Which one should I use/keep?

[Tony414]

I have my hands on two video cards. I get one of them free. Which should I choose?

ATI x300 SE 128mb
Nvidia Geforce FX5600

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!!

[Crashless]

I'd say the x300, simply because it's a current-gen card. Normally I live in the nvidia camp, but AFAIK the FX series cards really sucked.

[pulls up a seat to watch the flame wars to come]

[Jere_Jones]

Originally Posted by Crashless

I'd say the x300, simply because it's a current-gen card. Normally I live in the nvidia camp, but AFAIK the FX series cards really sucked.

[pulls up a seat to watch the flame wars to come]

Gotta disagree. Depending on what you want it for (of course), the FX5200 (and above) put out GREAT quality svideo. IMHO.

Granted, it needed a little tweaking, but my FX5200 is just as good as my 350's output but without the headaches.

Jere

[gplasky]

No flames.

I would tend to agree with you. Only other thing I would consider would be if I were using the latest nVidia codec. Could be a chance with the nVidia codec and the nVidia video card the picture could actually be better. Depending on what you're outputting too. I had a FX5200, now a FX5700 connected to a 42" HDTV with a picture that would blow away most ATI Radeons. Nice thing it connects to the HDTV VGA port and all the settings are done through the nVidia driver. (No Powerstrip nonsense.)


Gerry

[stanger89]

Keep the 5600, IIRC (from the early nVidia 3.0 decoder discussions) it supports the advanced deinterlacing, and possibly hardware film detection (aka Hardware VPP).

[Tony414]

Ok! Looks like I'm stickin' with the 5600. The reason is the advice Stanger mentioned. The only thing I need help with is some of the advanced settings. My Sony has a DVI port and S-Video ports. I have tried the DVI in the past but had issues. Is there any Nvidia adjustments for either the DVI or S-Video I can do?


Thanks!!

[stanger89]

You should try the newest nVidia drivers:
ftp://download.nvidia.com/Windows/71.84/

They've added a lot of stuff for driving HDTVs lately.

Oh, and DVI is definitely the way to go.

[Tony414]

Okee dokee. I got it installed and played around with it. I have it connected using the DVI. It's very clear. This is what I'm experiencing playing back a dvd. I think it might be DVI related. I have my own dvd-video I created of a movie I recorded with Sage. It plays great on another pc connect to a monitor using powerdvd and also on a stand-alone player. On my Sage box I use TheaterTek DVD and it's really choppy. Can't seem to figure this out. I'm gonna switch to s-video to see if that does anything.

[stanger89]

Which version of TT? If it's 2, have you got the latest update and are you using Fullscreen Exclusive mode?

Also, what resolution are you running.

- I say this grudgingly You may want to try the X300, some have reported better results with ATI if you're running really high interlaced resolutions (like 1080i) over DVI with nVidia.

[Tony414]

Here is where I'm stuck with TT. I'm searching all over there forum for some help but can't get any Yes I am using 2 with the latest update and is there something special I need to do to set it to Fullscreen Exclusive mode?
I messed around with some of the command line options for resolution but I don't think I'm doing it write. My desktop res is at 800X600.

Thanks for the help Stanger !!

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Tony414

Here is where I'm stuck with TT. I'm searching all over there forum for some help but can't get any Yes I am using 2 with the latest update and is there something special I need to do to set it to Fullscreen Exclusive mode?

I'm not sure what you have to do (I don't actaully use TT), if you can't get right click context menus than you're using it.

I messed around with some of the command line options for resolution but I don't think I'm doing it write. My desktop res is at 800X600.

Is that S-Video or DVI?

[Tony414]

S-Video.... I'm switching back to DVI. Come to find out, TT is causing the problem. I installed a copy of NVDVD and it's working great! It seems like TT has too much tweaking involved right now. I'll get back to them and ask what I need to do in order to set it to full screen exclusive mode (or chk there forum). Have you messed around with NVDVD? Got any pointers???

[gplasky]

All you had to do for TT to use full screen exclusive mode was to start the app. Right-click on screen and go to Configuration. Choose the Video tab. Click the Advanced Video button. Under VMR9 choose Full Screen Mode. You could also choose YUV mixing. And under Acceleration you could choose DXVA. But now that you have NVDVD installed be carefull about installing TT over that. People have had issues with it working correctly, registry issues and basically not getting either one to run right afterwards. Both use the same decoders so I never could understand why people felt they needed to install both.

Gerry

[Tony414]

Well I guess I was running it like that all along. I believe I did make that change while trying to fix my problem. I agree with you! I definetly wouldn't put both together. Before I installed NVDVD I made sure I removed all registry entries for Nvidia and TT.

[Tony414]

Another delima When connecting to my Sony TV using DVI, is it possible to get, or better yet! How would I get a dvd or a dvd I made from an mpeg-2 to play in full screen? I can't seem to accomplish this. It's fine using s-video....