Radeon AIW vs GF4 TV Out

[Wakecrash]

I have two video cards I could use for my HTPC
Any comments on which should be better?
ATI Radeon AIW 32MB DDR (The first rev Radeon)

Gainward Geforce4 TI 4200 with VIVO,

Both have S-video out

Thanks for any advise.

I have a PVR 250 card connected to directv and a 36" std def TV with s-vid inputs

[kny3twalker]

Geforce 4
your other is alittle out of date
and will make your CPU work a lot harder
but try both

[stanger89]

Try yourself and compare, the Geforce is newer, but nVidia cards got about 0 respect in HTPC use before the Geforce FX line, comparing yourself is the only way to know for sure.

[Wakecrash]

GF4 does look better, but no overscan issue I will post on anouther thread.

[Wakecrash]

since I see a lot of views I will update.
I went and bought a GF FX 5500, picture quality much better than the other two cards by far and can be adjusted to fill entire screen.
Also, when watching fox news the little ticker at the bottom used to be jercky,,, no more.

It worth upgrading to a newer card.

[stanger89]

Originally posted by Wakecrash
Also, when watching fox news the little ticker at the bottom used to be jercky,,, no more.

Gota ask

What decoders are you using, and are you using DXVA?

[Jere_Jones]

Thanks for the update.

Can you elaborate on how you adjusted the overscan?

Jere

[kny3twalker]

and one more question is the GF FX 5500 really a faster video card than the Gainward Geforce4 TI 4200 with VIVO?

I am thinking it is slower

[stanger89]

Originally posted by kny3twalker
and one more question is the GF FX 5500 really a faster video card than the Gainward Geforce4 TI 4200 with VIVO?

No offense, but are you a gamer? You seem to be overly concerned about choosing the "faster" card.

I'm just curious, because although you are probably right, there are distict advantages to going with an FX over a 4 series:

-The FXs have DXVA, the TI's don't or it's VERY limited.
-DX9 compliance (limited benefit)
-Newer card/newer design better TV out apparently

[Wakecrash]

I am now using the NVDVD 2.55 decoder and DXVA is set at default. I have just left DXVA at default because I have no idea what it does. One selction just has A, B, C, or D then anouther has Bob, Weave or Bob and Weave. I might play around with the setting sometime.

The new card did not initially come up and overscan at 800X 600, however I set the disply res at 720X480, it overscanned, picture was a bit squeezed, then when I set back to 800X600 it stayed in overscan mode.

The G-force 4 Ti maybe a faster card for DX8 based games, and should and may be faster on some DX9 games that disable DX9 features played on DX8 cards. Halo is an example that loads certain eyecandy only if card is true DX9. If my primary reason was gaming I would stick with a GF4. Well sort of, I have an FX 5900 for my gaming rig.

You can usually find some pretty good gaming performance reviews here:http://www6.tomshardware.com/

[kny3twalker]

No offense, but are you a gamer?

what do you mean???

of course I love to play video games

and yes my friends and I get on a few times a week and play

usually Counterstrike, and now Beta CS Source

we play other online games but none are quite as fun

and of course there are a great number of single players I like to play when I have time (Doom3, Far Cry, Halo etc.....)

should any of these matter though?

and I know what you mean by in Halo and a DirectX 8 though

and Sorry not trying to "Thread jack"

[stanger89]

Originally posted by kny3twalker
and Sorry not trying to "Thread jack"

Hey, that's one of my favorite things to do here

No, I was just curous, because you seem to come at the video card issue from the absolute/average performace angle, where faster is better, even at the cost of some features. And being that you do like to game that makes perfect sense, and I'd be right there with you if talking about cards for gaming.

However I gave up on PC gaming (got an Xbox), and now I come from the performance is secondary to image quality and features that affect it...

*provided the card has enough performance to function properly*

For example, the Geforce 5 (FX) and 6 series have far more advanced video features than that of previous generation cards, and have better image quality to boot.

From my perspective, assuming all did everything I need (VMR9 and no tearing), I have no preference Geforce FX 5200 or 5950 Ultra. With Video, once you have enough power, more does you no good, it's a binary thing, the card is either fast enough or not, if it's fast enough, a faster one is pointless.

Now I know the 5200 5950 example is bad, since the 5200 can't really do VMR9, and uses less advanced video processing (esp deinterlacing) than the faster FX cards.

[kny3twalker]

I understand
just my Mentality

Sorry about that

-god just like my car.....

[stanger89]

Nothing to appologize for, it was just an intersting observation I made