Need to upgrade 2nd pc to play 1080p video

Lister2020

Lister2020

Lister2020

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22 Jan 2007
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Its pretty old these days. opteron 146 2.0 ghz cpu, radeon 1600pro 256 mb graphics card or something like that with 4 gig of ram.

On a budget what cpu and gfx card would get it to comfortably play 1080p video?

Id also be looking at putting a blu ray rom drive and a QUIET psu into it as the current one is noisy as hell i disconnected all the other fans including cpu fan and noticed ZERO decrease in noise.

Can anyone spec a brother?

cpu socket is 939 btw. the mobo does have an expansion port on it to go to 940 but dont know how much that would cost or if its necessary.
 
I'm running a 939 amd x2 3800 or somewhere around there with a 512mb 3450 gfx card. Plays blu-ray absolutely fine. However if you are playing mkv type encoded files it might be a different mater.
 
Looking at 939 dual cores they still seem pretty damn expensive. Would it actually be better to get an am2 mobo and a am2 processor? Only thing is it will need a god few pci ports for expansion cards like usb ports, wireless pci card and obviously pci express for gfx card.

Also is there any chance I can get a GFX card which will also do the audio so that I can get the sound and video down a hdmi port?
 
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Yea - the options for upgrading s939 are not great, the market is awash with the slightly newer am2 versions instead.

Anyway, I used to run a s939 X2 4400+ 2.2GHz. It dealt with 720p .mkv files fine, but gave up when playing all 1080p files. I did not have a blu ray player then- but i'm assuming a modern graphics card could offload most of that decoding and allow proper 1080p playback.

Compared to the graphics you currently have - even the cheapest card on ocuk should trounce it and play 1080p fine. If you want a cpu that can definitely play 1080p on its own - i'd suggest an intel e5200 or an AMD athlon II X2 250, either would need a new motherboard costing around £60.
 
Grab an geforce 8 series or ati 3xxx and use DXVA/VDPAU to decode mkv's and blurays. VDPAU is making great headway on non dxva profile mkv's, I havent encountered any mkv's (some about 2-3 years old) that havent played with gfx acceleration thanks to VDPAU.
 
Lister2020 said:
prob bein too optimistic to hope just a gfx card update would do the trick?
Click to expand...

Latest software allows all H264/AVC decoding to be done by the GPU. So it is possible. Very popular at the moment, Atom + cheap 8500 = fullhd loveliness which is silent cheap and low power!
 
Erm well I aint got an atom lol.

So, What GFX card would do the trick. Id also still need to get a quiet psu because the current one is just ridiculious.
 
this bundle looks amazing!!!

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-003-OB&tool=3#

but not enough pci ports :( Need one for wireless, external sata, and erm well, I suppose the usb extension port aint entirely necessary......

if I got this, what GFX card would I need to buy with it to ensure smooth playback, and is it going to be cheaper or more expensive than just buying a really good GFX card?

I'll still also have the problem of getting sound and video out of a single hdmi lead out of the computer :S
 
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Lister2020 said:
Erm well I aint got an atom lol.

So, What GFX card would do the trick. Id also still need to get a quiet psu because the current one is just ridiculious.
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Atom's just an example, low powered mobile cpu but still combined with a gpu is plenty for 1080p.

Lister2020 said:
this bundle looks amazing!!!

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-003-OB&tool=3#

but not enough pci ports :( Need one for wireless, external sata, and erm well, I suppose the usb extension port aint entirely necessary......

if I got this, what GFX card would I need to buy with it to ensure smooth playback, and is it going to be cheaper or more expensive than just buying a really good GFX card?
Click to expand...

Check this out:

DXVA is technology that allows HD decoding to be sent to the GPU rather than the CPU. Ofcourse because GPU's are awesome at doing anything to do with images/video they absolutely chew through HD and can even add post processing and effects (yes, upscaling HD!). VDPAU is the linux implementation of this currently only available on Nvidia cards.

Is your current machine PCI-E or AGP? If PCI-E, grab yourself one of these. Plenty of grunt to play HD videos. You just need to set up the software to use it properly.

If its AGP, ATi HD 3XXX series supports gpu decoding also, you would have to hit the second hand market for these I would imagine.
 
Lister2020 said:
its pci e.

and currently on windows 7.

So that gfx card alone will do the trick?

What about the sound issue?
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GFX card alone will do the trick yes.

What is the sound issue sorry? Will your HDMI be going to a receiver or straight to the TV? Do you need optical out instead or something?
 
No. There is no external sound system so its just hdmi straight to the tv. currently the gfx card is dvi, not hdmi so there is no sound. will this graphics card supply sound to the tv at the same time?
 
Lister2020 said:
No. There is no external sound system so its just hdmi straight to the tv. currently the gfx card is dvi, not hdmi so there is no sound. will this graphics card supply sound to the tv at the same time?
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Certainly will. ATi cards can chuck out 7.1 over HDMI iirc. It will come supplied with a special ATI dvi-hdmi dongle which will allow the sound output.
 
Ok in that case the card is ORDERED :D

What software do I need to get get it doing all the hardwork when it comes to decoding HD video?

I also need recommendations on a silent PSU.
 
Lister2020 said:
Ok in that case the card is ORDERED :D

What software do I need to get get it doing all the hardwork when it comes to decoding HD video?

I also need recommendations on a silent PSU.
Click to expand...

For MKV's the easiest is to use Media Player Classic - Home Cinema. It supports DXVA nicely out the the box and also allows use of pixel shaders to further sharpen/upsample the video!

Combine it with AC3Filter to boost the dialogue/centre channel a bit and thats your audio sorted aswell.

As for Blurays, I'm not 100% sure but I think you need Cyberlink PowerDVD as it has its own renderer which supports DXVA. Thats about it.

No idea on the PSU i'm afraid!
 
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