Top quality video on your PC: Splendid!

The quality of video viewed on PC now rivals high-end consumer TVs, according to Asus, thanks to the firm’s newly launched ‘Splendid’ technology.

The firm’s new ‘Splendid Video Enhancement’ technology detects when a user activates and uses any video application and then automatically optimises image quality for the best visual results possible.

Buyers of Asus' PC graphics cards will now find Splendid Video Enhancement built into each card's drivers. These drivers can also be downloaded from the firm’s home page at www.asus.com.

“Graphics quality has become one of the most important features in personal computing as more and more people are using their computers for games, movies and image editing,” said Jerry Shen, general manager of Asus Graphics Business. “Splendid Video Enhancement is a significant step forward in PC home entertainment, because video representation on computers is finally as good as on the best TVs.”

According to Asus’ technical team, videos played on a PC don’t usually look as good as TV. That's because most PCs don’t come equipped with the kind of image-processing unit that's commonly found in consumer electronic display devices. As a result, images can appear to lack depth and might appear grayish. Asus reckons its Splendid technology is the missing link that improves the video display on monitors to such an extent that it can finally satisfy movie buffs, hardcore sport fans and 3D gamers.

Splendid Video Enhancement’s ‘Area Pixel Processing Algorithm’ carefully evaluates each pixel in every frame and adjusts these based on smaller regions without affecting the whole picture. Colors in each region are dynamically optimised according to conditions most favorable to the human eye. Asus claims Splendid is especially effective at reproducing human skin tones, green stretches of grass and trees, and blue sky and sea.