Home Office TV Solution
Written: Feb 01 '01 (Updated Feb 06 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Saved me a lot of space
Cons: You are stuck with it's video capabilities.
The Bottom Line: Need a TV for a home office? This is the card for you.
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| rbinck's Full Review: ATI ALL-IN-WONDER 128 Pro, (32 MB) AGP Video Card |
I have set up an home office in my bedroom and didn’t have room to have my computer and a television. I purchased an ATI All-In-Wonder from a friend of mine who was going to try something else and wanted to dispose of the ATI card. Well it seemed to me to be a very good option versus trying to cram a monitor and a TV in the room. Boy what a great investment it was!
The price I paid was less than the cost of a small color TV so far so good. I added a Cambridge Soundworks four point surround card and speakers and I was in business. You can read my epinion on the Cambridge Soundworks speakers at:
http://www.epinions.com/cmd-review-7088-4B7A62BA-3A5B46CF-prod3
Once all of this was installed and hooked up to cable, which I had to run into the bedroom, the TV tuner was ready to go. I was using an old Multisync 13” monitor and the picture quality was just horrible! I was ready to throw in the towel and buy a conventional TV when my son who is in the computer business, suggested we try a different monitor. He brought over a Gateway 2000 EV700 17” job and what a difference. We tried several different monitors, including a 21” Multisync, but I opted for the 17” Gateway due to room considerations.
The picture quality is best at the 640 by 480 resolution. I use my monitor resolution set at 1280 by 1024 and the full screen resolution is a little grainy and setting the monitor resolution to 640 by 480 doesn’t change the look of the full screen picture by the way. Full screen is fine when viewed across the room, but if I’m setting at the computer the 640 by 480 window is just fine. It is great to be able to type this epinion and have the TV on in a window, which is what I am doing right now. It is also great to be able to watch TV and surf the web during commercials. Ever had a commercial come along for something you wanted to buy? You know one of those 800 number jobs and there is never a pen and paper handy and by the time you get all of that together the commercial is over? Well with this setup I can just click the “capture video” button and “grab” the frame that contains the phone number.
In addition to the TV tuner input there are two other inputs. One is an S-video and the other is a VHS connector that takes standard composite video. There are line inputs for audio signals as well.
One of the useful features I have used is the ability to turn on a transcript file. This feature works in conjunction with the closed captioning feature. It will make a transcript text file automatically.
The audio is output from the TV tuner and plugged into your stereo sound card. This can go in on a line input connection. The stereo is very precise and has a great sound, but I have noticed that on some networks the audio quality is so bad it fakes the decoder out and you get some fluttering type noise. Due to this it would be nice to be able to turn the stereo decoder off, but as of this writing I haven’t been able to do so.
In summary, I would not be caught without a TV card in my home office computer. I don’t know how I have survived without it before, but I can say that for so many things. Isn’t technology great?
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 50
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Epinions.com ID:
rbinck
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 - Top 500 |
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Member: Richard Binckley
Location: Houston, Texas
Reviews written: 125
Trusted by: 26 members
About Me:
Retired A/V professional, likes Hawaii and Classic Cars
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