The New Theater 650 TV Tuner Solution from ATI
by Josh Venning on June 14, 2006 4:00 AM EST- Posted in
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CPU Utilization
With any computer application, there will be a portion of the CPU allocated for it depending on the type of task it is performing. The amount of CPU power used while an application is running is known as the CPU overhead, and we were interested in what kind of overhead we would see while using these tuners, since recording a program is something that should ideally be able to be done in the background while performing other tasks on your computer.
We used the windows task manager to get a general measurement of CPU usage during three different states with each of these cards. The first was while simply watching live TV on the system, then while watching TV and recording simultaneously, and lastly, while recording live TV in the background (with WMCE closed) and no other programs running. We also measured the amount of CPU usage while the system was idle just to verify that it was the expected 0%, and it was. Here are our CPU utilization results.
We can see that the Theater 550 and 650 show similar results, which makes sense as the 650 is based off of the 550. We see significantly higher CPU usage with the DualTV, particularly while watching and recording live TV, but this is because we are able to watch a different channel than the one we are recording. Had we installed a second Theater 550 or Theater 650 card and used it to watch another channel, we have no doubt the CPU usage would have gone up as well. It is possible one of ATI's partners could include two tuners on one board to provide a solution similar to NVIDIA's DualTV, but for those not interested in multitasking, the Theater 650 does offer some benefits over the competition (as you will see in the next section).
With any computer application, there will be a portion of the CPU allocated for it depending on the type of task it is performing. The amount of CPU power used while an application is running is known as the CPU overhead, and we were interested in what kind of overhead we would see while using these tuners, since recording a program is something that should ideally be able to be done in the background while performing other tasks on your computer.
We used the windows task manager to get a general measurement of CPU usage during three different states with each of these cards. The first was while simply watching live TV on the system, then while watching TV and recording simultaneously, and lastly, while recording live TV in the background (with WMCE closed) and no other programs running. We also measured the amount of CPU usage while the system was idle just to verify that it was the expected 0%, and it was. Here are our CPU utilization results.
Theater 650 Watching Live TV:
Theater 650 Recording Only (not watching):
Theater 650 Watching and Recording:
Theater 550 Watching Live TV:
Theater 550 Recording Only:
Theater 550 Watching and Recording:
DualTV MCE Watching Live TV:
DualTV MCE Recording Only:
DualTV MCE Watching and Recording:
| CPU Utilization Summary | |||
| Watching Live TV |
Recording | Watching + Recording |
|
| NVIDIA DualTV MCE | 25% | 7% | 35% |
| ATI MSI Theater 550 Pro | 21% | 4% | 29% |
| ATI MSI Theater 650 Pro | 21% | 4% | 25% |
We can see that the Theater 550 and 650 show similar results, which makes sense as the 650 is based off of the 550. We see significantly higher CPU usage with the DualTV, particularly while watching and recording live TV, but this is because we are able to watch a different channel than the one we are recording. Had we installed a second Theater 550 or Theater 650 card and used it to watch another channel, we have no doubt the CPU usage would have gone up as well. It is possible one of ATI's partners could include two tuners on one board to provide a solution similar to NVIDIA's DualTV, but for those not interested in multitasking, the Theater 650 does offer some benefits over the competition (as you will see in the next section).
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pjladyfox - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
She actually. ^__^The one thing that really irked me over the 550, which pretty much forced us to go with the X1800 AIW instead, is that without MCE 2005 it was not a very useful card. Heck, we did'nt even have the fallback of the Multimedia Center, which a lot of us who have had either ATI AIW or their stand-alone TV tuner learned to live with, and instead got shafted with the terrible bundled software. :P I mean, come on, if you bundled the nice Adobe software with the AIW why not at least do it with your tuner cards instead of pawning off the third-rate discount bin stuff?
In either event I'm hoping that whoever did this article re-labels this one since this is definatly NOT a review in any sense of the term.
LoneWolf15 - Thursday, June 15, 2006 - link
Ouch! I'm so sorry. No disrespect intended. :)
That's why at the time I went with a Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150. My TV Wonder PCI is fine for just watching (provided you use very specific versions of ATI's MMC software, as some have seriously broken the audio setup in their push to go from analog to digital across the PCI bus) but all the software solutions I saw were most compatible with Hauppauge boards at the time over the Theater 550. In fact, GB-PVR, my personal favorite, is great when paired with any PVR-xxx card. Bonus: it's free.
I got a ReplayTV on the cheap with a lifetime subscription, so I dismantled my HTPC. Still, I'd love to replace my TV Wonder with a good card for casual use in my main system. With the lack of information on DVR and Catalyst Multimedia Center, this card won't be it. And I'm in full agreement of you that this article does NOT constitute a review.
SHSPVR - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
In ABC it all get this error6/14/2006 11:35:54 AM - Problem connecting to tracker - (10049, "Can't assign requested address")
hondaman - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
I fail to understand why you think its acceptable to leave out the DEFACTO capture card. AGAIN. Hauppauge is the clear industry giant in video capture, and you publish another article, flippantly referencing us to your previous review of the card. Image quality is subjective, and its important to allow us to see, and judge, the image quality instead of your "just trust me" attitude.Leaving hauppauge out of a capture card review would be like reviewing ATI's latest video card, and comparing it to SIS instead of nvidia.
Myrandex - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
One disappointing *feature* I discovered on my Theater 550 PCIE that is EXTREMELY IRRITATING is lag with the video in ports. I tried hooking up a game system to it, and if I hit the jump button for example, I would have to wait a little bit for my character to jump. I'm not talking anythign like either, I'm talking extremely noticeable. Itried contacting powercolor help, and they said update drivers (already did) and somethign else, and then quit responding to me. Is there anyway that this can be tested as if I would have known this ahead of time, I don't think I would have purchased it.nvmarino - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 - link
If you want to connect a game console to your display via your PC you want one of these:http://www.simplifidigital.com/shopsimplifi/index....">http://www.simplifidigital.com/shopsimp.../index.p...
As others have commented, tuners cards (especially those with hardware encoders) are not designed for this.
mattsimis - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
I agree, I had to get rid of my Theater 550 setup (and seems 650 is as bad) and swap back to a 7year old Brooktree 878 based TV Capture card due to the lag. The BT878 has a delay of about less than 100msec, its excellent.I have to use the Svideo Input on TV Cap Cards as the Satelite TV service here (Sky "Digital") uses encrypted signals that can only be decoder on their decoder box. Once you decode it, you can output the raw video signal (SCART RGB to Svideo adapter). I then input this into DScaler. Image quality was a bit better on the Theater 550, however the lag was unusable.
From the article it seems the lag isnt just on the Video Inputs, but the TV Tuning too, so contary to the other reply, seems everyone will notice it. Cant understand how a 2000msec delay is considered "ok" for product release.
Matt
BigLan - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
"Cant understand how a 2000msec delay is considered "ok" for product release."These types of TV cards are designed for watching TV (not video games) and specifically for timeshifting/recording TV using a PVR application with a built in TV Guide, so channel surfing isn't necessary. For that purpose a 2 second delay doesn't really matter.
What you want is a transcoder, which is a different beast altogether.
sirfergy - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
That is because it has to encode the signal. You aren't supposed to use it as a video input to your computer for consoles.Crucial - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
Your choice to not include the Hauppage cards was a slap in the face of everyone who asked for them and nothing short of a joke. The Hauppage cards are by far the more popular product and it would make more sense to compare them for those of us who might buy the new card if they infact are better. If your video card reviews followed the same pattern as your tv tuner reviews you would be the laughing stock of the internet. We want a screenshot of the apple, pattern and girl on a hauppage card to see for ourselves which card looks better. I'm guessing the couple of years old pvr150 would look better than all of them and ATI wouldn't let you show it. If not then do a couple more tests and update the review.As for the DTV portion of these cards, I'm sorry that you don't get DTV reception in your area but I couldn't care less. Millions of us do and use it. If Anandtech is going to be a top quality review site they need to find a reviewer who can get it. Important things to know about the DTV would be can a digital and analog channel be recorded at the same time? What kind of cpu usage does the tuner use when recording both or watching an analog and watching a digital? Can MCE use 2 of these cards and record 2 analog and 2 digital channels at once?
Each time I see these reviews I hope you change you tune and do a real comparison of whats out there and being used instead of being the puppet for the corporation thats giving you free product to play with.