Media centre pc

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27 Feb 2006
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Normanton
I've put together a basic xp media centre pc with some spare parts ive got laying around and I was wondering what graphics card to get for it.

I've got:

P4 3.2ghz
MSI Micro atx PCI express board with on board sound and graphics
80 GB hard drive
1 Stick 1gig DDR400 ram
1 Stick 512mb DDR333 ram
Skyth Ninja cooler
Gigabit Lan card
NEC DVDRW
Small ATX Case and 350Watt PSU

I have the movies stored on a fileserver on the network not on this box.

I've tried it as it is its fine for playing avi's but it stutters a bit when playing dvd's probably down to the onboard graphics im assuming also I was thinking if I get a graphics card that will connect through hdmi I won't need to use the onboard sound either.

Just looking to hook it up to my 32" HDTV to use it to watch downloaded .avi's mostly and play dvds

I'm considering getting a freeview card for it aswel but dont know what the quality is like on these and does it upscale the signal to HD?

1. Is the spec going to be good enough to play avi's, dvd's and maybe HD stuff when more mainstream

2. Will getting a seperate graphics card solve the stutering when watchin dvd's and what budget card would you recommend

3. It is worth while getting a freeview card for the pc or am I better off getting a stand alone upscalling freeview box, any suggestions on what to get

4. Whats best way of connecting pc to HDTV at min im using VGA and its allright but would HDMI be better


Cheers
 
a x1300 pro or something similar is enough for media centres not too sure about the p4 though as i have a pentium d 2.8 and said gfx card and it copes with all hd stuff 720p to 1080p mkv,avi,wmv etc etc as for tv cards i dunno.
i use dvi to vga for connecting to pc as the original card was a hdmi only geforce 6600 (sony viao media cantre btw) and it drove me nuts either overscan or under scan and never native res of tv so have binned it :p some people say they can fix that with powerstrip but it wouldnt have it for me.

good luck
 
rate ive settled on a 2400 pro anyone got any input on whether its worth while me getting a freeview card and what to cable to use to connect the pc up to my tv
 
my current media PC has a P4 and it works ok for all the normal freeview TV stuff, as far as HD is concerned Im not sure you may want to look at some of the new silent mid range ATI or Nvidia cards for that. Only problem with my P4 is it runs very hot and over all my system creates a fair amount of noise (hoping to upgrade soon).
The card I have in mine is a AGP Nvidia 6600 which for apart from the fan noise plays all SD freeview stuff ok.
 
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