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Mr FancySocks posted:The Hauppauge WinTV HVR 1600 seems to be a really good deal right now at $60. I just got one myself, and it's working great. Hmm, that card combined with MediaPortal seems like exactly what I'm looking for. I think I might go ahead and order one soon. Thanks.
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Feb 22, 2008 05:50
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dur posted:You'd need a video card like a Radeon 3540 that has HDCP support to actually play any Blurays if you got this for an HTPC, right?
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Feb 22, 2008 18:55
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Saukkis posted:I don't think HDCP is necessary currently. A Blu-ray movie may require it, but I haven't heard of any that does it. Just to be clear about this, any hd-dvd or bluray movie requires a full unbroken hdcp chain to play back at full 1080p resolution. I believe that cyberlink has a tool on their website which will tell you if your setup meets this requirement. A full chain implies one of the handful of software players (powerdvd, nero showtime?, and one other who's name is escaping me at the moment) and a hdcp compliant video card, and a display with hdcp.
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Feb 22, 2008 20:47
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Saukkis posted:I don't think HDCP is necessary currently. A Blu-ray movie may require it, but I haven't heard of any that does it. Yeah, dfn already covered this, but it has to be stressed that 1080p from Bluray is not possible without A) a fully compliant HDCP video card/monitor/tv, or B) something that strips the HDCP protections.
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Feb 22, 2008 20:58
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Mr FancySocks posted:I am using the Gyration HTPC remote suite. Super cheap right now at $60 and a great air-mouse/remote, with a small keyboard for when you need it. I really want that, but it's not in stock in any store near me 
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Feb 22, 2008 22:09
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Is there any way to make Windows Media Center's series record function a bit more... intelligent? It works fine, but is a bit over-zealous on what it records. When the same episode is repeated 3 times in a week, I get all 3 recorded rather than just one, even though they all have the same episode name. Other than this, and my near perma-broken VFD, my setup's now perfect after months of fiddling, and finally getting ShowAnalyzer working automatically yesterday 
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Feb 24, 2008 14:23
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SFrost007 posted:Is there any way to make Windows Media Center's series record function a bit more... intelligent? It works fine, but is a bit over-zealous on what it records. When the same episode is repeated 3 times in a week, I get all 3 recorded rather than just one, even though they all have the same episode name. Have you set it to just record new run episodes? I think the default for a series recording is a shotgun approach where it records it whenever it sees it. Go to TV+Movies -> Recorded TV -> View Scheduled -> Series Then click on the series you want to modify. Then hit Series Settings. The very bottom option is Show Type, you can pick First Run & Rerun, Live or First Run. If you hit First Run it should only record episodes the first time they air.
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Feb 24, 2008 23:40
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I'm using a 1.66Ghz Mac Mini Core Duo with 1GB of ram as my HTPC. It can handle 720p HD material fine usually, but in the past couple days I've noticed on some HD movies when there's a lot of action going on, there will be slowdown and/or stuttering. Will adding another GB of ram help alleviate this problem, or is it something that can only be fixed by having a faster processor or video card?
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Feb 26, 2008 16:55
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OldSenileGuy posted:I'm using a 1.66Ghz Mac Mini Core Duo with 1GB of ram as my HTPC. It can handle 720p HD material fine usually, but in the past couple days I've noticed on some HD movies when there's a lot of action going on, there will be slowdown and/or stuttering. Will adding another GB of ram help alleviate this problem, or is it something that can only be fixed by having a faster processor or video card? Stuttering on high action/movement scenes is almost certainly the processor. More ram is unlikely to help, and video cards don't really touch HD decoding (unless they are specific models using specific software). Can you grab a dashboard widget that will track your cpu/ram usage? It would be an easy way to verify what's being overburdened.
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Feb 26, 2008 18:00
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I am in the market to build myself a small computer to put in my media center, but I'm not sure if what I am looking for qualifies as a true HTPC. This will all be displayed on a 40" Samsung 1080p LCD, I assume via DVI -> HDMI. What I want to do: - First and foremost, I'd like to be able to use my LCD TV as a full blown computer when I'd rather stay on my couch and do some light web browsing instead of going to my bedroom. - Run a few games like EVE online, or PC titles my 360 doesn't have. - Stream or play video/music from the computer I am building, or from other computers in the house. My 360 can already do this but I kind of HATE having to have Windows Media Player open to do so. What I'm not looking to do: - Record TV (my DVR box does this just fine) - Play TV through the computer (I am happy with my cable provider) - Have a fancy dashboard unless it's easy to have this and switch back and forth between regular windows XP for game playing/browsing With these specifications in mind, what should I be in the market for? I do want to keep this small form factor as I don't have a ton of space on my media rack and having a tower case sitting next to your nice LCD looks stupid. Is the most important part simply having a decent video card to handle the 40" screen? This really is essentially just a computer in a small case, as I don't need a TV tuner or anything, correct? Last but not least, any ideas on what kind of budget should be able to handle all of this? I already have a very good gaming PC in my bedroom, so all of the latest and greatest games will probably stay there, but I do want to play a few games on the TV as well without breaking the bank.
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Feb 26, 2008 23:46
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I just wanted to show everyone the coolest HTPC case ever: Link  Its wall-loving-mountable, yo!  Their other models are pretty slick as well, although none are available in US yet. If I hadn't just bought a Silverstone several months ago I would be buying the TF8. They'll probably all cost a goddamn fortune.
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Feb 27, 2008 01:19
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SubCrid TC posted:Have you set it to just record new run episodes? I think the default for a series recording is a shotgun approach where it records it whenever it sees it. Yup, I've got it set like this and it's still doing it. Maybe there's something missing in the UK listings it downloads that stops it from working properly (though it does get full descriptions and episode names). Thanks anyway
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Feb 28, 2008 00:03
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EC posted:I just wanted to show everyone the coolest HTPC case ever: That is hot as poo poo but room for 1 HDD is a bit rough.
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Feb 28, 2008 05:15
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Overture posted:
I'll just give you my answer for the standard HTPC, most of the people I know use this as their setup: Case: Antec NSK2480. (Not super small, like a tower but laying flat) Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-MA69GM-S2H. HDMI out and will handle 1080p. NO Graphic card needed. (It's an HTPC, not a gaming rig) Choose any AMD Athlon 64 X2. Higher the better, black box is good. I recommend 5600+ At least 3GB ram, a couple HD's, and you're set.
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Feb 28, 2008 05:37
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This post is not so much an HTPC question, as just a general PC video watching question. Codecs. Can someone enlighten me about them? I have a few specific questions too, but a general overview of which ones are good and such would be nice. I'm going to be using Media Center for now, maybe Media Portal. I would love to be able to play 720p video files. So what will I need to be able to watch 720p files in Media Center? Also, where does one obtain these  of 720p quality? Are they DVD rips? Are we not allowed to say on the forums?(USER WAS BANNED FOR THIS POST)
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Feb 28, 2008 06:31
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Wood for Sheep posted:This post is not so much an HTPC question, as just a general PC video watching question. There is a thread about codecs in the SHSC forum, look for it there it's very recent. As for files, you're an idiot.
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Feb 28, 2008 08:30
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Wood for Sheep posted:Also, where does one obtain these I'm guessing you mean video files to test out your PC. Microsoft has a few: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/musicandvideo/hdvideo/contentshowcase.aspx
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Feb 28, 2008 14:39
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Randi Challenger posted:That is hot as poo poo but room for 1 HDD is a bit rough. Yeah, I noticed that, but I would wager that most people* use their HTPC simply as a playback device, and have recording, file storage, media streaming happening on another machine. *most people being the small niche who have HTPCs, more than one computer, have setup a PVR before, and would actually consider hanging a HTPC on the wall underneath their flatscreen. 
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Feb 28, 2008 15:10
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Phillyt posted:There is a thread about codecs in the SHSC forum, look for it there it's very recent. As for files, you're an idiot. Thank you for the direction to the codecs thread, but I have already looked there and there is little information about what each codec package does. That thread is just people saying which ones they use with MPC and then to use VLC if nothing works. Unless someone has posted something new in the past 4 or 5 days, that does not pertain to my question. Also, those codec packs that I have tried in the past have made it unable to use Media Center to watch anything. And that doesn't really help me since that was why I posted in the first place. Next time, if you really can't help then don't say anything, it makes everything easier. As for the files, all I have are .avi which are not HD. They can be upscaled fairly well, but they're not true HD. How do you rip DVDs to your harddrive and have Media Center recognize them, and then upscale them? Maybe I am just missing something, so tell me what I'm missing. Wood for Sheep fucked around with this message at 21:34 on Feb 28, 2008 |
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Feb 28, 2008 15:42
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Wood for Sheep posted:Also, those codec packs that I have tried in the past have made it unable to use Media Center to watch anything. And that doesn't really help me since that was why I posted in the first place. Next time, if you really can't help then don't say anything, it makes everything easier. Jesus christ you're an idiot. Talking about downloading illegal content will get you banned, which is why that guy linked you to the MS site.
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Feb 28, 2008 15:58
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Wood for Sheep posted:GUYS GUYS GUYS WHERE CAN I GET MOVIEZ My goodness, you're a slow one.
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Feb 28, 2008 17:20
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Wood for Sheep posted:So my question was where does someone find HD content files to play?
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Feb 28, 2008 17:23
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Wood for Sheep posted:Thank you for the direction to the codecs thread, but I have already looked there and there is little information about what each codec package does. That thread is just people saying which ones they use with MPC and then to use VLC if nothing works. Unless someone has posted something new in the past 4 or 5 days, that does not pertain to my question. Not sure if you'll read this, but FFDShow, Haali Media Splitter, AC3Filter, and CoreAVC make a solid and concise codec set-up.
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Feb 28, 2008 18:07
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For what it's worth, Nvidia's new 8200 chipset is due out on March 4th, which is their mATX solution, with an integrated video chipset that does onboard decoding. Even cooler is there are big hints that Nvidia will release a codec pack that will utilize full GPU decoding on all HD formats (MPEG2, VC1, x264). So no more PowerDVD required!
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Feb 28, 2008 18:22
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Well this is pretty good as I have to wait for 8500s to get back in stock and settle down in price. If I can find a nicely priced 8200 based mobo that does on board decoding, that'll straight tits. Do you have any links to articles or anything that I can read up on?
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Feb 28, 2008 19:08
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Crackbone posted:For what it's worth, Nvidia's new 8200 chipset is due out on March 4th, which is their mATX solution, with an integrated video chipset that does onboard decoding. Sounds great! I hope they package it on mobos with hdmi and some decent audio hardware. I'll definitely being keeping an eye out for this.
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Feb 28, 2008 20:31
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Randi Challenger posted:Well this is pretty good as I have to wait for 8500s to get back in stock and settle down in price. If I can find a nicely priced 8200 based mobo that does on board decoding, that'll straight tits. Do you have any links to articles or anything that I can read up on? http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=990188 They're definitely going to be HDMI solutions available. I'm trying to get clarification from a guy about this supposed Nvidia codec. Either way, onboard cards capable of HD decoding is really awesome. Apparently the Intel solutions are due soon as well.
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Feb 28, 2008 20:50
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Wood for Sheep posted:Thank you for the direction to the codecs thread, but I have already looked there and there is little information about what each codec package does. That thread is just people saying which ones they use with MPC and then to use VLC if nothing works. Unless someone has posted something new in the past 4 or 5 days, that does not pertain to my question. CoreAVC does do HD decoding and I believe thats why people recommend it in that thread. That was the point of me helping you. Not every post is going to be someone holding your hand.
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Feb 28, 2008 22:20
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I posted this in the SHSC parts thread, and got a response that it was my processor causing the problem ...quote:I have a Shuttle with a Athlon Venice 64 3000 with 1GB of DDR400 RAM serving as a HTPC, and it's been really chugging on me. Besides general slowness (I use MediaPortal to navigate through my movies), a few recently x264 encoded movies stutter to the point of being unwatchable. The weird thing is that I swear my system used to be able to handle those files just fine. Do I really need a new system to be able to handle 720p videos?
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Feb 29, 2008 18:03
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Strict 9 posted:I posted this in the SHSC parts thread, and got a response that it was my processor causing the problem ... Codecs?
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Feb 29, 2008 18:32
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Strict 9 posted:I posted this in the SHSC parts thread, and got a response that it was my processor causing the problem ... I didn't say you needed a new system to play 720p, I said I'd suspect (based off my old system experience) that you're probably seeing high CPU usage on x264 720p files - I recall a couple doing 69-80% on my old Athlon 3500. You didn't specify what resolution these new video are at. If they're 1080p stutter free playback is out of the question. If they're 720p, are the stuttering in general or only in high action scenes? Are all of you files now stuttering, or just the new ones? You can always download a widget to see CPU/Ram Usage (or just open up task manager) to see what's actually being taxed on your system. And Nathan's right, it could be a codec issue, have you updated recently?
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Feb 29, 2008 18:44
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Crackbone posted:I didn't say you needed a new system to play 720p, I said I'd suspect (based off my old system experience) that you're probably seeing high CPU usage on x264 720p files - I recall a couple doing 69-80% on my old Athlon 3500. Why hello there. Actually, to begin with I should double check to make sure those videos are in 720p, but I am fairly certain they are. The stuttering occurs almost instantly and seems to have nothing to do with the action on-screen. Only the "new" files are stuttering, but I don't have any old x264 files to compare with unfortunately. Xvid and such files are still playing fine, as are my DVDs. I'm not sure how I didn't think to check for updated codecs. I think my fear is that I must have spent hours tweaking settings based off advise at avsforums.com and didn't want to risk losing that. I'll do a codec update and check my task manager to see what exactly is being used. Thanks for the advise.
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Feb 29, 2008 19:45
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Strict 9 posted:Why hello there. "Tweaking"... does that mean you're doing some sort of postprocessing on these files through something like FFDSHOW? What's your player software setup?
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Feb 29, 2008 19:59
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Crackbone posted:"Tweaking"... does that mean you're doing some sort of postprocessing on these files through something like FFDSHOW? What's your player software setup? Exactly. I'm not sure how much of an actual benefit I get through that, of course, but I did follow the guide posted here. I'm using MediaPortal as a front-end with MPC as my player (I believe - I'd have to double check that).
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Feb 29, 2008 21:04
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Strict 9 posted:Exactly. I'm not sure how much of an actual benefit I get through that, of course, but I did follow the guide posted here. I'm using MediaPortal as a front-end with MPC as my player (I believe - I'd have to double check that). I saw that the other day, but the OP is over a year old and I've been looking for something a little newer.
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Feb 29, 2008 21:14
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For lower-end CPUs, CoreAVC is generally recommended for x264 playback over ffdshow and other equivalents. http://www.coreavc.com/ DivX and DVD playback work fine because they don't require anywhere near the amount of processing power to decode that x264 does
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Feb 29, 2008 21:55
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Strict 9 posted:Exactly. I'm not sure how much of an actual benefit I get through that, of course, but I did follow the guide posted here. I'm using MediaPortal as a front-end with MPC as my player (I believe - I'd have to double check that). You really shouldn't be post processing ay HD files. It is ridiculously cpu intensive and can lead to a lot of issues. Processing makes sense when upscaling but that is about it.
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Feb 29, 2008 22:19
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Juriko posted:You really shouldn't be post processing ay HD files. It is ridiculously cpu intensive and can lead to a lot of issues. Processing makes sense when upscaling but that is about it. Exactly the sentiment above. That's why I asked about postprocessing. While I read AVS as well, those people who postprocess are usually obsessive freaks with "golden eye" syndrome. If you're doing anything other than playback of x264 files through FFDSHOW, turn off the other junk.
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Feb 29, 2008 22:23
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Crackbone posted:Exactly the sentiment above. That's why I asked about postprocessing. While I read AVS as well, those people who postprocess are usually obsessive freaks with "golden eye" syndrome. If you're doing anything other than playback of x264 files through FFDSHOW, turn off the other junk. I find most of their processing to actually be really destructive. Some of the lighter stuff can be nice but the actually effect is so small I don't see why anyone cares. Some of the processing they do artifacts so badly at times I wonder how they can think it is better.
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Mar 1, 2008 22:56
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I have a SD CRT TV with an old DVD player, and I was thinking about putting together an HTPC so I could watch movies from the HDD and stream from NetFlix, and record stuff (that's PVR I think?), in addition to I guess playing DVDs and reading the signal from my indoor HD antenna while I'm there. Is it worth getting one in this situation, and would it be worthwhile to upgrade in a year or two for a new HD TV, maybe adding a blu-ray drive and decent sound system? It seems like most of the guides are HD-focused and with my limited experience (built one computer based on a TechReport guide) it's taking awhile to get a handle on everything. PerniciousKnid fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Mar 2, 2008 |
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Mar 1, 2008 23:41
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