Suggestions on a non-gaming oriented VIVO AGP Card

[commemoratives]

I am starting to build another machine and would like some suggestions on a VIVO card. The MB is an ASUS A7V133 and I will be using 512 megs of RAM. Will also be using the RAID1 on 7200 RPM drives.

Haven't picked out a CPU or video card yet. I am not in to gaming, and I am probably going to leave it up to the AC97 on-board sound. I'll wait and see how I feel about the sound system later. For now I want to get some suggestions on what would be the most appropriate video card.

What I will be doing:
1) Capture cable/dish/VHS to PVR and record it on VCD using Nero. May go to DVD some day, but not for now.
2) Output video to a VCR to record slideshows, etc on VHS.
3) Play around with converting to MP4 for use with my crappy work laptop (still running '95)

What would be the best value in a VIVO card with a tuner, composite, and SVHS? I will need a bundle which includes PVR software and I guess hardware encoding is the best solution. I have been looking at ATI AIW's and they look good, since it will not be used for gaming I am wondeing how much is too much in the way of a card? I also plan on tinkering with overclocking if that is of any concern.

TIA

 

[Willoughbyva]

So far I haven't played with the vivo part of the card, but I just got a Radeon AIW 7500 and I am happy with it.

 

[Daovonnaex]

You may want to consider the Matrox Marvel G450 eTV

 

[commemoratives]

Good looking card. I just printed the manual and will read through it. (my idea of fun)

Any idea whether the PVR software offers commercial skip? I know this was a feature in VCR's for a while which seems to have gone away. When I am looking at burning th VCD all of the fluff I can cut out would be nice.

 

[Rand]

I gotta go with Daovonnaex, if you need VIVO and your not gaming then the G450eTV is one hell of a nice card. The best 2D money can buy, excellent driver support, best dual head implementation available, and solid crisp VIVO.

As a secondary choice the ATi Radeon 64MB VIVO or an AIW Radeon7500 is very good.
Similar VIVO quality, a superior gaming card, better DVD, but otherwise clearly inferior to Matrox's offering.

 

[commemoratives]

I appreciate the advice. I have to admit more familiarity with ATi, a quick search on pricegrabber shows either ATi card is 20-30 bucks cheaper. I haven't gone through the Matrox manual yet, is there any compelling reason to select it over ATi if they are so close in price?


Got to admit the dual head is a great idea. I am using an older ATi with video out now and when I switch to composite out the monitor goes nuts and has to be shut off.

 

[rbV5]

Just remember, both cards use the same Ligos Software Mpeg encoding, so get the fastest cpu you can afford. Also, the G450 etv is not a dual head like the G400, the second display must be a TV (or VCR), a bit more functional than the ATI AIW, but very similar in XP with the AIW 7500 and AIW 8500 series.

With MMC 7.5, its hard not to recommend the AIW 7500, its priced close to the eTV, IMHO, has a better software package, twice the video memory, comparable VIVO caapabilities, far better 3D graphics and OpenGL. A more mature\versitile package, Matrox makes very good cards, but ATI's been making AIW cards for several generations now, this is matrox's first real AIW.

You can't go wrong with either, for value, I just picked up an AIW Radeon for $110, but I'd have got a AIW 7500 if I'd known it was coming out.

 

[commemoratives]

Semi-Bump

Looking for more options & opinions. The Matrox is a good looking card, but it is awfully hard to think in terms of something other that ATI, any other voices on the subject?