Any chance you can get 1080i deinterlacing tests in the future? 480i source material is fine, but with OTA HDTV widely available now, and the 7800gt/gtx line flaunting HD spatial temporal deinterlacing, i'm sure this is what most readers want to know about.
Its nice to see detailed looks into a vastly overlooked area of video card performance. Kudos for using a standard to measure by, now if we see more of this type of scrutiny from more reviewers perhaps we'll actually get to see these features enabled rahter than reading about how great its going to be some day.
Now lets take a good look at connectivity, custom resolution support, 1:1 pixel mapping, codec support......
quote: Despite what ATI told us at our Avivo briefing last month (although ATI insists it was a miscommunication), H.264 decode acceleration is not launching alongside the R5xx GPUs. ATI is committed to bringing both H.264 decode acceleration and transcode assist by the end of the year, but for now, we have no way of testing those features.
nVidia already fooled me with this once. They called it PureVideo and I bought a Geforce 6800 AGP and waited eagerly for driver support that never came for hardware decode of HD WMV files (or hardware encode of MPEG), because the NV40/45 design was borked. nVidia left every single user that bought an NV40/45 card in the lurch. No recourse. So everyone who bought one with the hope of using PureVideo was screwed.
Not making that mistake again with any company. If a feature isn't supported at the time I purchase a product, that feature doesn't exist. I'm not going to believe press releases anymore, seeing as touted features can be revoked if drivers or hardware don't work out right. Never again.
Note: I now own an ATI X800XL, and have nothing against ATI or nVidia other than that I 'm too cynical to believe either of them on any feature until I see that feature in action.
I was thinking the exact same thing. Never again will I by something that will have features added at a later date. This is just a marketing tactic because they already know the hardware won't handle what they promised.
I just amended the article to include this information:
"Both the ATI and NVIDIA drivers were set to auto-detect what de-interlacing algorithm the hardware should use. We found that this setting yielded the best results for each platform in the HQV benchmark."
If I forced the adaptive or motion adaptive settings, some of the HQV tests did worse, while none improved in image quality.
Am I the only one that thinks the NV version of "De-Interlacing Quality: Vertical Detail" (page 3) is worse? Some of the red/green alternating lines are completely green or lose detail.
And how often do the different film cadence modes get used really ? (However, they get the same amount of points (weight) as some more elementary tests.) And I can't tell the functional difference between ATI/NV in the second image in page 9 "De-Interlacing Quality - Mixed 3:2 Film With Added Video Titles".
Or are the reasons for these differences only visible in moving video?
[quote] And I can't tell the functional difference between ATI/NV in the second image in page 9 "De-Interlacing Quality - Mixed 3:2 Film With Added Video Titles".
Or are the reasons for these differences only visible in moving video?[/quote]
Nah, de-interlacing artfacts would always turn up in the proper still framegrab and be easier to see that way as well, but I can't see any de-interlacing artfacts on any of the shots that are claimed to have such issues so am at a loss to understand the author's conclusions on that page. The first ATI shot does show some nasty compression for some reason or another, but I don't see any of interlacing issues in the shots on that page from either ATI or Nvidia.
It's tough to see here, but those are actually supposed to be interlacing artifacts. They appear as compression artifacts here, but in motion you get a very clear lined pattern.
One thing about the guitar strings... Are you sure that they are artifacts and not the texture of the guitar strings? I do agree with one thing, they kinda look extreme...
It is an acoustic base guitar and those do tend to use some pretty massive copper wound strings, but yeah I don't see anything that looks like interlacing artifacts in those shots.
Regardless, thanks for the update Anand and I'll check back to see how things turn out. The next card I buy will most likely be for my media center so de-interlacing quality is on my priority list.
I don't follow, the text at the bottom which the test askes to be compared defiantly doesn't show any interlacing artifacts in the posted pics while compression artifacts are mostly in the top right of the image and on the hands. The text does look a bit sharper on Nvidia, but best I can tell that is just from appling a sharpening fliter as that seems to be pretty obviously the case in the last shot with the fingers on piano keys and the slight shifts in geometry than can be seen there.
Also, since the compression artifacts only appear in the first ATI shot, I can't help but wonder if that came about from downsampling as the jpg to under 40mb which nearly a quarter of what a full quality jpg of that resolution would be. Regardless, I am curious to see any further explnation of de-interlacing issues with the new r5xx chips as I would hate to try and upgrade my media center card only to wind up with worse de-interlacing than on my current r420 based card.
Apparently ATI isn't seeing what I'm seeing, so the issues may have been a driver problem, I will update you guys as soon as I have a driver/fix for the situation.
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ST - Thursday, October 6, 2005 - link
Any chance you can get 1080i deinterlacing tests in the future? 480i source material is fine, but with OTA HDTV widely available now, and the 7800gt/gtx line flaunting HD spatial temporal deinterlacing, i'm sure this is what most readers want to know about.ksherman - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
I installed PureVideo, but what players actually take advantage of it?rbV5 - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
Its nice to see detailed looks into a vastly overlooked area of video card performance. Kudos for using a standard to measure by, now if we see more of this type of scrutiny from more reviewers perhaps we'll actually get to see these features enabled rahter than reading about how great its going to be some day.Now lets take a good look at connectivity, custom resolution support, 1:1 pixel mapping, codec support......
LoneWolf15 - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
nVidia already fooled me with this once. They called it PureVideo and I bought a Geforce 6800 AGP and waited eagerly for driver support that never came for hardware decode of HD WMV files (or hardware encode of MPEG), because the NV40/45 design was borked. nVidia left every single user that bought an NV40/45 card in the lurch. No recourse. So everyone who bought one with the hope of using PureVideo was screwed.Not making that mistake again with any company. If a feature isn't supported at the time I purchase a product, that feature doesn't exist. I'm not going to believe press releases anymore, seeing as touted features can be revoked if drivers or hardware don't work out right. Never again.
Note: I now own an ATI X800XL, and have nothing against ATI or nVidia other than that I 'm too cynical to believe either of them on any feature until I see that feature in action.
Lifted - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
I was thinking the exact same thing. Never again will I by something that will have features added at a later date. This is just a marketing tactic because they already know the hardware won't handle what they promised.Patman2099 - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
Is it just me, or is there no mention in the article of what Deinterlacing option they used on the ATI boardyou can change it in CCC, Ive found that the Adaptive looks best on my radeon 9700.
which deinterlaxing mode was used?
Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
I just amended the article to include this information:"Both the ATI and NVIDIA drivers were set to auto-detect what de-interlacing algorithm the hardware should use. We found that this setting yielded the best results for each platform in the HQV benchmark."
If I forced the adaptive or motion adaptive settings, some of the HQV tests did worse, while none improved in image quality.
Take care,
Anand
user loser - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
Am I the only one that thinks the NV version of "De-Interlacing Quality: Vertical Detail" (page 3) is worse? Some of the red/green alternating lines are completely green or lose detail.Compare to the original:
http://www.belle-nuit.com/testchart.html">http://www.belle-nuit.com/testchart.html
(720 * 486 (NTSC) )
And how often do the different film cadence modes get used really ? (However, they get the same amount of points (weight) as some more elementary tests.) And I can't tell the functional difference between ATI/NV in the second image in page 9 "De-Interlacing Quality - Mixed 3:2 Film With Added Video Titles".
Or are the reasons for these differences only visible in moving video?
TheSnowman - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
[quote] And I can't tell the functional difference between ATI/NV in the second image in page 9 "De-Interlacing Quality - Mixed 3:2 Film With Added Video Titles".Or are the reasons for these differences only visible in moving video?[/quote]
Nah, de-interlacing artfacts would always turn up in the proper still framegrab and be easier to see that way as well, but I can't see any de-interlacing artfacts on any of the shots that are claimed to have such issues so am at a loss to understand the author's conclusions on that page. The first ATI shot does show some nasty compression for some reason or another, but I don't see any of interlacing issues in the shots on that page from either ATI or Nvidia.
Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
It's tough to see here, but those are actually supposed to be interlacing artifacts. They appear as compression artifacts here, but in motion you get a very clear lined pattern.Take care,
Anand
intellon - Thursday, October 6, 2005 - link
One thing about the guitar strings... Are you sure that they are artifacts and not the texture of the guitar strings? I do agree with one thing, they kinda look extreme...TheSnowman - Friday, October 7, 2005 - link
It is an acoustic base guitar and those do tend to use some pretty massive copper wound strings, but yeah I don't see anything that looks like interlacing artifacts in those shots.Regardless, thanks for the update Anand and I'll check back to see how things turn out. The next card I buy will most likely be for my media center so de-interlacing quality is on my priority list.
TheSnowman - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
I don't follow, the text at the bottom which the test askes to be compared defiantly doesn't show any interlacing artifacts in the posted pics while compression artifacts are mostly in the top right of the image and on the hands. The text does look a bit sharper on Nvidia, but best I can tell that is just from appling a sharpening fliter as that seems to be pretty obviously the case in the last shot with the fingers on piano keys and the slight shifts in geometry than can be seen there.Also, since the compression artifacts only appear in the first ATI shot, I can't help but wonder if that came about from downsampling as the jpg to under 40mb which nearly a quarter of what a full quality jpg of that resolution would be. Regardless, I am curious to see any further explnation of de-interlacing issues with the new r5xx chips as I would hate to try and upgrade my media center card only to wind up with worse de-interlacing than on my current r420 based card.
Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
The text itself is fine, it is the background image where the interlacing artifacts are seen. I'll see if I can get a better screen grab tonight.Take care,
Anand
Anand Lal Shimpi - Thursday, October 6, 2005 - link
Apparently ATI isn't seeing what I'm seeing, so the issues may have been a driver problem, I will update you guys as soon as I have a driver/fix for the situation.Take care,
Anand
vailr - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
Newer driver version?Ati Catalyst 8.18 beta:
http://www.station-drivers.com/forum/viewtopic.php...">http://www.station-drivers.com/forum/viewtopic.php...
Live - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
I would if I could. Quit teasing us and give as the real deal, lol.
cirrhosis - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
INQ has benchies already. Not a surprise. Cards are matched.Hacp - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
GRAKK!cirrhosis - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
Interesting. Here's hoping that ATI improves on what they've started. Looking forward to the comoing months and what they bring.