Software bundle
With that little lot, and given the price, no further icing on the cake might have been needed but there is a big dollop, or, actually, two. Somehow – and we're still struggling to work out how – ATI has been able to afford to include two seriously strong, and recently introduced, Windows editing packages from Adobe.
Amazingly, the card comes bundled with two Adobe's "budget" editors - Premiere Elements 2.0 for video and the still-image editor Photoshop Elements 4.0. About the best price you'll find for those two bought as a bundle over the net is £90 – including VAT and delivery – but lots of retailers would be happy to take well over £100 from you.
Were you to buy them separately, the best prices you'd find would total around £120, so what ever way you look at it, ATI is giving some serious and useful third-party added value. And make no mistake, these are extremely good programs. Each provides a huge proportion of the features of the much higher priced, non-Elements, full version.
Okay, that's the end of the nice stuff for a while, and before we go on, we need to make certain things clear. First, this isn't a review, it's a preview. The ATI package we received didn't include everything that purchasers will be getting, didn't come in a retail box and wasn't tested over an extended period of time.
The package lacked a manual for the ATI Remote Wonder Plus wireless handset – yes, in case you missed the earlier reference, a handset comes as standard. It also had no help files or manual for the Catalyst Control Center. Further, we imagine that the supplied drivers and software aren't the final release versions – though they were pretty stable, especially given the provocation they had.
A review should also be rather more complete than our offering, which has one gaping hole. As we said, there's been no testing done of the AIW's component video output and no serious objective benchmarking. We think that's close to unacceptable and wouldn't be surprised if you did, too. Especially given that the card is said to be targeted at power gamers and users who will want to connect its video output to PC monitors or TV sets that are able to handle high-definition video.
Unfortunately, the product arrived too late for us to arrange for it to be mated with an HD-capable monitor or TV. It turned up on the Friday evening preceding the Monday ( November 21) that the card was scheduled to be made public. More accurately, the card was integrated into a suitable system for us by top UK system-integrator MESH Computers at the drop of a hat – thanks guys – and that system only arrived with us on the Friday evening.
