nVIDIA Launching Personal Cinema 2.0 NV3x Based

[David G.]

Well , the thing that amazes me is that the card/device setup looks more and more like an ATi AIW solution while the remote control has been virtualy copied .

The quiestion is , when is nVIDIA going to take this seriously ?

I remember seing candidate cards from MSI with integrated TV Tuner based on GF4 Ti and GF4 MX being called " the next Personal Cinema revolution" more than 12 months ago but none of them surfaced . Only the "green style" external TV Tuner line has reached retail while manifesting a modest number of products availble .

THe AIW line is probably the best multimedia solution avaible for the simple PC user and I sincerily hope nVIDIA is going to represent a serious competitor and I would really like some MPEG-4 hardware encoding capabilities from the next generation AIW line . ( IMHO nVIDIA will always be behind ATi on this chapter as they've never been concentrated on quality but speed , which seems odd also as the old Personal Cinema line was much more expensive than the AIW omologues while exposing only two chices as the graphics engine : GF2 MX & GF3Ti200) .

Will this line bring a significant performance boost ? Or will they be based on slower 5600 and 5200 like VPUs which , after all , are not that much faster than the old GF3 Ti 200 ?

Will nVIDIA be able to offer a top of the line card with Personal Cinema 2.0 bundle like ATi does with all it's high end solutions ?

Will the complexity of the HUGE NV35 card allow the presence of an integrated TV TUner ?

 

[Ante P]

Actually nVidia and ATi use the same manufacturer for their remote controls so the resemblence isn't odd at all.

Personally I do hope they make something out of their personal cinema.

There were a few odd manufacturers who produced GeForce 4 Ti 4600 with Personal Cinema, don't have the link anymore but I've seen it.

 

[David G.]

Actually nVidia and ATi use the same manufacturer for their remote controls so the resemblence isn't odd at all.

Could you give more details on that please ?! Like a to the manufacturer's page or any kind of usefull info ?

 

[Ante P]

Actually nVidia and ATi use the same manufacturer for their remote controls so the resemblence isn't odd at all.

Could you give more details on that please ?! Like a to the manufacturer's page or any kind of usefull info ?

Nope, I just remember reading it at some site which did a comparison of nVidias Personal Cinema and ATis AIW.
He specifically mentioned that the remote controls were damn near identical and that this was due to both companies using the same manufacturer.

It was some time ago now so I haven't got the slightest clue where I read it.

 

[demalion]

I think X10...both are RF remote controls, and X10 has been focusing on home interconnection for ages (both RF and power line signal piggybacking, I think)..

One example of something sort of similar.

 

[David G.]

Yup , they do look quite similar and the software bundle makes me belive even more in the scenario .

Thanks for the link .

And here's another puzzling thing : couldn't ATi just sign a contract of exclusvity just to kick off nVIDIA from the manufacturer's list ?

Why did they let nVIDIA benefit from one of their best features , RF remote ?

 

[demalion]

How would that be in X10's interest? Nor do I think ATI prioritizes such exclusivity to a degree to make it worth their while...their focus is in the advantage of engineering (allowing AIW versions of their high end cards, and using their Rage Theater chip) and a solid software bundle.

Exclusivity in software solutions seems more likely, and they might have done that with the TV listing service, for example.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

There were a few odd manufacturers who produced GeForce 4 Ti 4600 with Personal Cinema, don't have the link anymore but I've seen it.

Well, if you're talking about a GF ti 4200/4600 with the ability to use the "little green box", there are a couple of them on the market...
GameSpot has a review of a 4200 here...
Here's another of the ti4200...

It would seem there are some personal cinema based 4600 cards reviewed here
(Google cache), but I'm a bit unsure...

Hope this helps a bit
If not, just tell me to shut up and go back to lurking...
It might just work

 

[Basic]

I must admit that I never realy understood how the external green box were going to be sold. (I don't think I ever saw it in RL/web stores.)

The first impression I got was "Yes, at last!" Since I thought that they intended to sell the green boxes separately, and all new cards using nVidia chips would interface with them (except perhaps the cheapest ones).

But then it seemed as if card+box were sold as a unit, and the box wouldn't work with other cards. Is that right?

I think it's a major misstake by ATi/nVidia to not do a modular gfx+TV card, where the interface at least holds a few generations. I don't care if it's an external box, daughter card or separate PCI card with direct connection. As long as it transfers the video straight to the GPU (as a texture) with minimal overhead. (Not over PCI.)

I think there's a lot of people that won't buy an AIW because of the high price, but could pay even more for gfx+TV if they knew the TV part could last a few gfx cards. Add to that the people that first bought a regular gfx card, and then feel the itch to get something more. But won't upgrade to an AIW since it meas buying a new full gfx card.

 

[Ante P]

@ Basic

I know that ATi has plans for doing "plugin" AIWs. You know that slot on some of the 9800 boards? At the 9800 launch they mentioned AIW and daughter card when speaking of that slot.
Though as you've also probably have seen they removed the "slot" on the final retail boards for some reason.


Gainward also has similar plans as they showed at CeBIT in Hannover.
http://www.nordichardware.com/article/2003/Cebit1/GainWard/Gainward.Addon.Slot.jpg
The white slot in the top left picture was to be used for various addons.

Again as in ATis case this design was dumped on the final retail board.


I'd love "plug in AIW"
go out and buy the 9800 Pro now instead of waiting for the AIW version
when ATi has finished the AIW design go out and buy the daughter card
that would be ideal

 

[MuFu]

nVIDIA Launching Personal Cinema 2.0 NV3x Based

Heh, only 3-4 months late. They are based on NV34 and NV31, AFAIK. Maybe NV36 too now actually... the "flagship" was supposed to be a 450/350MHz NV31 PC board but obviously that idea was dropped pretty soon, lol.

MuFu.