Replace Radeon 7000

[Bathman]

I have the above graphics card. However I would like to improve the quality of the TV output.

I tried a Matrox G400 with VGA to scart adapter and found the quality of the TV output to be better. However it did not have DVD hardware assistance and my weak cpu (Via c3 1.2) was not powerfull enough to give flicker free playback.

I was thinking of getting a Radeon 9600. Would this give better TV output quality than my 7000 and would it reduce the load on my cpu (when playing back dvd) more then my present Radeon 7000.

Has anyone tried Matrox later generation of graphics cards (550) with Sage and how do they compare with respect to CPU load on playback and TV quality.

Thanks

[phenixdragon]

I used a 9600SE in a box. It is cheap and it will do the job for what you are looking for. It has hardware assist so it won't do you MPEG w/o some CPU usage but it should lower it down for you.

I couldn't tell you anything about the Matrox card.

[kny3twalker]

do not get an SE card
try to find a PRO or non PRO
but SE is usually unclocked with poor memory

[Bathman]

Thanks for you replies. However a have another couple of questions.

Would an ATI9600 deffinatly give me better TV out quality.

Would I also be correct in thinking that this card would be able to display VMR9? Therefore I would be able to use the transparent OSD.

Does VMR9 add any increased load onto my CPU or is it all done by the graphics card intself?

Thanks

[kny3twalker]

Would I also be correct in thinking that this card would be able to display VMR9? Therefore I would be able to use the transparent OSD.

Does VMR9 add any increased load onto my CPU or is it all done by the graphics card intself?

well it would depend on the TV you are uising

the card will do VMR9 but smoothly depends on SDTV or HDTV

and yes it will increase the CPU usage a little over overlay

but not enough to make a difference unless you are trying to play back WMV HDs or using the TNM function built into WinDVD 6