ATI Radeon 8500DV...stop me please!!

[Sciascia]

God I want this card so much that it hurts. Actually what I want is a Marvel with good drivers for Win2K and better 3D power. So it looks like this is my only choice in a thinning market. I did a lot of research and all of the reviews are pretty favorable. the feature list is longer than my arm and it is priced pretty reasonably. After posting several questions at different forums about the TV out capabilities it sounds prety decent. I really like DVDMax a lot and it sounds like it may do it. 1 response in 15 posts is not a good sign though...

This is a quote from good old "Boob" at Sharkey Forums:

With my Radeon 8500, it will display to the TV the same thing that my monitor displays, EXCEPT for when I use either Windows Media Player or The Playa (DIVX). With either of those 2 programs, the video will become full screen on the TV, but my monitor will show it as a window, and I can just move it out of the way and continue doing whatever I want on the computer

Sounds like DVD Max to me. If anyone knows whether or not this works with MSP6 I would appreciate it. That is the last piece of the puzzle.

[stolbovoy]

I have Radeon 8500 and it has ‘Theater Mode’ (AKA DVDMax) with beta 5.13.6025 Win2k drivers. Also I've got it in Win98 too, but don't remember driver version (beta too). There is new check box in Overlay panel that activates this mode. If check box doesn’t appear after installation of the new driver you can change registry value in key like HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\ATI..[something]\Display\000[something]\ DisableOverlayTheaterMode to 00000000. I don’t remember exact key name, but if you will need it I can take a look.

It works with MSP 6.5

Viktor

[Sciascia]

Thank You for the info. Just a few more questions.

Can I capture to avi using different codecs such as PicVideo or Huffy or RGB?

Does MSP6.5 try to recompress the whole clip or does the smart render work?

How is the overall quality of video capture, or should I say are you happy with it?

How good is the 3D gaming, (if you have tried it)?

Why is the sky blue?

Thanks for your time.

[stolbovoy]

I have regular R8500 (without DV and without video IN), so
unfortunately, can tell nothing about capture with R8500DV.

Quality of video out pretty the same as with G400, but it's not as convenient as Matrox, you probably should do a some tricks to make it work as you want .

About 3d gaming - it's fast and nice, but I can't get Trilinear Filtering work in Serious Sam and RTCW.

Good luck,
Viktor

[Sciascia]

OK, that will work, sounds great. Thanks for the info Viktor.

[landrover]

Hi,

I share your thoughts about the AIW Radeon 8500DV, although I think it's pretty expensive. It costs about 25% more than the Marvel G400TV when that was new and that one was already expensive for a consumer graphics board. Not that I have any regrets though...

landrover

B.t.w, Did you know it was recently released in Europe as Hercules AIW 8500 DV?

[Sciascia]

i just saw that but couldn't find any info specifically about it. I have a good price $326 from Provantage.com and they are fast and don't rape you on the S&H. I'm getting ready to place the order after I finish typing this message.

[landrover]

Wow, that's a nice price indeed! Have fun and tell us about your experiences with the card.

landrover

[Sciascia]

The bun is in the oven (the card is ordered..woohoo)

Now how much is the street price for a used G400 TV? Good condition, just a little underpowered for newer games.

I know that I am going to miss HW compression even with my speedy Athlon.

[Dr Mordrid]

I haven't used the hardware compression on my G400-TV's for anything but betaing in years. PICVideo + YUY2 gives much better results and can be used up to 5-8 mb/s for higher quality when needed. I started using it for MJPeg captures with a Celeron 600, so it's also fast/mhz.

Dr. Mordrid

[AndrewDV]

Hi,

For what is worth, I toyed around with the new 7500 Radeon AIW. In general, it works really well. Keep in mind, that I have not downloaded any new drivers either. The built in software is kind of clutsy, but highly functional. The remote control is very nice, but could use some tweaking.

As far as TV Out, I was a bit dissapointed, but then surprised. When I first connected a TV to the mix, I instantly noticed there was no overscan (a key part to DVDMax). Then, I read on Rage3D (http://www.rage3d.com) about changing a registry setting. An option for overscan appears in the Hydravision configuration tab after making the adjustment and rebooting. That makes the output much nicer to view.

I think the TV output of the desktop is pretty good. Of course, a TV does not compare to a monitor. What took me by surprise is outputing DVD playback. The playback is so crisp! I am having a hard time telling the difference between that and my standalone (Sony 560D). IMO, I think it gives the standalone a run for the money.

Capturing with the 7500 AIW is alright. The TV tuner quality is very good (the 8500DV is even better, but draws more heat). Being one who likes integrated entertainment, I have a lot of fun with the timeshifting and such. Their software is not a complete solution like ShowShifter (http://www.showshifter.com), but does a good job. Using the convenient BOB is nice as well. You can read on VCDHelp (http://www.vcdhelp.com) about using the AIW to capture with different codecs.

I know this is info is about the 7500, but hope this helps. It is a better card than the previous makes, but still requires some tinkering and external software.

[prophet]

PAL version

Does ATI have European version of 8500DV available (with PAL tuner etc.)? Or we'll have to wait for Hercules version?

[Sciascia]

AndrewDv

Thanks for the info. I an really looking forward to playing with this. The DVD quality of the ATI has been really been talked up alot everywhere that I read. Just as long as I can edit my video I am happy.

[landrover]

Prophet,

according to the ATI website the AIW 8500 DV comes as a PAL version for countries with a PAL system. The Hercules AIW 8500 DV has been released recently. Fairly expensive though, at 529 euro´s...
The Hercules AIW 7500 is priced at 269 euro´s, so if you don´t need firewire...or are there other big differences between the two?

landrover

[Sciascia]

Probably clock speed or type of ram used. Same GPU I think. GPU what a crazy frickin idea. Who would've thought that with 2GHz processors that you would still need to offload the work to the video card?

Good news is that Provantage said that they would ship my card on the 8th. I just got an email saying that it is already out the door. They did the same with my Santa Cruz the other day. I am extremely impressed with their prices and service. Best online experience in 5 years of doing it. I have never had a bum deal or been ripped off online either. Just a cut above the rest. They have a great selection, good staff and excellent prices. They have good shipping rates as well and they ship to APO addresses.

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