AGP 6600GT and nvidia drivers/decoders

[Jesse]

Hello,

Not to rehash one of the many "which video card" threads, but I would like some advice on this card and the appropriate drivers/decoders before I buy it.

From reading this forum, the TT forum and the AVS forum this seems to be the card of choice these days. I have found a gigabyte passively cooled card at zip zoom fly which comes with the component dongle.

After reading the thread regarding nvidia decoders/drivers I am not so sure I want to tackle this. I then started re-thinking the xcard, but waf is of prime importance, and I think the ui issues would be a deal breaker. Can someone give me a good baseline setup for this card? What drivers/decoders and the appropriate settings for them so I can get out of the gate with a picture comparable to my sony directv box (svideo). I dont mind some future tinkering to get it perfect, but I cant spend two weeks getting something comparable to what I have now. I dont HAVE to have VMR9 right away, overlay would be ok to get started with. I have been raving to the wife about how great this will be, but so far all she is seeing is that I have spent way more than a tivo would cost, and that I cant seem to get the remote working (see my post about uirt locking up sage........)

The box is a P4 Ht 3gig prescott with 1 gig of ram on an intel mobo with an 865 chipset, XP pro sp2, directv stb to pvr500 via svideo, maudio d410 (using spdif), ati radeon/rage?? 7000(composite out). The tv is a 36" standard def JVC. I will probably not be upgrading to HDTV for at least another 1-2 years. If it matters, I am planning on using a component connection which will pass through and be swithched by a Denon AVR3805.

Thanks in advance,

Jesse

[stanger89]

What drivers/decoders and the appropriate settings for them so I can get out of the gate with a picture comparable to my sony directv box (svideo).... I will probably not be upgrading to HDTV for at least another 1-2 years.

You really might want to consider the Xcard.

[korben_dallas]

Or get a Radeon 9550 or GeForce 6200, if you don't want to spend around $200 for that 6600GT.

[abbott_m]

Well I've got a 6600GT and am fairly dissapointed with it's performance with Sage. I cannot get VMR-9 to function well at 1080i DVI connection or component. I'm wondering if a change to an ATI card will help this?

[Jesse]

Thanks for the quick responses.

Korben: While $200 is'nt exactly chump change I dont mind spending it if the card is worth it.

Stanger: The xcard is VERY tempting. But I know that a slow UI will be a BIG waf killer. Back in '97 when we had had enough of getting screwed by Adelphia cable we switched to directv. We paid big bucks for the latest Sony SAT-A2 just because the UI was sooo much faster than the much cheaper RCA stb. Are you suggesting the xcard because I am not upgrading to HD in the near future, or because setting up the 6600GT is such a PITA?

Thanks again.

Jesse

[stanger89]

I'm suggesting the Xcard because you don't have an HDTV and don't plan on getting one. It will be really easy to get it going (just plug it in pretty much). But it will probably be much more difficult to get it to look as the Xcard (that may be optomistic).

FWIW, setting up my 6800 (which is trickier because I'm using VGA out to an HDTV and have to set up custom resolutions) basically consisted of installing it, installing the newest official drivers, installing the latest nVidia decoders (which is all you'd have to do to get it up), and then (because of VGA+HDTV) I had to define a couple custom resolutions.

[mlbdude]

Originally Posted by abbott_m

Well I've got a 6600GT and am fairly dissapointed with it's performance with Sage. I cannot get VMR-9 to function well at 1080i DVI connection or component. I'm wondering if a change to an ATI card will help this?

ATI has much better windowless and non-full screen renderless playback performance (even my old non-pro 9600 beats my 6600). However, if Frey ever starts to support full screen renderless then the nvidia will be good to go. In the end the deinterlacing of video content is a little better on the nvidia so it should be better for TV.

[abbott_m]

That's kind of where I'm stuck then. How fast (or if) frey decides to go to the full screen renderless is kind of a problem. I'm not terribly thrilled about waiting around for 6 months only to find they have no intentions of getting the nvidia cards good support. I don't mind getting an ATI card (just an irritation) but I'm trying to figure out what would be best without getting ridiculous. My TV is a 50" samsung HDTV using DVI as the input, any suggestion?

[mlbdude]

DVI out of an ATI is not fun unless you know PowerStrip well. I would suggest using Overlay for now and not waste any money.

[abbott_m]

Since I've only heard about powerstrip I guess you could say I don't know it well. What exactly does it do? Also I'm not shy about moving to component (this TV has every blasted input known to man in the back of it).

[Jesse]

In the end the deinterlacing of video content is a little better on the nvidia so it should be better for TV.

I guess this is going to be another "which video card" thread. So, if I dont mind using overlay (which I dont), then you are saying that the pq on the 6600GT should be better than the ATI. This seems pretty consistent with what I am reading hear and there. You mentioned an ATI 9600. Any thoughts on how the ATI 9800 will compare to the 6600GT. From Stanger's post it looks like I am worrying needlessly about the driver/decoder settings. Perhaps I should just shop around for whichever of these two cards I can find cheaper and buy it?


Thanks again to all,

Jesse

[RedR]

*RedR LOVES his 6600GT AGP!! Why? SageClient rocks with it compared to the GF4 5700U! As well PC games just melt for it!

[stanger89]

About the only thing wrong with nVidia's stuff, is some have trouble with VMR9 tearing at high resolutions with DVI. I'm not sure where the threshold is, but I've heard that it's >1000, most often in the context of 1080i.

I know my 6800 has been near flawless, every once in awhile I'll see what might be a tear at the very top of the screen, but it's really nothing compared to my old Radeon 9500 (non-pro). I guess I'm kind of the opposite of mlbdude on this, I think ATI's drivers are crap, and have been completely happy with my 6800. But then again I'm running VGA to my HDTV, my story might be different if it were DVI, or maybe my 6800 has enough extra oomph that it hides any problems.

Of course nothing quite compares to Geforce 6x00 + nVidia decoders + VMR9 Fullscreen Exclusive mode. I can't wait for Sage to get it

[korben_dallas]

I am extremely happy with the picture quality of my ATI 9800 Pro and Nvidia DVD/MPEG-2 decoder. (Go figure they work so well together!)

But there is no current card worth upgrading to from the 9800 Pro, so I'm gonna wait until ATI's next line of Xxxx's and Nvidia's next line of 6800's. The ATI cards will have the Theater Pro 550 and be PS 3.0 compliant, while the Nvidia cards will have fully functioning Pure Video. It should be an interesting match up.

[mlbdude]

The PureVideo stuff from nVidia is nothing special. The one item I can actually see is the deinterlacing of bad flagged material. That is definately better (however my 5700 visually does this just as well). I also think that regular video content deinterlacing is "slightly" better.

If I was buying a brand new card or upgrading from something really ancient, I would either try and wait till the nVidia drivers imrove just a bit or go ahead and get a 6600. I still get better performance and better DVD PQ from my quiet, passive cooled 9600 but I think it is near end of life.

Stanger, you are not the only one I have heard not liking a 9500. I think that card must be crappy release or something.

[gplasky]

All the 6600's have "full functioning" Pure Video. It was the 6800's that didn't have the WMV-HD hardware acceleration working in the NV40 chip. The 6600's use the NV43.

Gerry

[Jesse]

Hi,

eVGA 6600GT on sale at New Egg for $186. Not passively cooled, but I guess I will jump on it.

Thanks again,

Jesse

[markthenewf]

I've got a 6600GT (PCI-e) and tossed that little helicopter fan to the dog and got the Thermaltake "Schooner" heatsink. Works friggin' great. Temps are the same at idle as with the fan and actually runs a couple of degrees cooler on load. Seriously! You can get passive cooling for just about any card nowadays.

As for the vid cards, I prefer NVidia. I've tried ATI; great hardware but the software blows goats. I've never seen software so difficult to custom instal or uninstall.... it's worse that Norton Antivirus!

[abbott_m]

Just curious but how are you checking the temp on the 6600GT. I've got the AGP version and I don't see a temp listed in the settings. I also tossed the fan and went to the Zalman water cooling system, works like a charm to keep the CPU temp down but it'd be nice to see the effect on the GPU.

[mlbdude]

Originally Posted by markthenewf

I've got a 6600GT (PCI-e) and tossed that little helicopter fan to the dog and got the Thermaltake "Schooner" heatsink. Works friggin' great. Temps are the same at idle as with the fan and actually runs a couple of degrees cooler on load. Seriously! You can get passive cooling for just about any card nowadays.

As for the vid cards, I prefer NVidia. I've tried ATI; great hardware but the software blows goats. I've never seen software so difficult to custom instal or uninstall.... it's worse that Norton Antivirus!

Just an FYI, the ATI drviers install and uninstall exactly like the nVidia ones do. Also, while normally nVidia has great drivers (I even became an nVidia guy because of that), the current run of drivers from them are horrible.