ATI All-in-Wonder X600 Pro

Company: ATI Technologies Inc.
http://www.ati.com

Price As Tested: $249.00 Direct
Graphics Processor: Radeon X600 Pro
GPU Engine Clock Speed: 400
Memory Clock Speed: 600
RAMDAC Speed: 400
Graphics Memory: 256
System Interface: PCIe
Card Width: single
Requires Power Connector?: no
Required Power Supply: 350
No. VGA Output(s): 1
No. DVI Output(s): 1
Video Inputs: Composite, S-Video
Video Outputs: S-Video, Composite
Included Cables: S-Video, Composite
Driver supports HDTV resolutions: 1280 x 768, 1920 x 1080
Includes DVI-I-to-VGA converter?: no
OS Support for drivers: Windows 2000, Windows XP
Bundled Software - Business, Utility, Media: ATI TV software bundle, Pinnacle Studio, Mediator 7
Bundled Software - Games: none
Warranty: 36 months



The ATI All-in-Wonder X600 Pro is the latest in ATI's popular line of 3D graphics/TV-tuner combo cards, and one of the first created for PCI Express graphics slots in new PCs. For those on a budget and with limited slots, it's a good choice.

The basic platform is the successful midrange Radeon X600 Pro graphics card, which was a pretty good performer for the price when it was introduced. It has four pixel pipelines, a core clock speed of 400 MHz, and 256MB of DDR memory at 600 MHz. In other words, you'll be able to play the latest games just fine with it, though not at extremely high resolutions.

In the past, All-in-Wonder cards had a tendency to create a rat's nest of wires behind your PC, as all the composite and S-Video inputs and outputs attached to short cables a few inches from the back of the card. ATI has made great strides here, replacing all those individual connections with a pair of long-corded input/output blocks that stack neatly on top of one another. This makes it a lot easier to plug and unplug VCRs, camcorders, stereos, TVs, and anything else you're going to capture from or send video and audio to.

The bundled software has improved as well, with more reliable video capture that offers more control over recording formats. Pinnacle Studio and Mediator 7 are included to help you edit your recordings into something a little more professional. Gemstar's Guide+ software grabs your local cable TV listings for free and serves as the primary DVR interface. It does a good job of quickly showing you what's on and makes marking shows to record on your PC's hard drive easy.

ATI hasn't quite knocked one out of the park with the AiW X600 Pro, though. The Theater 200 video processing chip used here isn't bad; it delivers TV of equal quality to most sub-$100 TV tuner cards. We've seen better from companies like Hauppauge, and even ATI's own standalone TV Wonder Elite, with the new Theater 550 chip, delivers dramatically better TV quality. Though this is only a standard-definition TV card, it would have been nice to have component-video inputs and outputs in addition to the S-Video and composite hookups.

If you have a small PC, or for any other reason have a very limited number of slots, the All-in-Wonder X600 Pro is a good way to get TV and decent PCI Express graphics at an affordable price. If you have some spare slots, however, we still recommend a graphics-only video card and a separate, superior TV-tuner card.