Handbrake encoding machine

[lwhitworth]

Hi all,

Currently encoding a big stack of DVDs to mp4 and the process is going to kill my three year old laptop at this rate, as it's only running a Core2Duo P8400 @ 2.26Ghz, and after encoding for a bit you could fry an egg on it.

So I'm thinking of a desktop to sit in a corner of my house and churn through the encodes. Doesn't need any fancy graphics or sound cards, doesn't need a huge chunk of local storage as files will end up on a NAS, don't need a monitor or anything like that. CPU is king with Handbrake so the faster the better!!

Budget somewhere around £500 - £600 but not set in stone. If it means saving some pennies that could be used for Hardware I could even run Ubuntu on it over Windows

Cheers for any tips

 

[lwhitworth]

Thanks so much guys for your quick replies.

When encoding I run everything through makemkv first, so the actual Handbrake part is run disk to disk (means I can stack up an entire season of a show before going to bed).

Am very very tempted by an i7 system so will probably head down that route Just as an aside, if I buy it without Windows for now, can I just purchase an OEM Windows 8 version down the line, or is the rule that you still have to buy it at the same time as some hardware?

 

[lwhitworth]

Cool I'll give Badaboom a look. My laptop only has a ATI HD3400 so I don't know how much that's likely to help!

As for getting more use out of the system than just encoding, that's the one thing that's stopping me from buying at the moment tbh, as I don't think I will. Already got a laptop that (apart from encoding) does everything I need and a Nas for file storage. Can't really think of anything else I need a system on 24/7 for!

And 7-9 minutes on a i7.....jealous!

 

[lwhitworth]

Yeah I'm encoding to watch via apple tv on my 40" tv so it's a nightly build of handbrake using the appletv3 preset with decomb switched on at default level at the moment. Cheers for all discussions so far, plenty of food for thought!