ALL-IN-WONDER X800 XT Continued...

The backside of the graphics processing unit is equipped with half of the memory chips, while on the GPU side we have the other half, for a total amount of 256MB local available memory. The PCB is not the typical red colors as we are used to seeing from ATI, but it is a purple/violet colored PCB. It looks good with the golden hardware I might add.

A closer look reveals a lot of chips on the back of the ALL-IN-WONDER X800 XT card. And what catches my eye? Well that empty spot on the PCB. Since I found that interesting, I searched around to find the missing piece. And yes, on several ALL-IN-Wonder X800 XT cards that is where the VIA VT1632M video processor resides. This is the chip that caters for EURO SCART connectivity facilitating a full RGB SCART output interface for connection of the board to devices such as video recorders or straight to TV. This VIA VT1632M is only present on the European version who feature PAL instead of NTSC. The VT1623M video processor, assists scaling - decoding hardware as well.

When we look at the structure of the PCB layout there isn't much difference with the normal RADEON X800 XT. There are just a bit more components involved on the ALL-IN-WONDER X800 XT in comparison. For the most part the PCB is designed much like the RADEON X800 XT and we wanted to point that out.

Let's have a look at the memory modules used on the ALL-IN-WONDER X800 XT card. The card comes equipped with eight modules, four on each side of the PCB. The memory modules used are the Samsung K4J55323QF-GC16 which are rated at 1.6ns (600MHz) or 1200MHz DDR. ATI clocks these at a more conservative 500MHz (1000MHz DDR) clock speed. Taking a screw driver, I removed the cooling system, let’s see what’s underneath.

Peeling off the 12 volt active heat sink fan temperature controlled cooling system, we can now get to the bottom of the ALL-IN-WONDER X800 XT and shed some light in its features and design. The ATI cooling system is comprised of an all aluminum base and clear plastic cover and is anodized in gold with aluminum fins that span out from the duct. As mentioned the fan is temperature controlled and is very quite in normal operation. The bracket we see is the retention mechanism that has a round rubber grommet that protects the backside PCB when installed. This entire cooler is held in place with these retention bar and the two screws that secure it firmly to the GPU.

On our return to the front of the card and after removing the heat sink we get a very clear look on the GPU used on the card, namely the ATI RADEON X800 Series GPU. Around the CPU we can spot again four of the eight Samsung memory chips placed in the typical RADEON PCB configuration.

Up close and personal, the RADEON X800 Series graphics processing unit. ATI always uses that extra metallic strip around the chip which will give it extra protection. Did we mention the R420 core, is a 16-pipeline GPU that runs at 500MHz clock speed? Just making sure...

I guess you spotted it as well, the ATI Theater 200 chip? This chip is responsible for the audio/video analog signal conversions, to digital a/v by offloading this process from the computer systems CPU. This allows the system processor to free up resources by using the Theater 200's onboard analog to digital decoders. I am going to test some of the video features of the card and focus on the decoder quality and offer some feedback of the rendering capabilities this card is capable of.