PVR-350 TV-OUT vs. ATI S-Video Out

[shfaxx]

Folks,
I've been up and running for a few months now with the PVR-350 TV Out and have since come across an ATI 7000 series Video card. I love the idea of being able to play DIVX and other video formats with the seperate video card, but can someone let me know if it's worth it? How do the outputs compare to one another?
Also since I'm thinking about not using the PVR-350's TV out I'm assumine I can now use my optical out on my motherboard for audio. Has anyone get tihs type of setup? Is it worth it?

thanks!

[Huw]

I would say the PVR 350 will be better than your cards s-video.

I use a PVR 350 but do not use the TV-out, I use the DVI on my graphics card to connect to my plasma screen, and use my spdif out for audio

[Guest]

I use both a PVR350 and a ATI7000. The quality is slightly better with the 350 but not by much.

I prefer to use the ATI7000 as it allows me to play my DIVX files. I do swith to the PVR350 whenever I watch football as the flaws of the ATI7000 are much more obvious with fast moving scenes.

I would suggest you try both and see which you prefer.

[bucknljake]

if you want great TV-Out, the X-Card allows for composite, S-video, or component (up to 720p) and includes Xvid / Divx support (where the 350 doesn't) the downside is that the XCard only supports 256 color in it's GUI (the menus)
unless you are using RGB/DVI output to a high-end High-def TV (in which case, just use your video card) the XCard is most likely the best output device you can use.

[shfaxx]

Thanks fellas, I setup my machine last night with the ATI 7000 card and your are correct, the MPEG2 playback is a little to be desired. I have it now so I can switch back and forth.

Few more Qs on this, Huw, you said you use your SPDIF out... How did you configure this? I have an ABIT VA-10 Mobo with onboard SPDIF out and tried to use it last night but got nothing. I have the 350's audio passing through the Line-In.

The X-card, will GBPVR work with it? Is the XCard basically a video card setup for high quality TV-Out?

Finally, When playing the DIVX files through the GB-PVR and the ATI 7000 card, it seems the quality is not that great. I used to use my PlayStation 2 and an old app called BroadQ to watch DIVX movies which worked well except when the bitrate was too high. Any thoughts on why the decreased quality when going through GBPVR?

thanks

[bucknljake]

as far as the x-card goes, it is basically a hardware decoding card (for HQ TV out) it's great for playing DVD's as well because it has Coax digital audio output (as well as regular 2ch analog) yes, it works well w/ GBPVR there's settings for it under Playback->Hardware Decoder Device the audio seems to just go to the analog out of the XCard by default I'm not sure if there's a setting for switching to the digital output (like for watching a DVD) It's a great card that was ahead of it's time when it first came out (somewhere around '01 i believe) but it never became widely recognized and thus there aren't alot of SW apps out there that support it. oh, and the card still runs around $80 - $90 so if you are on a tight budget, like most of us here that use GBPVR this may not be a great price/value ratio item for you.

for more info go to their webite:
http://www.sigmadesigns.com/products/xcard.htm