AMD’s TV Wonder turns your laptop or PC into a feature-rich HDTV DVR home theater

AMD today introduced two new TV Wonder products that could really accelerate the blurring of the digital and analogue worlds – both are thumb-sized devices that plug into your desktop or notebook and offer high-definition television (HDTV) viewing and digital video recording (DVR) capabilities. The rangetopping ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCIe is a combo-tuner DVR with ClearQAM tuning, allowing PC users to receive unencrypted digital content available from their local cable television provider, and switch between analog and digital TV to watch and record a digital TV program while simultaneously watching/recording an analog TV channel.

With the external plug-and-play ATI TV Wonder 600 USB, a desktop or notebook PC easily becomes a feature-rich DVR for HDTVs. The easy to install TV Wonder 650 Combo PCIe is a combo tuner that can capture both locally-available over-the-air and cable programming, including HDTV where available. The PCIe add-in card offers ClearQAM technology that captures unscrambled digital channels that may have previously been unavailable. Both products come with AMD’s Catalyst Media Center™ software, and integrate seamlessly with Windows Vista® Media Center and Windows® XP Media Center Edition.

“More and more, customers are using the PC as a digital hub for TV and video capture and these solutions put The Ultimate Visual Experience™ in reach of almost any PC user,” said Matt Skynner, vice president of marketing, Graphics Product Group, AMD. “These new HDTV tuner products provide a perfect complement to AMD’s graphics solutions, AMD LIVE!™ platforms, and AMD Turion™ 64 mobile technology-based notebooks – delivering simplified home theater PC options that come together for uncompromising visual quality and ease of use.”

The ATI TV Wonder 600 USB package includes a slim credit-card-sized IR remote control, A/V input adapter for video capture from a camcorder or VCR, and user-friendly Catalyst Media Center Software. Catalyst Media Center offers a simplified user interface optimized for TVs, an advanced electronic programming guide, DVD authoring and playback, video conversion and AMD LIVE! On Demand powered by Orb! for accessing the DVR from any computer with a broadband connectivity.

Extending the ATI TV Theater family, the ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCIe features ClearQAM tuning, allowing PC users to receive unencrypted digital content available from their local cable television provider. The ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCIe is a combo-tuner DVR, so users may switch between analog and digital TV to watch and record a digital TV program while simultaneously watching/recording an analog TV channel. The ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCIe also features high image quality, 3D comb filtering, and FM tuner.

The ATI TV Wonder 600 USB and ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCIe are scheduled to be widely available throughout North America by September 2007