[aclug-L] Re: on a lighter note

[Jesse Kaufman <glandix@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sat, 2004-04-10 at 21:48, James Lancaster wrote:
> As far as I know there are not any of these cards at the moment. At least a=
> s far as I can tell there are few (it's not a widely supported feature) if =
> any HDTV-out cards with nvidia & ati chipsets (expect them only on High End=
>  as a special feature $$$$)

actually, i found out (thanks to www.htpcnewc.com) that my best bet was
to go with an ATI (i chose the ATI AIW 9600) w/ the add-on HDTV
converter accessory (VGA->componanent) ... still haven't gotten around
to ordering the HDTV converter, as their online ordering system seems to
be having problems :( ... BUT the picture is MUCH better even just via
s-video in both linux and xp ...


> Better than a plasma might be a projector, as there is one DLP at dell for =
> $899 (800x600 native resolution though), and it will be larger than any pla=
> sma in the price range.

seeing as how i won't be upgrading my tv for at *least* a few years, not
too worried about that :P


> ATI's All-in-wonder cards have a linux driver, but it (due to hw problems I=
>  believe) doesn't support things like mythtv and tvtime. Other things might=
>  work fine, be buggy or be flaky.

there are two drivers, gatos (open) and ati's (closed) ... the open ones
don't yet support my card ("At this moment all of currently produced ATI
All-in-Wonder cards use the newer Rage Theatre 200 chip which is not
supported by these drivers. ATI has recently provided documentation for
this chip, but it would be a while (at least 6 months) for anything
usable to appear. This chip is quite powerful - but quite complex
too."), but the closed ones work great for TV/monitor-out (i don't
really care about watching tv w/ that card, because i already have a
tuner in my tv :P and i don't have a problem rebooting to xp to do video
capture, since it will be pretty rare) ...

currently running at 1024x768 and it looks wonderful!  now, to get the
VGA->component converter so i can get progressive scan timings and
resolutions 


> Let me know what you find, because I can't find any specific cards from ati=
>  or nvidia that do that via google at the moment.

do that?  component-out you mean?  another option for doing component
out (albeit more expensive, but better in other ways) is the Crecendo
Transcoder (http://www.crescendo-systems.com/transcoder.html) ... there
is a comparison/review of the transcoder and the ATI adapter on
htpcnews.com and is a good read about the benifits of each (the ATI
adapter only works, afaik, on ATI cards, but the transcoder works on any
VGA-out) ... gonna try the ATI adapter first ($100 less, why not? :P)
and if that doesn't work, go for the transcoder ...

-g-

-- 
"...deflated ... and jaded ...
i hate it when you call ... (which isn't at all)..."
        'Thanks, That Was Fun' - Barenaked Ladies

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