Is ATI AIW 2006 PCI-E good?

[hhamzeh]

I am planning to buy a Video card for the computer that I use for editing computer. I may want to edit some HDV clips in the future as well. I saw this card which has a reasonable price compare to other recent AIW products and I am wondering if anybody has any experience (good and bad) with this card.

Thanks in advance for your input.

[rallynavvie]

For editing and playback of video the video card makes almost no difference. You can basically get away with anything that supports your display layout (dual monitors, DVI, etc.). The only difference is the hardware decoding that sometimes comes with video cards though I don't know which support HD decoding or if the standard decoder only references the type of compression.

And if you're looking for capture you should be using a seperate capture card and NOT one that converts directly to MPEG2 if you're planning on doing any editing beyond simple razor work. Even then it's better to do the encode after the work so you can have control over i-frame placements and such.

And personally I've never liked the quality coming from any of the VIVO offerings. They have funny drivers that like to cause problems and often don't play well with some hardware/software.

[hhamzeh]

Thanks rallynavvie!

Is this card a good buy for $183 Canadian? I see some of AIW cards are over $400 CAN, so I am wondering if this one is a quality and reliable video card. Is there a reason that this one is cheaper? Is there any beter model / brand (PCI-E) for the similar price. By the way this is a barand new, retail box. Thanks.

[lacywest]

Thanks rallynavvie!

Is this card a good buy for $183 Canadian? I see some of AIW cards are over $400 CAN, so I am wondering if this one is a quality and reliable video card. Is there a reason that this one is cheaper? Is there any beter model / brand (PCI-E) for the similar price. By the way this is a barand new, retail box. Thanks.

For gaming ... 256 megs of video ram is good ... a clock speed of 400 mhz

I will do a search and post some links here.

I found this post good ... lets you know what to look for in a high - end video card.

The ATi Radeon 9800 XT 256MB
ATi Turns Up The Heat In High End 3D Graphics

http://www.hothardware.com/viewarticle.aspx?articleid=460&catid=2

Alright, we'll admit it too. We try to keep over-exuberance in check around here, in an effort to remain objective. However, the first thing that came to mind, when we saw the Radeon 9800 XT, was sort of a primal simian grunt, rather than an actual thought. Arrrgghh, arrgghh... more power! Now there's a heat-sink and cooling setup that can bring out the monkey man (or woman) in all of us. Folks, this thing is gorgeous. With a spiral bladed fan that measures nearly 80mm across and an all copper sink, this card is decked out like our old 72 GTO, chromed and braided with the hood up for show in the parking lot. Since the Radeon 9800 XT is built on the same VPU core technology, only at a revved up higher clock speed, it's no small wonder that ATi went to great lengths to develop a strong cooling solution. After all, these new 412MHz core and 730MHz memory clocks have to stand up to rigorous quality assurance test patterns ATi's QA torture chamber, before it can be considered "retail ready"..

ATI All-In-Wonder 2006 PCI Express ... reviews

http://www.viperlair.com/reviews/video/ati/r5xx/aiw2006/index.shtml

Last month, ATI unveiled their All-In-Wonder X1800 XL, a high-end part with the price tag to match. For the most part, the big chunk of the $400 pie is due to the VPU, thus targeting the AIW X1800 XL towards gaming enthusiasts with an interest in multimedia.

Now, just over a month later, ATI is releasing the ATI All-In-Wonder 2006 PCI Express, a sub-$200 product based on the X1300 VPU (non-Pro), which differs from the All-In-Wonder 2006 released earlier this year as that was based on the Radeon 9600, as well as being AGP based. As you may expect, the AIW 2006 PCI Express will not have the raw horsepower of the AIW X1800, but it is significantly cheaper and features the same multimedia features as its more expensive brother.

Links to other reviews ...

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33846508

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2651&p=5

The A-I-W 2006 is a little less specialized than the X1800 XL A-I-W, as it will be geared mainly towards people who want the video playback/recording features of the card over gaming performance. But in spite of this, even with the lower clock speeds it can still run games like Halflife 2 and Doom 3 at resolutions up to 1280x1024 reasonably well.

This card does what it claims to do very well and it has a lot of good video features. Another great thing it has going for it is its incredible ease of use. The thought of finding and installing computer hardware for recording and playing video on a PC can be daunting to some, but for people not very familiar with this kind of thing, it shouldn't be much trouble at all getting everything setup and running quickly. Setting up the Gemstar GUIDE Plus+ to record and watch shows is fairly easy and straightforward as well, and we commend ATI for making the A-I-W 2006 so easy to use.

http://www.hothardware.com/viewarticle.aspx?articleid=787&cid=2

http://www.devhardware.com/forums/video-cards-5/2006-edition-vs-x800xl-ati-aiw-help-83692.html

The All-In-Wonder 2006 PCI Express review here has a core speed of 446 and memory speed of 401.

The All-In-Wonder X800XL PCI Express review here has a core speed of 400 and memory speed of 998.

and both require a minimum CPU/Memory X800XL here and 2006 here and I'm not sure if these are available as AGP .... is your current AIW PCI-e or AGP?

[hhamzeh]

lacywest,

Thank you very much for all the information.

From ATI website I found out the following information for this card

Pipelines = 4

What does this mean? does this mean that this card is equivalent of AGP 4X?

Thanks.

[cowgoo]

The pipelines are the roads that info from the card and the computer talk to each other along. So AGP determines how fast, and pipelines determine how much at once. For video work, I think 4 would be enough.

[lacywest]

The pipelines are the roads that info from the card and the computer talk to each other along. So AGP determines how fast, and pipelines determine how much at once. For video work, I think 4 would be enough.

Well if pipelines are mentioned in CPUs ... I heard a while back ... Intel used pipelines in their chips that were longer than the pipelines in a AMD chips.

If the CPU chip received info that needed correction ... the info will have to wait before leaving the Intel chip's pipelines but because the AMD CPU has shorter pipelines ... corrections can be processed faster. So supposely a Intel chip runs super fast compared to AMD chips ... and helps them make corrections faster while a AMD chip can run slower and makes the corrections needed .... seems like this makes sense.

So this might be what "pipelines" are kind of about ... in Video Card CPUs ... either that or I'm good at talking bull shit.

OR ... you can read this ... and find out ...

http://www.devhardware.com/c/a/Video-Cards/The-Graphics-Pipeline/

The Graphics Pipeline
(Page 1 of 4 )

Similar to the way a CPU has a pipeline filled with small stages that each do a single task quickly, so too does the GPU in your video card. Today on DevHardware, we'll go over those stages and what goes on in them, in this first part of our series on graphics.
Those of you who have checked into how a CPU operates know that all current desktop processors use what's called a "pipelined" architecture. What this does is take a large task, and break it down into smaller stages. This allows you to do multiple things at once and make your overall clock speed equivalent to the slowest of those stages.

A good example of this is doing multiple loads of laundry (for those of you who live in the real world and don't have mommy doing it for you). You put the clothes in the washer, set it to wash, take the clothes out, put them in the dryer, then fold them.

Now pretend you have multiple loads of laundry to get done. This is where the pipeline comes in. When the first load comes out of the washer, you can put the next set in, while the previous load is drying. Then, when it's done, you can fold one set, while one is drying, while another is washing. Now you have a three stage pipeline, and you can get more work done. At the end of each stage, you have a load coming out completed, after the first load has passed through all the stages, assuming no interruptions.

Seems like from what I've read there ... I am correct ...

[cowgoo]

What I'm talking about is the pipeline on the VIDEO CARD ITSELF, as the poster wanted to know. This has nothing to do with the cpu. The basic amount is 4, the mainstream amount for some gaming is 8, while top of the line more expensive cards use 16. This is more about how much info the vpu can send to the cpu.And as for your quote:

"A good example of this is doing multiple loads of laundry (for those of you who live in the real world and don't have mommy doing it for you). You put the clothes in the washer, set it to wash, take the clothes out, put them in the dryer, then fold them.

Now pretend you have multiple loads of laundry to get done. This is where the pipeline comes in. When the first load comes out of the washer, you can put the next set in, while the previous load is drying. Then, when it's done, you can fold one set, while one is drying, while another is washing. Now you have a three stage pipeline, and you can get more work done. At the end of each stage, you have a load coming out completed, after the first load has passed through all the stages, assuming no interruptions."

This makes my point, would you rather have 4 pipelines(washing machines), 8 or 16. Which do you think would get the job done faster?

But all this is moot if the poster just wants to do editing, any card can do it.

[hhamzeh]

Thanks all for your useful.

As almost all of you mentioned, for editing and playing back video (including HD Video and later on HD-DVD), almost any card would do the job. As the result, this card with PCI-E and 256 Mb memory and 4 pipelines and finally 400MHz speed is way more than enough for what I am planning to do.

I think my confusion came from the "Ulead Video Studio Plus System requirment" which indicates 16x PCI Express display adapter and recommends 2 GB or more of memory for HDV editing. However, almost evrybody agrees that video card and huge amount of memory would not have any effect on video editing or playback of Hith definition video. I guess they just want users to upgrade to new stuff.

By the way, does 16x PCI-E is faster than 8x AGP?

Once again thanks for the useful info!

Regards,

hhamzeh