HTPC - HD Playback confusion

champ222

champ222

champ222

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Hi all.

I know there are a few threads like this kicking about, but i'm trying to get to the facts here.

I am building an htpc, that will be running win xp, and XBMC

it will eventually be connected to a full HD plasma.

I wish to play back all audio, and video files including 720p and 1080p mkv files.

Bluray playback is not required, as i'll get a bluray player for that, which should handle dvd upscaling duties as well, the main reason for that, is XBMC doesnt support bluray, and i doubt it will any time soon either, and to be honest, it makes a bit of a mess at playing dvds sometimes too hehe, but it does everything else perfectly!

So anyway, regarding hd file playback on a pc (mkv files etc) i have got the impression that hardware video decoding for HD files, isnt really going to do anything for me, since the hardware (graphics card) will only do the decoding if its in a standard format, such as a bluray disc, and that most HD video files are not in any standard format, and the graphics card wont step in and do the work.

Is this the case? can someone who knows confirm one way or the other?

So assuming that is the case, and that i have no need for bluray playback, as far as components for my htpc, the cpu will be doing all the work, so i could get a mobo that has all the appropriate outputs and features, HDMI, spdif etc and a reasonable cpu to handle the work, which from what ive read, shouldnt need to be anything special? and skip the graphics card all together?

Tell me your thoughts please gurus hehe.

Thanks in advance.

Andy

ps, isnt there some sort of second hand market in here?
 
ahhh, that explains that one then hehe

only another 100 to go lol

i've been here ages, but i'm a bit of a lurker, i should be more active hehe
 
champ222 said:
I wish to play back all audio, and video files including 720p and 1080p mkv files.


So anyway, regarding hd file playback on a pc (mkv files etc) i have got the impression that hardware video decoding for HD files, isnt really going to do anything for me, since the hardware (graphics card) will only do the decoding if its in a standard format, such as a bluray disc, and that most HD video files are not in any standard format, and the graphics card wont step in and do the work.

Is this the case? can someone who knows confirm one way or the other?
Click to expand...


I may be wrong but my understanding is that it shouldn't matter what container the file is in. As long as it's in a profile and level which is accepted by your graphics card the OS should know to send the data there once it has gone through the media splitter to separate audio from video stream (most likely Haali Media Splitter in case of .mkv files.)

Most people use H.264 (occasionally VC-1) and can't imagine them using non-standard profiles and levels (most likely Hi profile and Level 4) so likelihood is you'll be fine. Not that any hardware processing is required with modern processors anyway.



Somebody correct me if I'm wrong but I would be very surprised if it didn't work like that.
 
"standard profiles"

That was the term i was looking for!! hehe

Thanks for the reply, i realised that mkv was just a container, but i thought the term would help distinguish from bluray.

I cannot imagine why anyone would use a non standard profile either, but then again, i cant see why anyone would use real player, quicktime, or wmv either... but people do hehe.

i see what your saying tho, modern processors should be able to do it all anyway, which does kind of beg the question why graphics cards bother to feature on board decoding at all?
 
champ222 said:
i see what your saying tho, modern processors should be able to do it all anyway, which does kind of beg the question why graphics cards bother to feature on board decoding at all?
Click to expand...

Various reasons.

Some would say it's just a sales gimmick.

Some older processors struggle (including my P4 3.0GHz which maxes out on 720P) and there are still a fair few about, on both AGP and PCI-e.

Multi-tasking. People often leave processes running while watching video on the PC.

I can see no reason why real encoded video can not be incorporated into games. If your processor is already running hard with the normal graphics coming up against a widget that then required decoding before displaying will send it way over the edge. If this is done an a dedicated chip it should cause very little overhead.


Probably more I can't think of.



But if all you want is a media player I honestly doubt you require it. It does seem to be included on reasonably priced cards nowadays though.
 
yeah thats a good point, if it adds HD options to pcs with older processors, thats a good thing, and if it doesnt add too much to the cost of the card, then why not?

So, for htpc uses, which kind of chipset would i be looking at?

Ive been impressed with my intel core 2 duo, and very impressed with my gigabyte mobo.

ive seen the Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H motherboard which looks quite good, (my case restricts me to micro ATX) it has hdmi, gigabit lan, and spdif, which is all i need as far as i can see, but it uses nvidia nforce 630i chipset, any problems there? or should i stick with an intel chipset?

Thanks a lot for the help
 
hardware acceleration exists because gpu's can do it faster and more efficiantly than cpu's, and also because it removes that load from the cpu.

hardware acceleration of file-based media sis fine as long as its in a format that can be accelerated as mentioned above - my 4830 will accelerate h264 in an mkv container using the cyberlink h264 filter, cutting cpu usage from ~40% for 720p right down to ~10%
 
Grimley - Thanks i'll have a read through that link.

james.miller - Ahh, cool, so is it software dependant? ie using the cyberlink filter? or it is also hardware dependant too? depending on the card?

Any idea if i can use the cyberlink filter in xbmc?

Thanks a lot guys
 
Research shows that XBMC doesnt use any hardware decoding at all.... i guess its because it is open source, and runs on openGL as its cross platform. People are trying various work arounds, but i'd rather avoid that if possible.

Fast processor it is then!

so what kind of processor do you guys reckon i'd need? Ive tried xbmc with my home pc, and it seems to run everything pretty sweet, my spec is E6300 overclocked to 3Ghz 2 gigs of ram, running XP.

i guess i should get something similar?

would these 45nm chips do a better job tho? run cooler maybe?

Thanks again
 
XBMC does not use the GPU as it's run on linux, therefore all the video decoding is done with the CPU.
For XBMC to run 1080 HD content PERFECTY then the cpu you need is a DUAL core running @ 3Ghz.

Also XBMC will play pretty much anything, it even plays AnyDVD Blu Ray rips straight off the bat without the hassle of VC1 conversions
I am about to build an XBMC rig as I have been renting a lot of blu ray :D ;)
This is what I'm buying and is meant to be pretty much the best setup for XBMC.

ASUS P5E VM-HDMI
Intel Core 2 Duo, E7300, Wolfdale Core
2GB (2x1GB) Corsair TwinX DDR2 XMS2 Dominator, PC2-8500 (1066)

You can use a cheaper Core2Duo and provided you can clock it too 3Ghz then it should play 1080 HD video perfectly with no dropped frames.
 
could you tell me.... whats the advantage of the G35/G43/G45 chipset over the gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H board nforce 630i.... which is half the price??
 
Barack_Obama said:
XBMC does not use the GPU as it's run on linux, therefore all the video decoding is done with the CPU.
For XBMC to run 1080 HD content PERFECTY then the cpu you need is a DUAL core running @ 3Ghz.

Also XBMC will play pretty much anything, it even plays AnyDVD Blu Ray rips straight off the bat without the hassle of VC1 conversions
I am about to build an XBMC rig as I have been renting a lot of blu ray :D ;)
This is what I'm buying and is meant to be pretty much the best setup for XBMC.

ASUS P5E VM-HDMI
Intel Core 2 Duo, E7300, Wolfdale Core
2GB (2x1GB) Corsair TwinX DDR2 XMS2 Dominator, PC2-8500 (1066)

You can use a cheaper Core2Duo and provided you can clock it too 3Ghz then it should play 1080 HD video perfectly with no dropped frames.
Click to expand...

for info... XBMC can run in windows aswell as linux and MAC i imagine its much the same on either os, but i wouldnt have a clue where to start on linux hehe

I was having a browse on the XBMC forum yesterday, and a few people mentioned the 'killer sample' i downloaded it, its a 96 meg file that is 23 seconds long!! i tried playing it in VLC, but it **** itself hehe, xbmc played tho.... smooth-ish
 
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Big.Wayne said:
Why you buying that old motherboard when the newer G45 is out? :confused:
Click to expand...

Because it's one of the best mobo's for XBMC ‘Atlantis’. Perfect HD video and audio.

The setup I am buying plays the killa sample with zero dropped frames which basically means it's not going to have any trouble playing 1080 material.

champ222 said:
for info... XBMC can run in windows aswell as linux and MAC i imagine its much the same on either os, but i wouldnt have a clue where to start on linux hehe
Click to expand...

Yeah I know it's called 'Media Portal', and because it's windows based it can use the GPU as it obviously has driver/code support which linux / XBMC ‘Atlantis’ doesn't!
 
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Barack_Obama said:
Because it's one of the best mobo's for XBMC ‘Atlantis’. Perfect HD video and audio.

The setup I am buying plays the killa sample with zero dropped frames which basically means it's not going to have any trouble playing 1080 material.



Yeah I know it's called 'Media Portal', and because it's windows based it can use the GPU as it obviously has driver/code support which linux / XBMC ‘Atlantis’ doesn't!
Click to expand...

i dont know if it dropped any frames or not to be honest, CPU never hit 100% but thats about all i could tell.

Its called XBMC for windows.... http://xbmc.org:80/download/ Third one along.

Media portal is something different as far as i know
 
Ahh my bad! Pretty sure MediaPortal are the same people that coded xbmc however.
xbmc should have an info option which will tell you info about the media being played and if any frames have been dropped! This is deffo on the xbox version.
 
Yeah you might be right, i tried out media portal once, it seemed quite different to xbmc, and i couldnt get the hang of it, probably because i was used to xbmc, since ive been using it since it first appeared on the xbox, and i was using xbmp before that.... seems like so long ago lol.

i'll check out that info option with the killer sample, and see how it performs.

i recently ran my home pc running the latest xbmc for windows through a full def plasma, running some HD movies, and it all worked flawlessly, i was using a dvi to hdmi lead, and was running analogue stereo sound, but i didnt see 5.1 via spdif being a problem, just didnt have an AV amp in the room at the time. I have no means of doing audio over hdmi, so i couldnt test that out. I'll have to wait until the HTPC is build before i can try that hehe, even then i dont have an AV amp with HDMI yet anyway.

It certainly looked amazing tho, XBMC really did look awesome! pixar shorts in high Def look so good!!

it was the panasonic full def plasma, the one with the built in freesat.... very nice indeed... panasonic make very good plasmas, second only to pioneer i would say, but the price of pioneers put them in a league of there own anyway... although i will admit, its been a while since i looked into this much, so some things may have changed, but still... you cant go wrong with a panasonic TV, even the LCDs look nice, and that says a lot coming from me lol, not a fan of LCD TVs generally.

I'm waffling again hehe

XBMC is deffo the way forward...
 
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