HD Playback

dmce

dmce

dmce

Associate
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
249
Location
Glasgow
Hi folks

Im thinking of putting the following together:

40 Gb Samsung MP0402H SpinPoint M40
AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Socket939
1GB (2X512MB) Corsair TwinX DDR
MSI K8NGM2-FID

I am a little concerned over its ability to playback HD files(720p and 1080p)? HD from a TV card is another matter.

I was thinking if i really needed to i could get a dual core in the future, especially after conroe forced price drops. I would need DDR2 RAM for that?Would it be best to upgrade both at the time or would ddr2 work on a single core?
 
The MSI K8NGM2-FID supports 1080p out does it not? That isnt taking into account the 3200+ Venice not quite being up to the task though.
 
Yes it does support 1080p but that's not your problem.

The problem is your graphics card has no onboard hd decoder so it's all done through the CPU.

That CPU is no where near powerful enough to display HighDef content.
 
Thanks glen8. I was kinda aware of that anyway.

At least dual core will be a little cheaper after the July price cuts so thats an option. As i dont have an HD tv at present its not a pressing matter. By the time i do have one theres is always the option of add in hardware acceleration. Something along the purevideo lines.
 
I have a 3700+ single core at 2.2ghz, 1GB, Asus CSM motherboard (which is identical to that MSI 6150 Nvidia chipset) plays 1080P with upto 71% CPU overhead. Try and get the fastest CPU you can (for sensible money)

At the present time HD is pretty rare- most likely stick to SD material for now, and when you do go down that route you could upgrade the graphics card to one with better hardware acceleration.
 
The 3700+ is a little beyond budget at present i feel. Roughly twice the price. I was thinking of clocking the 3200+ anyway. I think your comment about future upgrade of gfx is probably best route. Cheers.
 
Why TwinX RAM? :confused:
Could get 3700 OEM, and use a 939 cooler that you have spare, or buy a new one.

Only 40GB? Not big enough. If you're concerned with noise, use a 2.5" for boot, and a 3.5" for mass storage (music, TV series etc) with power managment on the hard drives. A desktop drive isn't that bad, if you prefer to have increase space/reduced cost over a bit more noise.
 
The RAM i wasnt so sure on. I figured at 68£ it was near to the cheapest but with tighter timings. Not that i expect that to make a significant difference but if i clock the 3200+ to about 2.4 i may have to slacken a little. Forgive my ignorance on RAM if thats a load of nonsense. Im open to suggestions on that.

Again if i can clock the 3200+ why spend more on a 3700+? Im going to stick a SI-120 on it, passively if possible but a quiet fan if need be.

The Samsung 2.5" Drives are supposed to be deadly silent. As it will be on a network i dont need storage other than OS and a few apps i dont need much more than this.

I have one eye, or ear on noise levels being as quiet as possible.
 
ah right I use the Value stuff myself, at the time of purchase considerble difference in price between the XMS, but it's only £4 or so. XMS memory
must have dropped down.

Will this machine be streaming HD material over the LAN? (not sure if enough bandwidth?) oh special offer on the 3700's now
 
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I dont see why not. A LAN can operate at ~100Mbit/s on fast ethernet, but HD (The current BBC trial at least) is streamed at ~20Mbit/s
 
hp7909 said:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Online_Catalogue_This_Week_Only_25.html - thank me later :cool:
Click to expand...

I pressume its a link to the GFX cards. Dont really want to spend 140£ > at the moment on GFX when i dont really need HD playback at present. I will go down the GFX upgrade in future when i got an HD tv.

Unless there was a 3700+ on there for about 70 quid that i missed :)

Heres a little article on HD playback testing. Havent tried it myself but it may be useful to others

http://www.digital-digest.com/articles/highdefdvd_test_page1.html
 
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