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03 MARCH 2005 |
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PowerColor Theatre 550 Pro |
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Being able to watch TV on your computer
has not been a new concept. It's
been around for quite a while now.
T'he main reasons it has not been
adopted by many people is because of the
poor picture quality as well as software
usability. One of the reasons
behind the poor picture quality has to
do with the idea that a computer monitor
has a much higher resolution than a TV.
In addition, there are other notable
problems regarding picture quality.
The picture quality looks a bit noisy
sometimes, the colors bleed, etc., which
makes it a poor experience. With
the release of the Theatre 550 Pro chip
from ATI, the goal is to bring the same
home theatre experience to your
computer. These include features
like stereo TV sound and radio and most
important of all, a 3D comb filter and
noise reduction to improve the picture
quality.
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The PowerColor Theatre 550 Pro is based on the
same name as the chip used for the TV tuner.
The box employs the same color red scheme that
is prominently used by ATI in their products.
The only difference is rather than use black in
combination with the red, PowerColor opted to
choose a more pleasing combination of white and
red.
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The back of the box briefly shows how the
picture quality is improved with the new
technologies used in this product. In
addition, there is a diagram of the card which
shows the exact ports that are on the card.
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When opening the box, there lies the card itself
neatly tucked and wrapped inside an anti-static
bag. When removing that layer, all the
accessories and extra items are revealed
underneath. Each of the items are
individually wrapped as well.
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This purple connector box enables you to connect
other sources of information to the card.
This is similar to the same kind of ports on
your TV. You can use it to view pictures
from a digital camera or you can use it with
your camcorder to record and capture video from
the device.
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This black box is basically an infrared receiver
for the included remote. I noted how the
receiver seems to be made from Cyberlink.
Therefore, I predicted that the software used to
interact with the card is a Cyberlink product.
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This long wire is basically used as an antenna
to be used for the radio feature of the card.
You just plug one end to the TV tuner card.
The wire is plenty long so you can get
reception.
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A full-sized remote is included with the
product. There are quite a few buttons
used to help control playback and functions when
using your TV card. It uses two AAA
batteries to power the remote.
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The remote has your typical numeric buttons.
But there are quite a few buttons used for the
home-theatre functions of the TV tuner card.
You can switch between viewing your Music,
Pictures, Videos, as well as your DVD player.
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There are two CD's provided to help you get
started in using the TV tuner. There is a
very thin manual which tells you how to set
everything up. One of the CD's has the
drivers for the card as well as the PowerCinema
software program from Cyberlink. The other
disc is a DVD which contains all other Cyberlink
software products. This includes
PowerDVD, Power Director SE+, MediaShow SE,
Power2Go, and PowerProducer. You basically
have the software that is the quality of
Cyberlink.
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Lastly, the package included another DVD which
is basically a demo disc which is used to
describe the new technologies in the Theatre 550
Pro. I watched the video and it showed
differences in picture and video quality with
aspects such as the 3D Comb filter, advanced
noise reduction, gamma, capture quality, etc.
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For a more advanced TV tuner card, I
noticed that there is not much to the
card. All the power and
capabilities basically lie within the
Theatre 550 Pro chip which is right at
the center of the card. The card
does have a nice gold colored bracket. |
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There are three
connectors on the card. One
connector is used to connect the radio
antenna. One is used to connect
your cable television. The last
port is used to allow you to connect the
purple box which contains the additional
audio/video ports. |
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There's nothing really special on the
back of the card except for the several
serial number labels at the back.
Keep in mind that this is a PCI card.
This card as well as other similar
versions of this product will later have
PCI Express compatibility. The
advantages of using this card with the
interface is still unknown.
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The ATI Theatre 550 Pro is basically the
heart of this card. If you would
like to learn the complete capabilities
and specifications of this chip, I would
recommend navigating to ATI.com.
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In order to install this product, you first
need to open up your computer and place the TV tuner card in the
slot. Be sure that the card is securely in the slot,
otherwise, you computer will not be able to detect and recognize
the card. Then you install the software by inserting the
driver CD into your computer and installing the drivers as well
as the PowerCinema program. After your reboot your
computer, you should be ready to go.
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I am familiar with the picture quality of
the current TV cards. Depending on the signal quality, I
have to say that some channels can look decent under optimum
conditions. I have, however, witnessed channels which are
completely noisy and are difficult to watch.
As mentioned before in this review, this product uses
Cyberlink's PowerCinema program in order to watch television on
your computer. It was a good idea to enable TV watching
with this 3rd party program because I'm familiar with the
troublesome issues (installation problems, compatibility with
SP2) that arose when ATI used their own multimedia software.
PowerCinema is different than other TV programs that I have
worked with. First of all, it encourages a Home Theatre PC
environment where you can access and setup things quickly.
When I ran the PowerCinema program for the first time, I was
greeted with a simple interface similar to the interface in the
Windows XP Media Edition. Then it asked me simple
questions like what kind of source I was using for the TV and a
single to scan all the channels which were available
automatically. I was surprised at how easy it was to setup
the TV program. In fact, this is probably the best setup
experience that I've had.
After you finish scanning all the channels, you are ready to
start watching TV. When at the main screen, you are
presented a variety of options. You can take a look at
Pictures, Video, TV, etc. I chose TV since that is what we
are here for. It then showed a preview window with a
random channel currently playing. In order to change
channels, I could either press a number on the keyboard or I
could click the 'up' and 'down' arrows at the bottom of the
screen to change channels. I then picked a channel that
looked decent (reception) and I clicked the button to go into
full screen.
I was immediately impressed with the picture quality.
Having been used to other TV tuners, I noticed that the picture
quality was noticeably clearer. There was less noise on
the screen, vivid colors, and no frames were dropped at all
resulting in very smooth motion. At first, I was looking
at the TV at the same distance as I normally look at my monitor.
This is a very important issue, you should keep in mind.
If your monitor was really a TV, would you really look at it so
close? I put some more distance between me and my monitor
and on my 19" LCD screen. I began to realize that this is
the first TV tuner product that makes it look like the quality
you'd really expect to see on an actual standard TV.
The PowerCinema program does ofter more capabilities than just
to watch TV. If you desire, you can take snapshots of what
you are watching or you can even record from the TV. When
you want to record something, the PowerCinema program acts
almost like a VCR. You set the time, date, and channel to
record and it will record it automatically for you if your
computer is on.
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Powered by ATI's Theatre 550 Pro chip,
computer users can finally have a TV tuner with technology
existent in current televisions. This product is the first
TV tuner that actually has the picture quality of a normal TV.
I know that in this review, I mentioned the impressive picture
quality of this TV tuner. I am aware that there are high
definition TV tuner's which provide significantly better picture
quality, but the picture quality of this TV tuner compared with
a standard television is now almost equal. If you are
looking to being able to watch television on your computer, this
TV tuner card powered by the Theatre 550 Pro chip is the way to
go.
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Reviewed by
ronald@digitalreviews.net |
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