Chaintech FX5600XT Personal Cinema vs. ATI 9600 All In Wonder Pro

[boxfetish]

I am assembling a Shuttle XPC for games and TV watching. I was wondering which one of these cards would be the better purchase. I can't seem to find any info comparing them.

Thanks in advance.

 

[rbV5]

To get a good comparison, you might want to wait a bit untill The ForceWare Multimedia application is released (supposed to be soon) As it stands right now, the WinDVR software isn't up to the same level as the ATI MMC suite, so I'd have to give the advantage to ATI for software right at this moment. If Forceware is at NVDVD level, it may be a big difference though as the Forceware drivers themselves"seem" much more configurable than Catalyst, and NVDVD is a superior DVD software IMHO. Whether Forceware will rival MMC's PVR is the big question though.

If you want DVI, then Personal Cinema is the only choice between them, AIW 9600 cards are VGA only. If you want dual head, then its the AIW 9600, but only dual VGA. Personal Cinema is a single head card.

Both remotes look to be very similar X-10 units, and ATI's I know from experience is real nice with a long range. I don't know why the nVidia remote wouldnt be the same, but perhaps behind the Remote Wonder as far as software is concerned.

Personal Cinema moved the tuner onboard, and both use a Philips analog tuner chip. The AIW 9600 will support YPbPr output with ATI's adaptor, while I don't see that with Personal Cinema if you need component output. The Personal Cinema uses a philips VIVO chip, while AIW 9600 uses ATI's Theater 200 chip.

AIW is a refined mature product, while Personal Cinema previously was horrible, these new models look potentially very good. They just haven't been out long enough to know yet.