ATI Radeon HD 5870 is the first video card to bitstream TrueHD and DTS-HD
By Ben Drawbaugh 
posted Sep 30th 2009 7:43PM
posted Sep 30th 2009 7:43PM
posted Sep 30th 2009 7:43PM
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So does the cheaper 5850. $120 less. less heat, smaller card & bitstream lovin!
It is about time... what year is this, 2007?
It shouldn't be long for the cheaper ones to come out. They always release the *870 and *850 first, and the mainstream versions not long after.
I'll be first in line when it comes down in price a bit.
C
It's news like this that makes me consider building an over-the-top HTPC instead of waiting another month or more for my Popcorn Hour C-200...
When they have a low profile card that will bitstream, I will buy my first Blu-ray player for my HTPC :)
It's nice to see this but it needs to be cheaper, come fanless, and also there is a known issue with HDMI syncing up with AMD/ATI cards where if you turn your TV off and turn it back on you may not have video anymore unless you reboot.
What version of Windows does that happen under? Vista? 7? 32bit? 64bit? Is it the catalyst drivers or does it only happen in various motherboard chipset/OS combinations?
I wouldn't be plugging this into my TV as it can neither decode nor pass lossless audio my Onkyo 805.
My understanding it happens in Vista and Windows 7. I personally and running Windows 7 and with my old 47” LCD TV it happened all the time. About 75% of the time, if I turned the TV off, come back later and turn it on it would lose the signal. The only fix was to unplug the HDMI cable and plug it back it or reboot, as replugging the cable didn’t work most of the time.
If you Google or search on The Green Button you can find out more about it. My understanding is that it’s an issue with the Catalyst drivers and something about it losing the EDID data while the monitor is turned off. Apparently, nVidia use to have this issue too but it is fixed. AMD claims it is fixed with the Catalyst drivers but everyone still says it is happening.
The issue is only with HDMI, component works fine. There is a tweak out there that you can modify the EDID data being sent where it can tell your computer to turn off and on the monitor but you have to know how to modify the EDID data. I looked into it but it was above my knowledge. I believe that even Ben Drawbaugh is running component on his system because of this issue.
I just picked up a new 55” TV last week and I don’t see this as happening as much now but I think that’s because my TV handles the EDID differently than my 47” did. I think the new TV tries to force a refresh but it doesn’t always work. About 10-20% of the time it doesn’t come back on with video and sometimes it will, but there will be no audio.
I don't think that the price comparison to a standalone bluray player has any merit. A gpu can do much more than just playback a bluray.
Plus, the 5850 at $260 just made the Asus soundcard that was required to bitstream obsolete. Even the $150 slim version of that soundcard is a non starter now considering what an extra $100 gets you. Not to mention not having to mess around with the cabling of that Asus setup.
they're on the right track...keep going and slash it's prices...
the 5770 and 5750 will be $200 and $150
and the 5670 will be around $120 and they will all have bitstreaming.
They could easily it make cheaper... if that was what they wanted. The 5870 is after all, a "make it as as powerful a gaming card (and other GPU applications) as we can sell" type of a graphics card; TrueHD and DTS-HD are just an afterthought. They're hot and loud, after all, not very HTPC material. It's not even an adopter tax - it's more of a "I need the best" kind of expense.
Couldn't older cards (ATI 48XX) be upgraded by software/drivers to have True-HD and DTS-HD bitstreaming? Or is there a harwdware limitation with the speed of the bus?
I have (naively) had the hope that my 4850 could someday be upgraded to bistream anything more than DD and DTS.
Probably not anymore likely than a firmware upgrade would make FAT PS3's capable of doing the same, as it's more likely that it's a physical issue more than software/drivers.
Agree with what most people are saying, your not paying the premium for the audio, your paying it for one of the best gaming cards available.
Did they release device drivers for Linux within the same calendar week as was released for other operating systems? Or will I have to wait 2 or 3 years to use the new technology?
Linux drivers are released with the others.
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