Theater 650 Pro Discussion

[spacded]

I would like to make it clear that me and MR SPacecadet are not one and the same we just by pure coincidence happen to have similar names , I am currently speaking to my lawyer about the negative comments made about me and some of you can expect supoenas very soon

Jake123
Your attitude, "Mr. Spacded to you", speaks volumes of your insecurity and "professed" knowledge. You are indeed a legend in your mind.

im not sure how you got all of that detailed psychological evaluation out of one post, but its these kind of comments that keep me coming back here for a laugh at pompous indignant twits such as your self!

clearly you lack any sense of humour or a girlfriend!

[jake123]

Your response...requires no response. My humor and social life is quite good FYI, but thanks for inquiring. "Twit"...don't know too many men who would use the word "twit". But alas...You are truly a legend in your own mind.

[Seraphic-]

Has anyone got the 650 to capture 640x480? It seems to be locked at 720x480.

[spacded]

Originally Posted by jake123

"Twit"...don't know too many men who would use the word "twit". But alas...You are truly a legend in your own mind.

I was thinking of another 4 letter word starting with C and ending in T
but thats are useful and your not!

hope your enjoying your 650!

[dabl]

I'm hoping the below won't happen when using the 650 with a Vbox 164e......

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post8300987
....
Now for the updated bad news. Using multiple cards in the same system works OK when recording 2 HDTV Programs, but if you start out by recording SD programing on the 650 Pro and then try to watch HDTV material with the HDTV Wonder, MCE will not allow you to. All you get is a message advising you that the second tuner (HDTV Wonder) needs to be redetected in the TV setup area or mce will simply crash. Not good at all. It is essentialy rendering the second tuner useless even though it is not being used. I am not sure if this is an issue with media center itself or can be rectified by ati changing the way that MCE detects it's tuners via driver a driver release. If it's an MCE issue, this is probably the straw that will break the camels back for most of you because I don't see microsoft putting any more resources into this operating system considering the deadline they are battling for Vista.

[jonaslasky]

Originally Posted by spacded

I would like to make it clear that me and MR SPacecadet are not one and the same we just by pure coincidence happen to have similar names , I am currently speaking to my lawyer about the negative comments made about me and some of you can expect supoenas very soon

Ooops... forgive me Spacedude... How I ever have got you mixed up with that humorless spacecadet I'll never know. Clearly you are a lot funnier. That other dude/bloke is devoid of humor and wrong to boot... please cancel that subpoena. I would offer you one of my T 550 as a peace offering but it only does NTSC, which is useless to you.

Go easy on that 123 guy... he's just a bit intense. I haven't seen your buddy Satnav lately.


Jonas

[spacded]

Originally Posted by jonaslasky

Go easy on that 123 guy... he's just a bit intense. I haven't seen your buddy Satnav lately.

Jonas

Me and satnav have sadly broken up!, he was getting too clingy and wanted me to commit which im not ready for, i think i may make J123 my Biatch!

ps its funny how MM Mike seems to have disappeared now everyones slagging off the 650 pro!

[Octavean]

Originally Posted by dabl

I'm hoping the below won't happen when using the 650 with a Vbox 164e......

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post8300987
....
Now for the updated bad news. Using multiple cards in the same system works OK when recording 2 HDTV Programs, but if you start out by recording SD programing on the 650 Pro and then try to watch HDTV material with the HDTV Wonder, MCE will not allow you to. All you get is a message advising you that the second tuner (HDTV Wonder) needs to be redetected in the TV setup area or mce will simply crash. Not good at all. It is essentialy rendering the second tuner useless even though it is not being used. I am not sure if this is an issue with media center itself or can be rectified by ati changing the way that MCE detects it's tuners via driver a driver release. If it's an MCE issue, this is probably the straw that will break the camels back for most of you because I don't see microsoft putting any more resources into this operating system considering the deadline they are battling for Vista.

Now that is indeed interesting,….

It is unfortunate that this isn’t a single Theater 650 Pro account which would make things simpler but it is interesting nonetheless. Do take note that the HDTV Wonder is known to not work with another HDTV Wonder in the same MCE system. This could be a driver problem or a hardware problem. The fact that the HDTV Wonder works with the Theater 650 Pro HDTV component at all is a good sign but I am not surprised in the lest that there are problems with such a combo.

Given that two HDTV Wonder cards don’t work in the same MCE system, it would seem that ATI has either taken some liberties with the HDTV Wonder design or Microsoft has extended some latitude (that they might not extend to some other companies) to ATI. Keep in mind that RU2 allows the use of two HDTV tuners in MCE and two HDTV Wonder tuners (and any other MCE compliant NTSC/ATSC tuner) should work together as mandated by the Microsoft Designed for Windows Media Center Edition Logo Program .

If the poster had a HDTV Wonder and a Theater 650 Pro installed on a MCE 2K5 system it may be difficult to keep track of which tuner is actually being used. To eliminate any question about tuner priority, the tuners priority should be either manually assigned in the registry or a utility should be used such as the following:

Media Center Tuner Priority Utility

We might be getting close to finding out how the Theater 650 Pro’s NTSC/ATSC limitation is handled in MCE. Perhaps one tuner on the Theater 650 Pro is locked down when the other is in use?

Then again, who knows,….!?!

ATI sure isn’t telling us!

[AIW_VID_FAN]

OK, Ive been riding this train since the 550 came out.
Swore off ATI many times, but couldnt wait to try out the Wonder 650
from Best Buy.
I guessing our issues are related to the rework (a couple of wires hand soldered to a cap or resistor and both input connectors.)
Here is what I sent to ATI ...

As a die hard yet very frustrated and dissapointed fan of my AIW products ,the Elite 550, HDTV wonder and the new 650. Its SAD to see the 650 launch is another disaster.
I purchased my tv wonder 650 from BestBuy several days ago.
Upon inspection of the card I IMMEDIATELY noticed the rework (wire to both input connectors).
As a Computer Repair Engineer for over 20 years
for several Computer manufacturers
I cant believe these boards shipped in this sad state.
My card initially installed OK but like other people have a problem finding any ATSC signal.
I have spent 3 days testing and rebuilding 2 machines investigation your problem.
I have 2 ATSC tuners (one is the HDTV wonder)receiving approx. 24 digital channels from this attic mounted UHF antenna.
After swapping the card out from pci slot to the second PC. The card no longer will let any machine boot, I have since returned it and tried yet another 650, It too has the rework and also gets no ATSC channels. After reading online
that others are having the same problem, I also
purchased a VHF/UHF/FM signal booster, It did scan ONE digital channel but no longer sees it.

Someone should get FIRED for this.

I should be working for ATI, how can these boards ship in this state after the 550 launch.
I have < 2 weeks before I must return this card.
I will likely return it much sooner than that.
This issue needs ATI Senior Managment attention.
ATI owes its customers and investors an immediate response but I wont hold my breath.

[jonaslasky]

Originally Posted by AIW_VID_FAN

OK, Ive been riding this train since the 550 came out.
Swore off ATI many times, but couldnt wait to try out the Wonder 650
from Best Buy.

I can't help but be impressed by the dedication of ATI fans like AIW Vid Fan... it's bordering... no it's actually gone past the point of insanity. I can almost cry reading some of the posts here . Unfortunately, ATI doesn't seem to value this. They have done nothing but disappoint their most loyal fans again and again and again. Hell I can't think of any other company who could have gotten away with so much crap for so long.

One has to wonder if ATI and its partners even bother to test their products before releasing them.... how hard can it be to do the same thing that so many ATI fans have done?.... and these people are BEING PAID to do it. The fans on the other hand ARE PAYING to go through yet another heartache and sleepless nights.

I'm only here to see that ATI gets punished. I'm using none of their products and never will again. I'm just sorry AMD bought them.

Jonas

[Billium]

ATI TV Wonder 650 Total Recall

dailytech.com/Article.aspx?newsid=3969

(sorry I don't have enough posts for a live link, but if you copy above into your browser it should work)

[SpaceCadet]

Originally Posted by hrlslcbr

To be able to capture both NTSC and ATSC channels, you'd need 2 theatre 650 pro chips on one card.

Almost all of the 650 chip is devoted to analog. ATSC, like other digital TV broadcast formats, already carries an MPEG-2 stream and does not require any MPEG-2 encoding. The 650 chip requires an external ATSC tuner/demodulator. Not allowing concurrent use of the NTSC and ATSC tuners was a poor design decision. For some time, the majority of home PC's (at least in the US) have been sold with Windows Media Center Edition as the OS. MCE expects concurrent use of the analog and digital tuners, and ATI knew this (any relevant ATI manager who doesn't know that should be fired). I don't know whether it's possible to put two 650's on one card, but I would have much preferred a dual analog tuner board. That would have spared me a slot, which I could have used for a decent ATSC board, were I so inclined.

[Question]

I think there was more then one problem with the 650.

I returned mine Friday because the motion adaptive comb filter wasn’t working properly.

The 650 had a lot of hanging dots in motion when capturing from the composite input.

The 550 had very little.

I called ATI and they said it was a known problem and that a future driver release should fix the problem, but gave me no ETA on the driver release date.

[hrlslcbr]

Originally Posted by jonaslasky

One has to wonder if ATI and its partners even bother to test their products before releasing them...

My thoughts exactly. I believe we all know the answer.

SpaceCadet: The theatre 650 pro chip is used when capturing with any input, so if you're already capturing an NTSC channel, the chip is already in use; it can't process 2 channels at once. Just like the 550 pro; you can't capture both the TV tuner and S-Video signals (and if you're capturing using the S-Video input, the tuner is sitting there doing nothing, but the chip is not).

[SpaceCadet]

Originally Posted by hrlslcbr

The theatre 650 pro chip is used when capturing with any input, so if you're already capturing an NTSC channel, the chip is already in use; it can't process 2 channels at once. Just like the 550 pro; you can't capture both the TV tuner and S-Video signals (and if you're capturing using the S-Video input, the tuner is sitting there doing nothing, but the chip is not).

You misunderstand the issue. The question is not whether the chip is in use, but how much of it and how much additional circuitry would have been required to support concurrent analog and digital capture. The analog tuner and composite video inputs require use of the comb filter. The analog tuner, composite video, and S-Video inputs require analog to digital conversion (video digitization). The analog tuner, composite video, and S-Video inputs require use of the MPEG-2 encoder, which is a significant amount of circuitry (probably the bulk of the chip). The digital tuner doesn't require any of that stuff. Digital TV is just that--it's already in digital form. Specifically, it already contains an MPEG-2 stream. If any additional processing is required on that stream, it would be trivial in comparison to the full MPEG-2 encoding of the digitized analog data. ATI's choice was not to expend the small amount of additional engineering and development time, and instead deliver a half-a$$ed solution.

[jonaslasky]

Originally Posted by SpaceCadet

You misunderstand the issue. The question is not whether the chip is in use, but how much of it and how much additional circuitry would have been required to support concurrent analog and digital capture. The analog tuner and composite video inputs require use of the comb filter. The analog tuner, composite video, and S-Video inputs require analog to digital conversion (video digitization). The analog tuner, composite video, and S-Video inputs require use of the MPEG-2 encoder, which is a significant amount of circuitry (probably the bulk of the chip). The digital tuner doesn't require any of that stuff. Digital TV is just that--it's already in digital form. Specifically, it already contains an MPEG-2 stream. If any additional processing is required on that stream, it would be trivial in comparison to the full MPEG-2 encoding of the digitized analog data. ATI's choice was not to expend the small amount of additional engineering and development time, and instead deliver a half-a$$ed solution.

I think you're the only one who's misunderstanding something here. Quit with the digital/analog lecture already.... it's all old and tiresome to the rest of the members.

What you have to understand is ATI NEVER intended to make the 650 a dual tuner setup. They never intended it to be that way. They NEVER promised that it was going to be that way. If you have some weird issues about that, go buy an Nvidia DualTV. You're barking up the wrong tree. Take your issues somewhere else. Start a new thread about dual, triple or quadruple tuners on one board. How about multicore? seems to be the rage these days.

The real issue here is after ATI promised all kinds of new features and fixes, the 650 is released in an unusable state. Let's focus on that. Let's make them account for their undelivered promises.

Jonas