Rating: Summary: A great 3d card with solid video features Review: First and foremost this is a 3d graphics card, and a real good one at that. It has seen better days, but it still runs any game on the market, usually exceptionally well. I too have had various issues with some of the TV recording functions, the software encoder (seems to happen to every ATI All-in-Wonder card I own), and it does run a little hot (better than most competing 3d cards though). All in all, it's a great card, and the TV issues can be dealt with if you know what you're doing--it's just not for everyone.
Rating: Summary: Well worth every penny! Review: First of all, let's forget the notion that you're using this to tape shows from television, for either legal or illegal future usage. I'd like to give you the perspective of one who works daily with digital media, both in editing and filming. This card rocks! It certainly lives up to its name!I had some initial problems getting the output to work, but then again I'm not one to read a manual from top to bottom for fun. Sorry, that's just not my thing. I read the essentials for what I need to do. I was on a rush job and needed answers fast. Though the manual had them, I called ATI's tech support and they were nothing but superb. The person on the other end was cordial, quick to the point, and more importantly, solved my issue in less than 2 minutes! This card really saved our bacon when the president of our organization needed a tape from digital and needed it fast. Without the proper hardware for that, we relied on the All-in-Wonder card to get the job done. Needless to say, the prez was more than pleased with the results. If you need a reliable piece of equipment, this is the one to go with. But, please be sure to read the requirements. It will need a 300W power source, so keep that in mind when purchasing. Check the one in your PC and either confirm that what you have will work, or buy a newer more powerful one. Trust me, in the end, whatever you need done digital media wise, you will get it done with ATI. Enjoy!
Rating: Summary: Well worth every penny! Review: First of all, let's forget the notion that you're using this to tape shows from television, for either legal or illegal future usage. I'd like to give you the perspective of one who works daily with digital media, both in editing and filming. This card rocks! It certainly lives up to its name! I had some initial problems getting the output to work, but then again I'm not one to read a manual from top to bottom for fun. Sorry, that's just not my thing. I read the essentials for what I need to do. I was on a rush job and needed answers fast. Though the manual had them, I called ATI's tech support and they were nothing but superb. The person on the other end was cordial, quick to the point, and more importantly, solved my issue in less than 2 minutes! This card really saved our bacon when the president of our organization needed a tape from digital and needed it fast. Without the proper hardware for that, we relied on the All-in-Wonder card to get the job done. Needless to say, the prez was more than pleased with the results. If you need a reliable piece of equipment, this is the one to go with. But, please be sure to read the requirements. It will need a 300W power source, so keep that in mind when purchasing. Check the one in your PC and either confirm that what you have will work, or buy a newer more powerful one. Trust me, in the end, whatever you need done digital media wise, you will get it done with ATI. Enjoy!
Rating: Summary: SAVE YOUR MONEY Review: First off, the people that rated this card with 3 or more stars obviously have not used this card. Their reviews are a textbook review I have seen on many websites.
Secondly, before I bought this card I doubted reviews saying, I never have a bad experience with drivers, so I bought it. It was fine for 2 weeks, I got the most "updated" drivers and my games (Doom 3, GTA Vice City, NFS: Underground, and many more worked great). Then the troubles began; my computer would freeze every 45 minutes or so, depending on how much load was on the card itself. So, TV watching was limited, gaming was out of the question, but DVDs actually played without the card quitting on me.
Also free phone support is limited to 30 days after you buy it. Well, since I bought it from a private seller on Amazon who didn't get me the card until 31 days after I paid for it, the FREE phone support was useless.
I knew I wasn't going to pay the 2.99 or 3.99 a minute charges for help, because they would just give me answers to general problems from a list that they have in front of them. Also, going to the website for help is pointless too. E-mailing ATI for support only gives you a response of (once again) general problems with certain situations that have nothing to do with your problems.
I will only give this video card one good mark. The input connector for connecting a VCR to show VHS tapes on your monitor is great with no quality loss at all, the tv quality was pretty decent, and the one touch recording for tv programs was easy as well. I actually programmed the remote control so that I could even turn off my computer from my bed after watching tv or a dvd, just to make me that much lazier. For the people who gripe about having to update the tv listings every week, don't you get tv listings in the paper every Sunday? Enough said.
Lastly, I broke down and bougt an ATI(I'm not against ATI, just the AIW 9800 pro)9550 AGP 256mb video card and a TV wonder pro that came with the video imput device so I still can watch VHS tapes on my computer. Those 2 items were cheaper than what I paid form the AIW and after leaving my computer running all day and watchng tv and doing the normal stuff I do on my computer, I have had no problems at all. Save your money and just buy the 2 cards separetely.
Have a nice day!
Rating: Summary: BEWARE! Poor Accountability and Impersonal Service! Review: I had such high hopes for this "all-in-wonder" card. About 2-3 weeks after using this card, I started to have problems. I lost three Trinitron monitors to this card, and a fourth has started to show similar problems and yes I am certain it was the video card or its drivers, as I tried various hardware configurations and made sure that all drivers were up-to-date. It is not an AGP or motherboard problem as I have an up-to-date bios firmware, and my system is a *ELL 8300, which you would think would be tested for compatability by both *ELL and ATI since they are both big-time players in their respective market niches. What upsets me even more is that ATI repeatedly has denied that it could be their card, and I get nothing but form responses with links to stuff that is unrelated to my particular problem, as if they did not even read the email I sent them with the description of the problem . When I asked for personalized service, they told me that it is not a problem with their drivers or their card and direct me to *ELL. Well, I must say that I am returning this card immediately. I will never buy another ATI product again. I have seen others who have experienced similar problems with older version of the catalyst drivers, but not with the latest. I am frankly surprised that this card is still able to get high reviews on amazon. Perhaps I have a defective card, but ATI would not even consider that, instead outrightly denying that it could be related to their product. Shame on you ATI. This was an expensive piece of junk. I am going back to NVIDIA and Hauppauge, and I will tell everyone I know to stay far away from your poorly supported products. BUYER BEWARE! I agree wholeheartedly with the reviewer that referred to this card as an all-in-blunder! -infinity stars for product&support +3 peanuts for each of the three weeks it actually worked (I think the only reason it worked that long, is because of other soundrelated problems that prevented me from using the TV anyways)
Rating: Summary: BEWARE! Poor Accountability and Impersonal Service! Review: I had such high hopes for this "all-in-wonder" card. About 2-3 weeks after using this card, I started to have problems. I lost three Trinitron monitors to this card, and a fourth has started to show similar problems and yes I am certain it was the video card or its drivers, as I tried various hardware configurations and made sure that all drivers were up-to-date. It is not an AGP or motherboard problem as I have an up-to-date bios firmware, and my system is a *ELL 8300, which you would think would be tested for compatability by both *ELL and ATI since they are both big-time players in their respective market niches. What upsets me even more is that ATI repeatedly has denied that it could be their card, and I get nothing but form responses with links to stuff that is unrelated to my particular problem, as if they did not even read the email I sent them with the description of the problem . When I asked for personalized service, they told me that it is not a problem with their drivers or their card and direct me to *ELL. Well, I must say that I am returning this card immediately. I will never buy another ATI product again. I have seen others who have experienced similar problems with older version of the catalyst drivers, but not with the latest. I am frankly surprised that this card is still able to get high reviews on amazon. Perhaps I have a defective card, but ATI would not even consider that, instead outrightly denying that it could be related to their product. Shame on you ATI. This was an expensive piece of junk. I am going back to NVIDIA and Hauppauge, and I will tell everyone I know to stay far away from your poorly supported products. BUYER BEWARE! I agree wholeheartedly with the reviewer that referred to this card as an all-in-blunder! -infinity stars for product&support +3 peanuts for each of the three weeks it actually worked (I think the only reason it worked that long, is because of other soundrelated problems that prevented me from using the TV anyways)
Rating: Summary: Did not work with my Epox board Review: I Have a Epox EP-8RDA+ and it wont even start the computer with this card in the agp slot with the power going from the power supply. I call ati they said the EP-8RDA+ is not finding that the card is geting power right from the power supply and he said this is a big thing in Hp,Gateways,Dells. He all so said that Epox can make a bios update to fix this. The man said there been about 10 calls about this so Ati will start to look into this with the Aiw 9800pro. I took this card over to my freinds house and it worked great with his Asus Nf2 board.
Rating: Summary: One bug, but it was fixed Review: I originally had a Geforce 4 5200 Plus by Mad Dog. That card worked great, but it lagged on certain games I play. Then I went with a simple Radeon 9200 SE. It was worse than the Geforce. But I stuck it out. Then the local store stocked some All-in-Wonder 9800 cards ( I have a Hauppage TV card, but it doesn't work right, so I don't have it installed). The 9800 is not the pro version, but I could record TV with it and it has 128 MB DDR RAM. I installed the card, installed the software, and rebooted. The graphics seemed slower when I would just try to open a menu. Okay, first problem was there. I downloaded the updated drivers, and rebooted again. Guess what? Graphics were fixed. I loaded the game that had issues with my past two cards. No problems, and the cool microwave tanks actually had the blur around them showing the heat they produced (Command and Conquer Generals: Zero Hour). I have tested every aspect of this card: video editing, recording tv, hooking up multiple monitors, and picture editing. All of it worked fine. Any issues other people may seem to have may be due to conflicting hardware or just not installed properly. I just know that it works for me and I love this card. I get to program recording for my favorite tv show (which works). The only real compaint I have is with the TV Guide. It only works in Canada and the USA even though it asks what country you are in. I am stationed in Korea and I can't download the TV guide from the net. But that's fine because I know when my shows come on anyway. So if you want a decent do it all card. This is for you and I highly recommend it. By the way, my system is self built (AMD 2500+ processor, 1.5 GB RAM, modem, LAN, 6 USB 2.0, 2 FIrewire, SoundBlaster Audigy 2 Platinum ZS, 420 GB hard drive space, ZIP drive, Memory Card reader, DVD burner, CD burner, and a basic floppy drive). That's probably why I don't have any problems. I can easily solve the conflicts because I know exactly what is in my pc.
Rating: Summary: Not a wonder with HDTV Review: I was expecting this card to work out of the box outputting component video to a HDTV. Turns out that this functionality is barely supported. Outputting in 1080i or 720p produces images with distortions, garbage, virtual screens, or parts of the screen chopped off. 480p can be made to work in 640 x 480 mode, but running high end video card in 640 x 480 is a horrible waste. It should be said that the card should work fine using DVI connectors to an HDTV or projector. The problem is trying to use the component, composite, or S-video output from the card with an HDTV projector or TV. That functionality is so poor that it shouldn't even be considered to be a real option.
Rating: Summary: Not a wonder with HDTV Review: I was expecting this card to work out of the box outputting component video to a HDTV. Turns out that this functionality is barely supported. Outputting in 1080i or 720p produces images with distortions, garbage, virtual screens, or parts of the screen chopped off. 480p can be made to work in 640 x 480 mode, but running high end video card in 640 x 480 is a horrible waste. It should be said that the card should work fine using DVI connectors to an HDTV or projector. The problem is trying to use the component, composite, or S-video output from the card with an HDTV projector or TV. That functionality is so poor that it shouldn't even be considered to be a real option.
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