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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TV Tuner Comparisons
In this section, we'll look at how the ATI Theater 650 compares with the NVIDIA DualTV MCE and the ATI Theater 550 Pro. As in the past, we will be looking at power consumption for these cards as well as image quality, but for this review we will be adding a section on CPU utilization to see what kind of overhead is associated with using these cards.
Power
For power, we tested each of the three cards at four different states: while the system was idle, while watching live TV, while recording live TV, and while watching TV while simultaneously recording the broadcast. Here are the results.
For reference, the power draw of the system without a TV tuner card installed was 145 Watts. We can see from the table that the Theater 650 and 550 drew less power than the DualTV overall, which makes sense given the DualTV's dual tuners as opposed to the other cards' one. We can also see that there isn't a very big difference at all between the power consumption of the Theater 650 and 550, and interestingly, there wasn't a difference between the power load of the system while watching and watching/recording with the Theater 650.
Channel Switch Speed
We again wanted to see if there was any difference between the channel switching speed of the different tuners, as the different hardware can sometimes affect this aspect of the tuner. Here are the results.
As the data shows, there is again not much difference between the Theater 650 and 550, and each of these cards took around two seconds to switch channels (the 650 being very slightly faster). The DualTV took about a half a second longer than the other two making it the slowest of the three. As we mentioned in the last review, two seconds may not seem like much time, but when trying to flip rapidly through channels, the delay can be very annoying. Unfortunately, it appears that the new "mini-can" tuner of the 650 doesn't substantially improve the tuning speed relative to the 550.
In this section, we'll look at how the ATI Theater 650 compares with the NVIDIA DualTV MCE and the ATI Theater 550 Pro. As in the past, we will be looking at power consumption for these cards as well as image quality, but for this review we will be adding a section on CPU utilization to see what kind of overhead is associated with using these cards.
Power
For power, we tested each of the three cards at four different states: while the system was idle, while watching live TV, while recording live TV, and while watching TV while simultaneously recording the broadcast. Here are the results.
| System Power Draw (Watts) | ||||
| Idle | Watching Live TV |
Recording | Watching + Recording |
|
| NVIDIA DualTV MCE | 170 | 197 | 176 | 203 |
| ATI MSI Theater 550 Pro | 167 | 186 | 171 | 187 |
| ATI MSI Theater 650 Pro | 169 | 187 | 174 | 187 |
For reference, the power draw of the system without a TV tuner card installed was 145 Watts. We can see from the table that the Theater 650 and 550 drew less power than the DualTV overall, which makes sense given the DualTV's dual tuners as opposed to the other cards' one. We can also see that there isn't a very big difference at all between the power consumption of the Theater 650 and 550, and interestingly, there wasn't a difference between the power load of the system while watching and watching/recording with the Theater 650.
Channel Switch Speed
We again wanted to see if there was any difference between the channel switching speed of the different tuners, as the different hardware can sometimes affect this aspect of the tuner. Here are the results.
| Channel Tune Speed | |
| Time in Seconds | |
| NVIDIA DualTV MCE | 2 1/2 |
| ATI MSI Theater 550 Pro | 2 |
| ATI MSI Theater 650 Pro | 2 |
As the data shows, there is again not much difference between the Theater 650 and 550, and each of these cards took around two seconds to switch channels (the 650 being very slightly faster). The DualTV took about a half a second longer than the other two making it the slowest of the three. As we mentioned in the last review, two seconds may not seem like much time, but when trying to flip rapidly through channels, the delay can be very annoying. Unfortunately, it appears that the new "mini-can" tuner of the 650 doesn't substantially improve the tuning speed relative to the 550.
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Egglick - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
I don't know about you guys, but I'm not as convinced as the reviewer that the 650 has better image quality. It's clearly got better color than the 550, but I see alot more noise and artifacts. Take a look at the top corners of the tomato, and the added noise (around everything) in the test pattern. This is likely due to the "edge enhancement" feature, but that should've been turned off before running tests like this.I also agree that there should have been a Hauppauge card included, as well as alot more discussion on the DTV features of the card.
BigLan - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
It could also be that the 550 setup was using an MPEG2 setting with a lower bitrate than the 650 or Nvidia card. Nothing about that was mentioned, but hopefully they'll have chosen the same on each system.Actually a comparison using different quality settings would have been very nice to have seen, as reportedly the dual tuner produces a better picture at a lower bitrate than other cards. This can be an important feature for some consumers who are willing to trade off some PQ and record at 1 GB/hour rather than 3 or 4 GB to get much longer recording time from their PVR.
I'll also note that no system specs were given either. Are we looking at a 2.4ghz p4, X2 or Conroe system here? Other comments have covered the lack of HDTV testing.
Lastly - the Hauppauge 150 is actually better than the 250. I don't think anand has ever looked at it, so I don't know how they would know the quality of it. While the 150 is cheaper than the 250, it is a newer, better card.
Araemo - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
CPU Usage numbers are fairly useless without knowing what CPU the test system is running.100% usage on a p3 is going to be noticeably less annoying on an FX-60(And will max out at '50%', since it will only use 1 core... I know there is only one graph showing in task manager, but task manager has the option of showing only one graph no matter how many CPUs you have, so that isn't really definitive.)
If you guys did say what CPU it is(and what the whole system is?), I missed it.
Squidward - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
Did you guys get to use the new Catalyst Media Center software at all? I've been curious how it compares to the old MMC software that's had the same nappy interface since 1995.Mumrik - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
Why didn't you touch on the hardware DRM engine that's mentioned in ATi's press release?A lot of us really want to know what the heck they're up to with that...
pjladyfox - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
I was wondering this myself since it will factor greatly into the purchase of any tuner hardware.archcommus - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
Would you say the improved image quality is worth selling my 550 card for?DigitalFreak - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
I want a card with dual ATSC tuners! There's a company with a reference design out for a year or more, yet no one is making this type of card.Chadder007 - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
No QAM support....No Care.AlexWade - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - link
No HDTV support....No care.Seriously, when are ATI and NVidia going to realize regular TV is going to be cut off soon? We have less than 3 years to go all digital, and new SDTV cards keep coming out. Brilliant.