mustang_steve
c[H]ewbacca
- Joined
- Jul 28, 2003
- Messages
- 11,112
Well yesterday I finally got cable, and re-discovered how bad the audio was on my Pinnacle PC-TV pro....so off to the store to buy a new tuner card. It had to be PCI and preferable not use a cable for sound.
-----Note, if you are an ATI !!!!!!, and cannot handle criticism and outright flamebait...please stop reading...this product deserves far worse than any bad words I can eek out-----
Well I saw an ATI at teh store, the TV Wonder Pro. It seemed to have some nice features and such, and the requirement of a video card seems like it would not need that silly cable and inastead use the bus and directsound to do it's job. I wish that was true.
Upon opening the card, it turned out to just be another variant of the Phillips tuner you can get in the PC-TVpro (which is now a $20 card, the ATI was $100). It also had a audio patch cable, something not mentioned on the outside of the box. Oh well I thought...ATI at least knows their stuff.
Or so I thought again...poor naieve me. I set it up, and well...video quality is terrible unless i turn HQ video on..but then the sound is so heavily compressed its unbearable....when the HQ video is off the sound is always too quiet and too loud at once...I have no idea how, but it is.
So I went to get updated drivers...guess what, now the sound is crappy under all conditions. The vido quality is improved though...but that doesnt matter since the sound is so staticky and clipping so much that its impossible to listen to.
Also note their lack of 24 hours support, and the fact this card isnt even on their support site for contacting support. I also am not willing to even RMA this card for a new one since I am reasonably sure now this is a driver issue and not a hardware issue since the driver update made the sound that much worse.
My end of it is ATI screwed up a product even worse than it was when it came out...The sound does ruin the product to the point it's not worth buying. If I was ATI, I would fire the staff behind this product for being too deaf and too blind to even be working on this product. Video quality thats no better than a 4 year old card, and sound that's far, far worse....for five times as much. This card won't even gat a rating...to take that kind of time is only for card that at least function right..
Basically, don't buy this card...its sucks in ways words cannot describe...and even at $20 is a complete waste of money. Get any other card in ti's price range or lower and you will most likely have a better card.
-----Note, if you are an ATI !!!!!!, and cannot handle criticism and outright flamebait...please stop reading...this product deserves far worse than any bad words I can eek out-----
Well I saw an ATI at teh store, the TV Wonder Pro. It seemed to have some nice features and such, and the requirement of a video card seems like it would not need that silly cable and inastead use the bus and directsound to do it's job. I wish that was true.
Upon opening the card, it turned out to just be another variant of the Phillips tuner you can get in the PC-TVpro (which is now a $20 card, the ATI was $100). It also had a audio patch cable, something not mentioned on the outside of the box. Oh well I thought...ATI at least knows their stuff.
Or so I thought again...poor naieve me. I set it up, and well...video quality is terrible unless i turn HQ video on..but then the sound is so heavily compressed its unbearable....when the HQ video is off the sound is always too quiet and too loud at once...I have no idea how, but it is.
So I went to get updated drivers...guess what, now the sound is crappy under all conditions. The vido quality is improved though...but that doesnt matter since the sound is so staticky and clipping so much that its impossible to listen to.
Also note their lack of 24 hours support, and the fact this card isnt even on their support site for contacting support. I also am not willing to even RMA this card for a new one since I am reasonably sure now this is a driver issue and not a hardware issue since the driver update made the sound that much worse.
My end of it is ATI screwed up a product even worse than it was when it came out...The sound does ruin the product to the point it's not worth buying. If I was ATI, I would fire the staff behind this product for being too deaf and too blind to even be working on this product. Video quality thats no better than a 4 year old card, and sound that's far, far worse....for five times as much. This card won't even gat a rating...to take that kind of time is only for card that at least function right..
Basically, don't buy this card...its sucks in ways words cannot describe...and even at $20 is a complete waste of money. Get any other card in ti's price range or lower and you will most likely have a better card.