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About LinkBacksSweet. I have to agree on your pick...I'm returning the Hauppauge 150 today and keeping the Theatrix card. Now, if I can just get my wife hooked so she will "authorise" purchase of new hardware for a dedicated machine.
Sweet. I have to agree on your pick...I'm returning the Hauppauge 150 today and keeping the Theatrix card. Now, if I can just get my wife hooked so she will "authorise" purchase of new hardware for a dedicated machine.
Bluefish266,
That's quite contrary to my experience with the 550. I'm going to get a good signal booster and install it and then try the 550 again. My previous experience with the 550 was not good. The quality of the picture was just BAD. I'll try it again with the booster tomorrow and post my findings here. Thanks again for the info, very helpful.
Sorry for the delay with this reply...
...but I have been out of the country (sunny - but freezing - Denmark !) and not had a chance to chase the info down...
The question related to Theatre 550 Pro (T550P) and AVI
T550P was designed with MCE firmly in mind
As such its native format is MPEG and not AVI
Does this mean that you can't capture AVI ?
No... you can always record to any of the compatible formats available - according to the recording software and codecs being used - but you will need a good CPU to handle simultaneous MPEG-2 decoding and AVI encoding at the same time
This is where ATI's advanced filtering programs come to the fore
Thanks to these filters, the captured images are cleaner than before
Artefacts are the enemy of smooth encoding/decoding because they are random and all of them get captured
Our advanced filters (combs etc) mean a cleaner source - so the captured result is not only higher quality than before - but it is also a smaller file
It is harder to say if the AVI quality will always be higher quality than with previous generation chips because the variety of potential subformats involved means that a generic answer is harder to tie down (anything from older AVI with Intel codec to newer DivX codecs based on MPEG-4)
T550P can produce amazing results - but those could be undermind by a less than ideal combination of software/formats (remember we are only talking about AVI !)
Could AVI actually be better on Theatre 550 Pro ?...
...when using a powerful CPU on an optimal PC with great choice of codecs - then the (qualified) answer is 'yes'
If you genuinely have an in-depth question in this area - can I suggest you post it here...
http://www.dvdoctor.net/cgi-bin/ulti...?ubb=forum;f=6
...where an army of video experts will be queuing up (round the world - in every time zone) to give you the best DV advice in the known universe (so it says on the packet !)
I am going to apologise up front if future responses on this kind of technical issue take a while - it is 'fun' to research for this level of specific question and I may not always be able to do it (feel informed)
.
"X800GT... snap it up while you still can"
HEXUS
......................................August 2005
welcome back from sunny and cold denmark!
I have seen that lots of companies don't talk about secam anymore in their first ink-stained press reports: it is seen as a simple PAL variant. Until the card ships to Europe in a PAL flavour, I've got no visibility as to whether it can manage the PAL-SECAM difference: that is, overlay of colour versus differential to the B/W signal. Andrzej, you'll have an instant customer if you can find out for me!
Welcome back Andrzej,Originally Posted by Andrzej
Could you maybe check if this T550P could be used in combination with an AGP AIW 9800SE ?
When will the card be available in europe
coming back to AVI, why would one follow this route
Analogue signal -> hardware encoder (MPG2) -> Soft decoder -> Soft encoder(Mpg2?)
Is it for
- Audio / Video sync (one also use AVI_IO with Theater 100, 200 chipsets)
- conversion to other formats (one could also convert the hardware encoded file)
Could someone explain to me?
Personally I would be happy to encode in MPeg2 directly
I am using AVI recording at the moment with my AIW 9800SE card because for highest quality and best A/V sync (under XP with AVI-IO)
One needs of course a large capacity harddisc and the best software encoders around.
Neutron
Last edited by neutron; 04-02-2005 at 01:02 PM.
I'm trying to figure out all this ridiculous AVI discussion going on in this thread, and others regarding the 550.
THE ATI 550 IS A TV TUNER CARD! NOT A CAPTURE CARD!
If you want to capture stuff to an AVI, buy a video capture card! Many good ones are made by Pinnacle, and they are cheaper than these 550 cards if you look around. AND you will get better picture. I absolutely don't seem to understand why you people are so concerned about capturing to AVI. That isn't what this is for! If you want to watch TV, buy the 550. If you want to make home movies, or transfer them to AVI, use a capture card.
Offcourse it's also a capture card. Why else would it have hardware Mpeg encoding?
Aslo, I capture everything first to mpeg and then I'll convert it to avi (xvid, divx), it always gives the best results. So this card will be perfect for me.
I can't wait untill I can buy this card in Europe (Belgium), I hope it will be available soon.
Last edited by evensteven; 04-02-2005 at 04:25 PM.
Why else would it have hardware mpeg encoding??? Because it is a PVR card. This card is designed to watch, pause, record, and fast forward live tv. I understand that you could transfer old videos, but it seems like the wrong way to go, when a video editing/capture card is going to give you the best quality. With one of those cards you can capture to a completely uncompressed AVI with 100% quality. Why would you use a TV card to do your capture when you will AT BEST get 75% - 80% of the quality?
Andrzej, I've got a very disappointing response from ATI customer support:
"Regarding TV Wonder Elite:
The TV Wonder Elite is not suppported with the ATI MMC software.
Regards,
Customer Care
ATI Technologies, Inc.
http://www.ati.com"
If the card is not supported, then why does the box of the theatrix say it supports MMC 9.0.4? Can you tell me if this is true? Thank you.
Huh! PVR= Personal Video Recorder so used to capture ....right?
ATI All In wonder cards were always designed to Watch TV, Record from TV and via the breakoutbox Composite and S-VHS signals. This Theatrix is no exception. (yeah it has the purple breakoutbox)
Using this for capture video tapes etc.. makes sense since we talk about DVD MPEG2 with bitrate up to 9Mb/s. As you might know with this bitrate and videoresulution it really doesn;'t matter what encoder you use. The quality is in most cases 95-99% of the AVI route.
I have been involved with SVCD and I can tell you for SVCD it makes sense to capture first AVI en then encode with software like CCE, Procoder, etc..
If you use it only for watching TV then use a TV....
Why would I buy this Theatrix
- To Capture TV programs (MPEG2)
..........edit the MPEG2 stream
..........authoring DVD
..........burn to DVD
- Incidently record old Video tapes and laserdisc
What are the criteria for such a card
- Quality of recorded MPEG2 stream
.........mainly depends on TV tuner and chipset
.........(so not really on hardware mpeg2 encoding)
- Audio and Video synchronisation
.........Till now 99% of hardware used seperate soundcard with all the
.........troubles...
- Audio quality
.........Most TV tuners card do have bad to moderate sound quality
- Recording audio in AC3
- Recorded MPEG2 should be ready for DVD Authoring
- Record from standby mode
- Easy to use software with lots of settings and no Bugs
- Filters to cleanup noise etc...
Regarding those Pinnacle cards, which one are you referring too?
I thought they used hardware MJPEG to capture video....(DC10 plus etc..)
Details of 550Pro according ATI press release
http://www.ati.com/products/theater5...nchenglish.pdf
I am brand new to this forum, but not to many others. Thanks to all who have taken the bullet in trying out these cards and reporting the results. I own 2 Hauppauge 150's, a Leadtek Expert, and an ATI AIW 9800 Pro, and I run a P4 system using GBPVR as my PVR software for the 150's and MMC 9.03 for the ATI. The Leadtek is retired.
Enough of the background, now to my point. I don't understand how watching this card live should provide any different results than the AIW. Unless the TV tuner on the card is improved over the AIW. I have seen nothing on this point. So a comparison of the live image quality is really only a comparison of tuners. In my opinion, the live image from the 150 tuner is about the same quality as the AIW.
The real selling point of the 550 is supposed to be the Theatrix 550 encoding chip, so the comparison should properly be of the played back mpeg. If anyone has an AIW to compare, it would be nice to know how the AIW's Theater 200 chip stacks up. As a 12 bit solution, it is certainly still capable. I suspect the biggest difference will be the 3d comb filtering, given that video soap type filters should be relatively similar on both cards. Anyway, I am being selfish, trying to determine whether I should shell out another $80 for something only slightly better than an AIW.
When I compare my 150's with the AIW, I much prefer the 150's, which use almost no resources. The AIW is still a nice 3rd recorder for 3 program nights.
S.
Last edited by satnav4; 05-02-2005 at 05:31 AM.
welcome satnav4. I think the quality playing back the mpeg2 capture has been reported as good, with no audio desynch issues, even with background processes running on the box. I've also heard (but not tested, am broke) that by comparison the hauppage stuff is lighter on processer use, a real benefit.
To me, the 550 chip gives:
- likely cleaner image when outputting a tv signal to a big tv screen (at least ati says so...)
- assured audio/video synch when capturing because a/v encoders on same card
- if your main graphics display card also serves as a capture card (like the AIWs), you can lighten its load with the 550 Pro as an add-in card
- as you say, better filters
For people who prefer avi capture, I would think the card is not the best choice, cos you've got to decode the mpeg2 stream and encode to your avi codec flavour, on the fly. So unless you've got to have a hulk of a processor or a dedicated capture box...
I hate tying up my computer for long encoding sessions, personally: just wasting cycles, when with a card like this you can go straight to something practical and dvdable.
There was a link somewhere on this thread: page 6, 7, to a site where someone has put TV captures of the 550 Pro, the 150 and the hauppage 500mce. Although I personally don't find this sort of test a true indication of what I'll hypothetically get on my box, you may want to check it out. This sort of exercise reveals nothing of what to expect from playback of a capture, as you rightly pointed out
Andrzej: if the card first encodes all analogue signals to MPEG-2, and then the stream has to be decoded, what happens when you use a program like AMCap, which only captures to WMV or to uncompressed avi. What is the bitrate used by the card if the program has no options to tell the card what bitrate to use? I hope you understand me.
BTW, what type of dolby digital encoding we get with the card? Hardware or software?
Last question. If the MPEG-2 stream has to be decoded by the system; it must done by the installed DVD decoder i.e. PowerDVD decoder (which have options to deinterlace, producing a 60fps video) so it could be possible to have a deinterlaced 60fps video captured, or this wouldn't work?
Thank you.
Some have commented it is not fair to compare a Theater 550 receiving an S-Video signal to a Hauppauge 150 (500) receiving its tuner feed. This argument has merit. According to the attached Compro article/ad http://www.comprousa.com/products/vmtvultra-3dyc.htm, 3d filtering is needed on tuner feeds to clear up the ntsc (never the same color) signal to properly separate the y/c signals. In S-Video, the y/c signals are already separated. Because the 550 has 3d filtering, you would expect recordings through the tuner to more closely approach S-Video quality than a 150, which to my knowledge does not have 3d filtering.
Does this really address anyones concerns? Maybe not. For me it does. If I just want to record TV shows to watch and delete, I will use my 150 tuners. The image qualty is great. If I want to save a movie to DVD, I will record through S-Video using the 150 or my AIW 9800pro. For anyone setting up a Tivo like PVR, it is still a no brainer to get some 150's or a 500 and use GBPVR (free), SageTV, BeyondTV etc, where you can set it and forget it. Use the S-Video when you get any "3d fears".
Just my 2 cents.
S.
Here are some screenshots from the theatrix 550. Make sure that you maximize the image in the browser.
http://www.automatit.net/users/bluefish266/
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