Multimedia Center/TV

Once you’ve got everything booted up and installed, you’ll be immediately greeted by ATI’s Multimedia Center software, which acts as the hub for unlocking all of theAll-In-Wonder X1900’s multimedia functionality. From here you’ll launch the TV/FM/CD/DVD players for watching TV/movies or listening to the radio, Gemstar Guide Plus for keeping up with your local TV listings, or the Library for managing all of the audio/video content you’ve recorded on your PC. All of the various players have a consistent user interface, while ATI’s Eazylook feature makes controlling it all from your couch easier on your eyes.

Watching TV on your PC

The All-In-Wonder’s most well known feature is the integrated TV player. The All-In-Wonder X1900 can receive up to 125 cable television stations or 70 stations via antenna. We should mention that this is regular analog cable TV; digital cable and satellite aren’t natively supported by the All-In-Wonder X1900.

X Games on ESPN

Woah

Lebron looks mad

ATI’s TV player can perform all the functions you’d expect out of any TV, as well as several added extras. With mulTView you can watch television on one channel, while you’re recording your favorite television show on another, or you can use mulTView to watch two distinct stations at once for picture-in-picture support. All you have to do is drop in a second compatible TV tuner card, like ATI’s TV WONDER PRO or TV WONDER ELITE.

Look out Homer

Bart is handcuffed to Homer

Sitting down watching TV

Another feature the TV player supports is the TV Bar. With TV Bar, you can surf the web and watch TV at the same time. Just open up Internet Explorer, click the TV icon, and voila, a window will appear on the side of your browser with the current channel you’re watching as well as a program guide with channel listings and programming information just below it.

Classic

Hi Lisa

Homer fighting the man

ATI’s TV player also has a channel preview feature known as channel surf. With it, you can see what’s currently playing on multiple television stations simultaneously. With the click of a button your TV display is split up into a number of thumbnails, each representing a different channel; these thumbnails take snapshots of each station, and are updated regularly. To select a channel, simply click it to appear in your display. Due to the slow speed of the older Microtune 2050 tuner, this process could take quite awhile, but with the newer, faster 2121 chip it isn’t quite as long of an ordeal. Of course, with Gemstar’s Guide Plus electronic programming guide software telling you what’s currently on this feature isn’t used very often. Especially since Guide Plus does such an excellent job with its interface…

Bart slapping Homer

Tug of war

Marge trying to play peacemaker as usual