ATI Unveils ALL-IN-WONDER 9600 PRO

by Anton Shilov
08/05/2003 | 05:28 PM

ATI Technologies unveiled today its ALL-IN-WONDER 9600 PRO graphics card with multimedia capabilities featuring loads of new features that will make the life of end-users a little bit better.

Being based on the RADEON 9600 PRO graphics processor with quite high performance in today’s 3D applications, the ALL-IN-WONDER 9600 PRO also provides FM Radio, Dual VGA, Faster-than-Real time DVD/CD Authoring and the next generation REMOTE WONDER II radio frequency (RF) Remote Control.

Here are three main features that differ the ALL-IN-WONDER 9600 PRO from other ALL-IN-WONDER devices:

• FM RADIO – New tuner delivers FM radio capability to the PC including FM-ON-DEMAND that timeshifts radio content to allow for pausing or exporting to MP3 file formats, 10 preset radio stations, capabilities to edit station identifiers, plus alarm and sleep settings;
• REMOTE WONDER II – With a reach of more than 60 feet, the new radio-frequency remote control unit gives users access to all of the ALL-IN-WONDER 9600 PRO functions plus quick access to all computer applications. Other features include new tactile mouse control, six programmable buttons, four auxiliary buttons, full integration with MULTIMEDIA CENTER applications, color coded-buttons for European Teletext feature, and future upgradeability;
• Dual VGA support – dual VGA output support matched with video in and video out, plus TV and FM connectors.

Other features of the ALL-IN-WONDER series remained present as well: TV-Tuner with Stereo sound and 125-channels support, VIVO, YRrPb output and so on.

Among the software features, the following definitely worth a mention:

• MulTView - Enables dual TV tuner capabilities such as Picture-in-Picture when combined with ATI-TV WONDER or TV WONDER VE;
• THRUVIEW - Allows for translucent viewing of TV, DVD (digital versatile disk) and video file playback;
• VIDEOSOAP - Delivers advanced filtering to reduce noise, improve sharpness and soften focus as desired to provide quality video compression for PVR and personal video editing functions;
• FULLSTREAM - Uses pixel shaders, based on innovative technology in the RADEON 9700 and RADEON 9000, to remove blocky artifacts from streaming video and provides sharper image quality and greater scalability;
• VIDEOSHADER - Uses programmable pixel shader technology to accelerate video processing and provide better-looking visuals;
• EAZYLOOK for on screen display information while using REMOTE WONDER;
• Closed Caption Search within TV-ON-DEMAND complements the popular "Hotwords" functionality with the PVR allowing the computer to search for content of interest whether it happens in the future or the recent past;
• Pinnacle Video Studio 8 - Offers powerful features for consumer video editing;
• ATI's MULTIMEDIA CENTER 8.6 now includes DVD and CD Authoring capabilities. A customer can easily archive recorded television, video and audio programs to the media of their choice with a couple of clicks of the mouse. ATI’s media authoring solution supports DVD+/-R, DVD+/-RW, and CD-R/-RW. Depending on the media drive speed, ATI’s solution allows Faster-than-Real time authoring which makes real time authoring obsolete because it does not tie up a computer for an extended period of time.

The ALL-IN-WONDER 9600 PRO will be available from selected partners in Europe and Asia-Pacific within 4 to 6 weeks for approximately $249.