How does Radeon 9600 compare to 8500DV ??

[J.Clarke]

How does the Radeon 9600 compare to an 8500DV in terms of video
performance?

In a sense that's apples to oranges--you're comparing a "regular" ATI
board with an "All-in-wonder". If you're asking how an ordinary 9600
compares in frame rates and whatnot to the 8500, it's a good deal
faster--the 8500 was a little behind the curve even when it was new. If
you're asking about the image quality, it should be a wash--the 8500
doesn't have a lot of room for improvement in that regard. If you're
asking about the TV features of the 9600 AIW vs the 8500DV, it's a mixed
bag--the 9600 would have a better tuner(_anything_ is better than the
tuner on the 8500DV), but it gives up the DVI out in order to get
support for two analog RGB monitors--the 9600 also uses a newer version
of the Rage Theater chip which provides additional hardware assistance
for MPEG encoding, reducing the workload on the CPU a bit.

 

[Barry Watzman]

How does the Radeon 9600 compare to an 8500DV in terms of video performance?

 

[J.Clarke]

The question was limited to framerates and performance, but I didn't
make that clear. I am fully aware of the multimedia differences
between the AIW and the video cards. The question was asked because
Best Buy has the 9600 for $79 tomorrow morning.

Geez, grab it.

 

[J.Clarke]

Yeha

but a 9600 deluxe version has fireiwire so you will not need all in
wonder cards anymore. You won't need piunnacle cards. You can do it
with firewire altough I heard that external firewire cards are more
reliable that onboard firewire.

You can do _what_ with firewire? You can get boxes that attach via
firewire that give you a tuner and analog capture capability, but the
decent ones cost about the same as an All-In-Wonder. And you will
probably find that those boxes don't work and play well with a firewire
port on an AGP board.

I'm not sure what you believe you are gaining by using an external box
connected via firewire instead of using a PCI board.

And read up on the 8500DV--the problem with its firewire port apply to
any firewire port connected via the AGP bus as they involve components
external to the video board.

 

[Sooo Sad]

Yeha

but a 9600 deluxe version has fireiwire so you will not need all in wonder
cards anymore. You won't need piunnacle cards. You can do it with firewire
altough I heard that external firewire cards are more reliable that onboard
firewire.

 

[Barry Watzman]

The question was limited to framerates and performance, but I didn't
make that clear. I am fully aware of the multimedia differences between
the AIW and the video cards. The question was asked because Best Buy
has the 9600 for $79 tomorrow morning.

Yeha

but a 9600 deluxe version has fireiwire so you will not need all in wonder
cards anymore. You won't need piunnacle cards. You can do it with firewire
altough I heard that external firewire cards are more reliable that onboard
firewire.

 

[J.Clarke]

Well,

a firewire card cost like 40 dollars. Buy one, connect your digital
camera to it and that is it. You won't need all in god wonders to do
the trick. But I think onboard firewire is a bit new and thus
instable.

I see. So how does one record a television broadcast with one's digital
camera?

 

[J.Clarke]

Hey Barry, I just caught this thread and was wondering about the
"(from analog sources)" condition regarding the 8500DV. I have seen
that for the AIW 9000 Pro, too. Does that mean that the 8500DV cannot
be used for DV video capture or is it unimportant (are the avi and
mpeg-2 formats analog)?? Seems odd since it is called "8500DV".
Anyway, thanks,

The "DV" part of the 8500DV consists of a Firewire port that doesn't
work very well because it has to go through a PCI-AGP bridge, and a
digital tuner (digital circuitry, not digital signal) that is grossly
oversensitive and overloads at the slightest pretext.

You _might_ be able to use the firewire port for DV but don't count on
it working. You can't do off-the-air HD capture with it without an
additional board that can tune the digital broadcasts.

AVI and MPEG-2 are necessarily digital is is any other data stored on a
computer, however with the AIWs the signal that was analyzed and encoded
in those formats was analog when it came into the machine.

 

[Sooo Sad]

Well,

a firewire card cost like 40 dollars. Buy one, connect your digital camera
to it and that is it. You won't need all in god wonders to do the trick. But
I think onboard firewire is a bit new and thus instable.

 

[Barry Watzman]

It was my fault for not making it more clear, but the inquiry was
limited only to straight video dispaly performance.

However, a 9600 plus firewire port (wherever) hardly makes the
equivalent of an AIW 8500. You still don't have either video capture
(from analog video sources) or the tuner functionality.

 

[Larry B]

It was my fault for not making it more clear, but the inquiry was
limited only to straight video dispaly performance.

However, a 9600 plus firewire port (wherever) hardly makes the
equivalent of an AIW 8500. You still don't have either video capture
(from analog video sources) or the tuner functionality.

Hey Barry, I just caught this thread and was wondering about the
"(from analog sources)" condition regarding the 8500DV. I have seen
that for the AIW 9000 Pro, too. Does that mean that the 8500DV cannot
be used for DV video capture or is it unimportant (are the avi and
mpeg-2 formats analog)?? Seems odd since it is called "8500DV".
Anyway, thanks,

LarryB

 

[J.Clarke]

Thanks, John! Would the AIW's (esp 9000 Pro) allow for recording to
CDr or DVDr from external video sources like a satellite box, tuner or
even VHS tape?

As long as the external source has an s-video, composite video, or
modulated video output the AIW should be able to capture from it,
however the newer ones do honor Macrovision so copying a commercial VHS
tape might be problematical. I used to record from DirecTV regularly
until I got a DirecTivo.

Would this be real time or to HDD first?

The software provided by ATI doesn't write direct to DVD or CD unless
you have packet-writing set up or are using DVD-RAM, neither of which
gives you a disk that is readable by most standalone players. Normally
writing to DVD or CD would be a two-step process--record to HDD and then
write. You might want to edit out commercials before you burn the DVD
or CD.

I know that
AIW is not a burner program but will it handle the video input
(streaming??)?

It will do the capture to hard disk, but without third party software it
won't stream live to a second machine--I understand though that that is
coming in a future release of MMC.

Now, if they and Dvico would just get their act together and integrate
HDTV into MMC . . .

LarryB

 

[Larry B]

The "DV" part of the 8500DV consists of a Firewire port that doesn't
work very well because it has to go through a PCI-AGP bridge, and a
digital tuner (digital circuitry, not digital signal) that is grossly
oversensitive and overloads at the slightest pretext.

You _might_ be able to use the firewire port for DV but don't count on
it working. You can't do off-the-air HD capture with it without an
additional board that can tune the digital broadcasts.

AVI and MPEG-2 are necessarily digital is is any other data stored on a
computer, however with the AIWs the signal that was analyzed and encoded
in those formats was analog when it came into the machine.

Thanks, John! Would the AIW's (esp 9000 Pro) allow for recording to
CDr or DVDr from external video sources like a satellite box, tuner or
even VHS tape? Would this be real time or to HDD first? I know that
AIW is not a burner program but will it handle the video input
(streaming??)? LarryB