Worth The Spot in my computer
Written: Dec 07 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: HAS TV,DVD,MPEG2 Encoding
Cons: Slow icky software
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| kkeeton's Full Review: ATI ALL-IN-WONDER 128 Pro, (32 MB) AGP Video Card |
Well first off you are considering buying this card because of it's cost over the matrox. I would recommend this card (go get it now) let me give you a 411 on who and why I chose this. I am a heavy computer user. When you computer breaks I’m the guy that people call (really it's my job) I also have an intermediate hold in the video editing and production area. Working on some cool stuff with expensive cool equipment.
Now who cares I came here to learn about the AIW128! Yeah.
I was researching this card for about a month before it's release. Remembering all the yuck along with the 8bit AIW I was a little skeptic. I wanted to go matrox (it was 450 at the time) that was what made me want an ATI. So I did my homework I want tell all the boring stuff you can go to ATi web to hear that. Here are the cool things I saw and liked before purchasing (i.e. what I read on ati) this card will accept s-video in and component. It allows DVD decoding (I knew I wanted dvd in future) and it decoded and encoded MPEG2. It had TV (was upgrading a Hauppauge TV card this was a MUST!) and it could put video out. All this was important to me and what I was looking for.
Here are positives after buying the card. The dongle was secure in the plug in (if you are pulling cords all the time like me a secure connection is good) GREAT 3d support (I play a few games never had a slow down or a bad graphic) great refresh support I have a 21' and I need fast refresh it passes the test. I got a DVD like 2 months later the DVD works GREAT no hardware problems to date. The encoder has the ATI (TV format) and MPEG2 they work w/o any flaws. Basically there were NO hardware flaws. I think the hardware is GREAT! This is built well and has no conflicts or flaws as far as a chip incompatibility goes. A+
Now software, this lacks I was sadly disappointed on this because it was such a great card that the software didn’t stand up to it. I have run this card on all OS (98/NT/2000/UNIX BTW Unix Linux works fine with rage chipset and xfree4 supports rage128!) and it works fine all components work but they could be better. Here is why
Let's start with the basic drivers you get on the cd. Fine what about upgrades? Good luck figuring out the ATI web page if you need a new driver and forget Unix support they don’t say much. You can get it but it was confusing thing god Microshaft includes support for it from the get go. Now on to the software that comes with it. I HATE included software I never want to see a hardware company make 'cool multimedia software' they suck at it. The TV changer is SLOW and is way to GUI (to much graphical stuff slowing it down) this sucks it just is slow, you play with it enough and you hate it (but I still use it sucks but works) The decoding sometimes will not be clear but if I switch programs (like a Linux xtv2000) it looks fine who knows. They include a CD player with the same stupid GUI WHY it's a video card!?! And the DVD seems to work fine I have never used another I have no complaints with it. However this sucks... the DVD player is only available in USA so you can’t download updates, you must mail order it. Shitty. The capture program I have never used (I use premier) so I can't say much there (bad GUI) those are the major programs.
Then it has the re-play TV if you are watching let's say Simpson’s and you see homer get hit with a box ...cool I want to see that again hit spacebar and it will replay the last 10 seconds of TV (you can change all the settings from space bar to seconds) so you can instant replay this is cool except for some reason it takes so damn long to load the replay it's not worth while (by 2 long I mean like 4 seconds and I have a mmx500 and that is to long) so I never use that feature. The hardware encoding it cool it will record MPEG1, 2 direct to your swap area that is cool.
As far as games go I don’t play many however I can render some cool 3-d stuff with no slow downs you have the rage128 which is cool on it's own.
So I recommend that you get this even thought the software sucks who cares it' s cool. This was a great buy for me. It’s kind of hard to resent I paid 150 for it. If I would a bought the matrox at 450 I would be "oh man I can get a big TV for that price" so in the end I love it!
A update if you are a hardcore gamer I know the radon AIw came out so get that (get it anyway it is cooler) and I know the 128AIW is like 100 now BUY BUY BUY you and your kids and your mom and your cat's will love this card. (Get a 21' next!!!!)
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
kkeeton
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Reviews written: 8
Trusted by: 2 members
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