA713x TV-card support.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
Real driver directory with multiple module-bearing C files. lore_activity on saa7134-video.c found a 2026 linux-media/stable bug-fix URL, so this is not abandoned and there is no evidence here for immediate removal; a lore_file_timeline query on saa7134-core.c also showed continued touches, though many are treewide. Web search produced the current kernel driver doc and cardlist URLs, which show the hardware class is legacy PCI analog/DVB TV/capture boards. Web search also produced the LKDDb URL confirming the driver is still built in current kernels. Recommendation is keep-annotate: upstream still fixes it, but new deployments are likely low and mostly legacy capture/TV systems; no single in-tree replacement driver covers the same installed base.