Life with Matrox

[Ghydda]

Yo everybody.

I just installed Win2k from scratch and I thought I'd give the new VT2.04 a shoot.

And I must say the skin feature looks really nice!!!! And I was pleased to discover that my system does not crass/hang/freeze when changing skin, as I have read it does for quite a few users out there.

However, my excitement of the new tools sorta faded to a big ZERO when I discovered that I cant get a picture on the video window. All I got is a dark green overlay(?!?!) color. Except when placing the window in the upper-left corner of the screen, then I get a black color inside the window.

This could quite possibly be related to the fact that "Matrox Quick Connect" can't start. All I get is a dialog box stating that no tuner module were found and thus some tuner features will be disabled for this reason (duh!). Pressing OK on this stage closes the box and then nothing happends. Nothing!

I've been ploving the Video forum for tips, hints and suggestions to this but all I've found were people who can't even start PC-VCR without crashing the OS or they have no prob at all. Strange.


The way things look now is that I'm on my way back to the beta PD and the beta VT. I've never had much trouble with those. They work pretty much OK on my system, giving fair low framedrops with MJPEG-files recorded with PC-VCR.
One complaint is that the beta PD is somewhat limited in features concerning screen adjustments. I'm now pushing my monitor to the max (PD 5.39) and by god I am pleased with it's performance.

I'd never figured Matrox would end up in the bottom of the food chain. For 5 years I've been a die hard Matrox user. The last three of them with the Marvel in my PC.

Imagine that. Three years with below average 3D-performance, below average stability: first we had AGP issues, then the OpenGL-issues, then the capture issues under Win9x (choose between capture ability or "gaming"-ability), above average 2D though.
Then Win2k came along, spreading new hope througout the galaxy. Paitiently I waited for capture drivers and yai! beta was ready January 2000. The excitement would not cease and with betas this stable (they were for me - go figure!) the final driver set was almost within reach!

No they weren't!


---- 12 months later ----


Now I'm out of energy, out of patience, out of hope and out of faith. My tolerance levels have dropped below zero and I feel a bit suicidal.
At night I have bad dreams, often I wake up soked in sweat. At work I don't get anything done, I daydream all day. All I can think of is revenge. My favorite "treatment" is my stuffing buggy beta drivers down Matrox employees's throat, choking them slowly, watching the life seep out of the helpless b*******...

I'm feed up


An old saying goes: what doesn't kill you makes you stronger (bahhh!), and being married to Matrox for 5 years has certainly provided me with some experince in dealing with difficult individuals on a 24-hours-a-day basis.

Many people have asked me why I don't sell the hunk'a'junk to some unsuspecting fool on ebay. I'll tell you why. I wouldn't wish the pain, the despair, the loss this piece of HW causes upon even my worst enemy.

To You, who managed to come this far down in my post I salute you! You clearly posses patience, will power and enough courage to take on the task of owing a Matrox graphics card.


Burnout, mistake, ignorance, delusion, despair, mediocrity, pessimism, dysfunction, faliure, incompetence. All words I associate with Matrox.



Despairingly - Ghydda

[Ghydda]

Well, back on PD 5.06beta and VT2.00beta and everything is fine. Of course I'm pretty much limited to capturing with 1 framedrop every minutte, but that's okay.

It seems to me that I always have had an all backwards machine. What works for others rarely works for me and vice versa.

All I can say is that I'm pretty curious about ATI's new 8500 card. If it comes in an All in Wonder version, I think I might jump ship and buy one. A friend of mine has the normal Radeon All in Wonder, and his captures are really good. And he almost always manages to capture directly to AVI (huffyuv) with no framedrops, regardless of what file size he ends up with. +20 GB is no problem at all!

I envy him. Working Win2000 drivers, working capture capability, no filesize limitation. Sweet.
I miss the old times when Matrox used to provide smooth rides into the world of home computing. I'm getting all nostalgic here.


I wish the best of fortune to all beings on this forum. Thanks for the help and the fun. Thanks for all the support and wisdom you've all shared through the last 4 years I've been comming here.


Ghydda

[jasonjlee]

Before you give up Ghydda.

If you check my thread...


Here

And follow the links back to matrox, you will see that at least 4-6 people are having the same problem...

I too am tempted to give up, believe me am I tempted..


But I ain't givin up without putting up ANOTHER good fight.

Out of interest, which matrox card do you have exactly? Is it a g200 without tv tuner?

Regards

Jason

[Ghydda]

Hi Jason

Yah, I got the G200 Marvel without TV-tuner. And the 8 MB memory upgrade (which was absolutly the worst purchase ever).

I'll look into those posts. Maybe there is hope somewhere in there. I don't know. I'm just sick waiting for nothing to happend. Sick of plowing through tons of tons of information. Sick of having to fiddle, tweak, perk and hack things just to get USABLE functionality. And sick of paying big bucks to do so.

I hope You find Your fight and get to win it.


Best of hope
Ghydda

[Ghydda]

Yo Jason!

I just replied to http://forum.matrox.com/mgaforum/For...ML/003969.html and found out those bastards have the forum closed outside office hours!!!

I will resubmit on monday. Their response should prove interesting...



Have a nice weekend all. The weather i finally behaving (the calender says it's here summer but the weather doesn't always agree)

Ghydda

[Brian Ellis]

I'm sorry, guys, much as I deprecate the way Matrox have let everyone down, there is one point that seems to be ignored.

When your G-200 was designed, about three years ago, it was in the early days of WIN 98 and the heyday of NT-4. W2000 was still just a pipedream. Matrox coped with the change to W98SE, but you are trying to put aviation grade kerosene into a Ford Model T and wondering why the engine doesn't start.

I have the G-200 Marvel w/o TV working well but I'm not trying to run it with a fuel that was developed years after the engine.

Dual-boot your systems and run the Marvel under W98SE. You can then do everything else under W2000, if that is your wish.

My apologies if I sound harsh, but this is a real solution that I'm suggesting, not a half-hearted botch with drivers.

[jasonjlee]

Hi Brian.

'much as I deprecate the way Matrox have let everyone down'

So they let us down by not having drivers for win2k....

'When your G-200 was designed, about three years ago, it was in the early days of WIN 98 and the heyday of NT-4. W2000 was still just a pipedream.'

I'll accept all of that..

Just one thing, when was the g400 made and sold.. Wasn't it upto 6 months ago? Wouldn't that put it AFTER win2000 release?

'Matrox coped with the change to W98SE,'

Not really a big one, unless you count WDM, but the code base was 98 which as you say earlier, was already around.

'but you are trying to put aviation grade kerosene into a Ford Model T and wondering why the engine doesn't start. '

Now to use your analogy, if the manufacturer says 'you can expect to be able to put kerosene into your Ford Model T from day x' AND sells it to people telling them to expect such, then all that company deserves when it fails on such promises, is at least....

A VERY LARGE AND VOCAL USER BACKLASH UNTIL IT MEETS ITS PROMISES.

Now I know why the drivers are difficult for matrox to write, it is I believe common knowledge. The Zoran chip on which the marvel is based, has no reference driver for win2000. Matrox however commited to a driver, and told people so. They did not have too. They could site the reasons brian stated, at least for the g200. If they knew it was beyond them, they could have said so.

Though the cynical amongst us may note: If they had admitted that they would function as they do, would those of us planning to use 2000 have bought a matrox card? As it stands under win2000 the marvel g400 offically has the same VIDEO capabilities as a wintv card, ie software only capture.. A wintv card can be picked up for £30.

Then it has failed to deliver on most of its promises, down to today where we have so called 'Final' drivers that dont appear to be working..

(As a side note, the linux drivers apparently work. And they only have access to the public developers docs. Maybe matrox just can't cut it anymore...)

Now, the reasons I am not dual booting are long and complicated, and I don't want to fill up this thread with my personal projects, I consider them off this topic. Needless to say, I need to run win2k.

[Edited for typo]

[Ghydda]

Hi Brian

I know I know. It's an "old" product I got on my hands on here. And for the record, I clearly see your point and believe me I have given this alot of thought aswell.
However, am I not correct in asuming that any high end (it once were you know) video graphics card containing a video capture section is not ment to have the limited 6 or 12 months lifespan as the current 3D game cards have? When investing in a top of the line 3D, 2D, capture and TV-out graphics card (top of the line with respect to amatuer and semi pro on a budget) it is for a range of years. At least it were for me. And at that time Matrox had a solid reputation for being one of the best (if not THE best) in the business and more importantly they had fabulous driver support.

All these things combined reassured me that Matrox was the way to go, because they could and would have driver support for a long time onwards.

I know Matrox pretty much has forfilled every promise regarding the G200 and it's various sisters, however many people doesn't just buy stuff on the basis of what it can do now or what is supported now. They buy it because they have faith in the product, the company and the people behind it. They buy it to make sure they are not investing good money in something that's not going to be supported within a relativly short period of time.

The point is, Matrox has got the "legal" part covered of the bargian, but they have not covered the part that is unspoken. Their obligation as a very respected company goes beyond the legal part, that's why they have earned the respect in the business. "You can count on Matrox" so to speak. This is what made Matrox the better company and gave them their livelihood in this hard hard business. And now this is were Matrox have failed utterly the past year or two.

You don't have to agree with me Brian, but this is pretty much how I see things. I am very dissapointed with Matrox and their actions lately and I think most people can agree on this.


Ghydda

PS. Hi Jason, you slammed the door pretty hard on our good friend Ellis However I'm sure he can take it, I havn't seen him running home crying yet and I don't think he will this time either. And I've seen him slamming the door harder himself Anyway, I think my friend Jason pretty much said the same things as I have, in other words - slightly more direct...

[Brian Ellis]

Jason, Ghydda,

To continue my analogy, when the Ford model T was built, there were no jet engines, so you could not expect them to cater for aviation kerosene. Even the G-400 was out before W 2000 was released, I believe (even if beta versions were around).

In all honesty, I think Matrox acted in good faith when they said they would develop a Marvel driver. I think it probable that they were also let down by Zoran. Where they failed was their psychology when they found that they had bitten off more than they could chew. This mistake has probably cost them one packet in the reputation stakes and another one in the wasted driver-programmer hours which they have supported. Maybe someone on this forum living in Montreal can tell us whether anything about them has appeared in the local papers???

No amount of bleating is going to correct the situation. You therefore have a limited number of choices:

a) use your (obsolete) Marvel G-200 in the manner for which it was designed, with W98

b) scrap it and buy a card which was designed for use with W2k

c) waste your time and money trying vainly to get your Marvel to work with Win 2k and fail, and continue bitching here

d) take Matrox to court for misleading you (only recommended if you have LOTS of spare money)

e)sell your computer and buy a ticket to a nice sunny spot where you can put your feet up and bronze yourself silly.

The choice is yours!

By the way, you may like to know that if my Marvel renders its soul, it would be extremely unlikely I would choose another Matrox, even though I'm satisfied with what I have, because this incident has made me lose faith in them. In a way, I therefore sympathise with you.

[Ghydda]

Thanks for your input Brian, we both know the easiest way out is option b). And possibly the most realistic one too.

But is this the way it should be? Not so long ago Matrox said they would scrap the MJPEG portion and just provide TV-viewing and 3rd party capture ability to RRG and Gx00 Marvel. I can live with that. The new processors are fast enough for SW-compression anyway so this is acceptable solution for me.

What is not acceptable is being stuck with beta on both driver and VT's. Do you know how limited those betas are? Being Brian Ellis I should think you do, 'cause you've been around the block for some time now and you do care enough to read up upon the subject.

I'm still 'bitching' because the final VT's does not work with G200 Marvel no-TV-tuner version. And if they work on every other flavor it can't be that difficult to fix. It's basicly the same hardware for crying out loud. I don't think that's being unfair or to much to ask.


All I ask for is non-beta VT's that actually works.
And mind you, that is a promise they gave and the last one they haven't withdrawen yet. So until they withdraw that promise aswell or provide some working tools I will be right here. Bitching.

And if nothing happends within a relative short period of time I just hope Matrox realises how expensive that course of action is going to get. For everybody.


Ghydda

[jasonjlee]

Brian,

This was, on first draft, a long post, that would have wasted perhaps a minute of anyones life who bothered to read it.


However, I cut it down to this:..

'To continue my analogy, when the Ford model T was built, there were no jet engines, so you could not expect them to cater for aviation kerosene. Even the G-400 was out before W 2000 was released, I believe (even if beta versions were around). '

if ford TELL ME to expect to be able to use aviation kerosene, then I would expect to be able to. Remember, some people bought it on the basis that THEY WERE NOT BEING LIED TO. What is wrong with that?

Now, just because I shot your argument to pieces, doesn't mean that I'm bitching

As for the rest, I agree completey with Ghydda

[Ghydda]

Right on! Gimmi five Jason!



Ghydda

[Brian Ellis]

Jason

When Ghydda's G-200 was made, W2k was just pure vapourware. I'm pretty sure Matrox never said anything about it at the time. After all, when it was built, the Pentium Pro 200 was state-of-the-art, even before MMX, and it worked on that (at least the PCI version). If you have upgraded from that, why not upgrade the Marvel, as well?

Analyse WHY Marvel G-200 was made. It was because it was impossible for low-cost hardware, including CPUs, could not capture analogue video (digital transfer was still in the future) in real time. Therefore the capturing required hardware codecs. CPUs have evolved to nearly 10 x as fast since then, so software codecs are now a possibility. Is it therefore reasonable even to expect this obsolete hardware codec card to do what you ask of it? And is it Matrox' fault that Microsoft made radical changes between W98 and W2000?

Dammit! Marvel was only a low-cost card. What other 3-4 year-old hardware (or software) do you have in your computer case?

If Matrox (or Ford) told you that your Ford model T, filled with aviation kerosene, is going to make Michael Schumaker tremble in his shoes at the next Grand Prix, would you believe them?

[jasonjlee]

Brian

'When Ghydda's G-200 was made, W2k was just pure vapourware. I'm pretty sure Matrox never said anything about it at the time. After all, when it was built, the Pentium Pro 200 was state-of-the-art, even before MMX, and it worked on that (at least the PCI version). '

Yeap, we've both already agreed this.


'If you have upgraded from that, why not upgrade the Marvel, as well?'

I have other hardware in other computers!

'Is it therefore reasonable even to expect this obsolete hardware codec card to do what you ask of it? '

ITS NOT WHAT I ASK.

ITS WHAT MATROX SAYS IT CAN DO. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT!

As you seem, after 3 times of asking, unable to answer this, I don't think I'm going to bother to reply to any further entries from you. I think you may just be one of those people who don't answer the points from other peoples post, and just ramble on and on. Whereas I actually answer your questions.. For example..

'Dammit! Marvel was only a low-cost card. What other 3-4 year-old hardware (or software) do you have in your computer case? '

3 year old software... maybe a little thing called 98?
Hardware. Maybe some 66mhz memory. A panasonic cf-01 touch screen to control my HA system. The two rewired for SMP celeron 300a slot one processors. A Soundblaster 16. An old PCI graphics card in my linux router. A matrox millenium PCI to run one of the dual screen machines. A G400 (maybe 2 years old) on my main workstation. An old scsi HD to boot and hold swap for win2k. Floppy drives.
Wintv card must be 5 years old.

You kinda walked into that one Brian.

'If Matrox (or Ford) told you that your Ford model T, filled with aviation kerosene, is going to make Michael Schumaker tremble in his shoes at the next Grand Prix, would you believe them? '

Tell you what Brian, you deal with my actual REAL WORLD points, and I'll come back and waste 3 minutes explaining to you why this is the most illogical analogy I have read. I kinda went along with it when it still made sense, but you've lost it here.

I repeat

ITS NOT WHAT I ASK.

ITS WHAT MATROX SAYS IT CAN DO. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT!

If you reply, PLEASE try to answer that point!

Jason

[Edited for yet another typo]

[Ghydda]

Oh Brian!! You do like to excagerate, don't you.

Anyway, we are not going to agree on this subject i fear. Don't take me for an old fart who hasn't got nothing better to do than complain all day. Because I see your point and to some extend I agree with you.
However I feel you are maybe not seing my point. Let me explain:

I have the european G200 Marvel without tv-tuner module. VT2.04 has been written to enable TV-viewing and 3rd party RGB-captures. This is what Matrox states in the most recent info I have awalible. And as far as I know of the new VT's work as expected with G400 Marvel, G400 RRG, G200 Marvel (the one with TV-tuner) and G200 RRG. But the tools does not work with my G200 Marvel. And until Matrox changes the their minds on their latest promise I am gonna keep trying to get them to deliver the goods. Why shouldn't I?

I hope you see that I'm not asking for a fully featured capture capebility under Win2k, just TV-viewing and 3rd party program captures. I see no problem in this small request. It's got to be a minor bug causing Jason's and my G200 Marvel to disfunction with the new VT2.04.


Stay cheerful all

Ghydda