Best TV out video card

[csy]

You can match stand-alone TV picture quality by using pixel-adaptive hardware deinterlacing available on mid-range and upwards video cards.

S-video interface does degrade the picture quality but on a SDTV it only degrades the quality by a small amount. Try this for yourself by connecting your VCR to TV via S-video (or composite) and use the VCR tuner as a back-to-back comparison to the TV tuner.

[Zato]

Zato - how smooth is motion?

Do you see any studdering or jumpy motion?
(this is what I would expect to see if the 64bit memory interface is a bottleneck)

The motion is fine - I was getting alot of studdering on my old 4200ti, but the 6200 is doing fine in that regard. If I can just nail down the picture quality, I'll be a happy panda.

[wscrivens]

You can match stand-alone TV picture quality by using pixel-adaptive hardware deinterlacing available on mid-range and upwards video cards.

S-video interface does degrade the picture quality but on a SDTV it only degrades the quality by a small amount. Try this for yourself by connecting your VCR to TV via S-video (or composite) and use the VCR tuner as a back-to-back comparison to the TV tuner.

That segues in to my question perfectly. I have a rather old TV with a busted tuner. For a number of years I have been using a VCR as a tuner, with a composite video feed to the TV - and it is working fine. I built my GBPVR around an ASUS P5S800-VM motherboard and a Hauppaague 150 tuner. I've got 1GB memory, and a 2.8GHZ processor, so there should be no problem there. I think the weak link in the system right now is the video card - an NVIDIA GEForce 2 with 64MB of memory. I'm feeding the S-videop output through an in-line converter to the same composite video input I use with the VCR. (not at the same time!) The picture quality with the VCR is a lot better than with the PVR.

I want to upgrade the video card, and I am looking at a variety of mid-range cards that offer S-video output and cost in the $50- $75 range. I see both NVIDIA and ATI chips offered by several card manufacturers, and the specs are pretty much greek to me. I can understand the comments given above about passive cooling, and I have a good chsssis fan sitting right next to the video card, so heat should not be a problem.

I like ATI graphics for games, and there have been comments here about problems with NVIDIA. In the Tiger Direct website (My favorite source for components) I see ATI Radeon 9550 from ATI, PowerColor, and Diamond Stealth. Does anyone have experience with any of those? The "genuine" ATI is the most expensive and I wonder if that's worth the extra $$.

TIA

Walt

[csy]

I own an ASUS 9550 with an ATI driver bug causing the TV-out to be disabled every time I reboot the PC, therefore requiring manual re-enabling after every reboot. ASUS support is very poor and ATI will not investigate fixing the driver because it is not an ATI card.

ATI cards are quite expensive. PowerColor is a very close ATI "partner", and would be a good second choice.

[wscrivens]

Interesting... I was thinking about an ASUS manufactured board, just on the basis that it would be more compatible with the MoBo.

Just in genreral, what characteristics should I be looking for in a video card? It will be used solely for TV, and at some point in the near future, I will probably get rid of the TV set I'm using and replace it with a flat panel monitor. Right now I have no plans to go to Hi-Def, at least until the price comes down.

So, so far I have the following:

• S-video output
  
• AGP 8X interface
  
• Convection cooling (no fan)
  

And these questions:

• + 1.5V specification? (The MoBo manual calls this out, but I can't find it in the spec sheets I have looked at)
  
• Memory? for 640x480 resolution at whatever frame rate SDTV requires, I would guess the memory requirement is pretty low. Higher resolutions on my TV set just make the picture overflow the screen.
  
• With a "real" monitor, what resolution is practical, and how much memory?
  
• What does "deinterlacing" do and why is it important? (I understand what interlaced video is - or was 30 years ago when I was repairing TV sets. Why would you want to eliminate it?)
  
• Is there a Wiki or other source of information about "tweaking" the video setup?
  

Tiger is offering a PNY GeForce FX 5500 for $29.95 - that's real tempting, but I would rather spend a little more and get a better picture.

Again, I don't want to be a pest, and thanks for the help!

Walt

[wscrivens]

Answering my own post.....
This thread is AWESOME http://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.php?t=16157
and has answered virtually all my questions. Thanks to all who posted to it.
My only comment is that I only found it by searching for information on the 6200 - not by seaching for "video card" or "Video Settings". The thread should be archived someplace, or wiki-ized to make it easier to find, IMHO. I don't know who does that sort of thing, but I would help if I can. I can't "give back" to the group with technical smarts, but maybe I could help in this way.

Walt

[Zato]

Interesting... I was thinking about an ASUS manufactured board, just on the basis that it would be more compatible with the MoBo.

I just wanted to comment that ASUS branded video cards are NOT guaranteed to work in ASUS motherboards. I know someone personally who had incompatibility issues and ASUS tech support told him this. He ended up having to go with a different card.

Just saying this cause it shouldn't drive your decision imo.

[volksman]

csy: have you tried the Omega Drivers for your ATI? They seem to push my AIW7200 much better than the manufactures drivers.

[csy]

csy: have you tried the Omega Drivers for your ATI? They seem to push my AIW7200 much better than the manufactures drivers.

Thanks, but I have tried these 3rd party drivers along with several others, with no fix for TV-out. These 3rd party drivers tend to offer gaming improvements, sometimes at the expense of video performance. You may have noticed the Omega drivers are missing the deinterlacing settings.

[stefan]

The thread should be archived someplace, or wiki-ized to make it easier to find, IMHO. I don't know who does that sort of thing, but I would help if I can. I can't "give back" to the group with technical smarts, but maybe I could help in this way.

Walt

Anyone can add things to the wiki. It's up to us users to keep it up to date and filled with information. If you want to add or change something there, send a pm to blader_se and he'll give you a username and password to get into the wiki.