ATI All-in-Wonder Radeon 32MB DDR

The Card Part II

The ViVo features of the All-in-Wonder Radeon are a bit more advanced than the standard Radeon. On the out side of things, the All-in-Wonder offers the same composite and S-video out connectors as the standard Radeon, however the All-in-Wonder version also includes a sound-out connector as well as an S/PDIF output for Dolby Digital Audio output. While the audio-out pass through was necessary to provide sound for TV shows, the S/PDIF out connector is a nice feature that no other All-in-Wonder type card that we have seen possesses. One complaint we have about the output dongle is its loose connection to the card. It was very easy to pull the dongle out, and with cables hooked up to it, it was not that unlikely for it to fall out completely.

On the input side of things, we find that the All-in-Wonder Radeon uses the same breakout box as previous All-in-Wonder products. Unlike the video-in function of the standard Radeon, the All-in-Wonder Radeon is able to take not only composite in but also S-video in as well as left and right channel sound in. The S-video in feature is quite nice and comes in handy with newer video camcorders, however sound is just as easily recorded by hooking an input source to the sound card. It seems quite likely that this is exactly what the All-in-Wonder Radeon does, looping sound through the card and into the sound card via the attached audio-out pass through cable. The output dongle fit snugly into the card, providing a stable connection.

On the back of the All-in-Wonder Radeon, we find both a RAM chip as well as Micronas 3430G sound processing chip that serves to send the un-amplified sound from the TV to the sound card. Manufacturers try their hardest to keep large components off the back of the PCB, as they increase manufacturing costs. In the case of the All-in-Wonder Radeon, ATI had no choice but to place components on the back due to the extremely full front of the card.

The large metallic box that replaces the location of the BIOS, one RAM chip, and power components is what makes the All-in-Wonder Radeon unique from not only other Radeons but also from many other video cards. The sliver box houses quite a few electronic components not found on the vast majority of video cards and is actually manufactured on its own PCB that interfaces with the card through a series of pins. Coming out of the box and sandwiched between the video-in and video-out connectors, we find the coaxial cable connection; a cable that proves to be the lifeblood of the All-in-Wonder Radeon. Without this connector plugged into a video source, the All-in-Wonder Radeon becomes nothing more than a ViVo (video-in/video-out) Radeon. However, plug it in and you enter a whole new world. Let's take a look at it.