What exactly is the ATI Radeon's DVD capabilities?

[Solidus]

I want to get a nice 16x toshiba dvd-rom, but it is a lot cheaper to get a bare-drive(no software). I was searching for a decoder, either software or hardware, when i found something about the ati radeon haveing some form of dvd capabilities. I have the 32MB DDR version of the Radeon. does this mean it can act as a decoder card? all i found on ati's website for the radeon was "hardware DVD playback for full-screen full motion DVD video on your PC." How do i set it up, if it does have a decoder? can i just install the drive and start watching, or must i set up something else?

[This message has been edited by Solidus (edited 05-22-2001).]

[Solidus]

ok, after a bit more research, i found that "Integrated iDCT and motion compensation allows for DVD decoding with minimum CPU usage." So now how do i set it up? is it automated, plug-and-play, or what? how does dvd decoding work?

[Harold7]

All you need to do is install the ATI software DVD player that comes with your Radeon and you should be all set to play DVD movies on your PC, if you don't have it, go here: http://www.ati.com/na/pages/showcase/dvd/ to find out how to get it.

Or you can purchase a software DVD player such as Power DVD... you don't need a hardware decoder card with the Radeon card since the decoder circuitry is on the Radeon card already. http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif

[Kuasimodem]

If you have the Radeon's Multimedia Center installed (it comes on the CD with the card) just right-click on the ATI icon in the system tray, go up to ATI Programs, and click on DVD Player.

It will open, and if a DVD is in the player, it will start to play automatically.