Some media pc advice

[Chris C]

I have built a simple media PC and it works fine, however I want to beef it up a bit as it struggles sometimes. Its got my old Athlon 3800+ in it with 3Gb RAM and an ATi HD2600XT.

The problem : If im trying to play a high def media file, lets say Beowulf 720p its fine, add DTS its mostly ok but I cant skip ahead in the film as it just doesnt like it. This is in VLC media player btw.

1080p its jerky add DTS and it wont play. Its also noisy.

So what im after is a sensible upgrade that will allow me to play Blu-Ray, HD media files up to 1080p with DTS and QUIET fans/coolers.

Was thinking a C2D + mobo + ram + cooler +2 fans

Silence is golden and thats what im really after so the price of silent fans doesnt bother me if they truly are silent. id like to keep the GFX i have as it seems good enough.

Any help much appreciated ideally id like a couple of options to fit different budgets as I dont know how much I will have to spend after I buy some Logitech Z5500s for it yet.

 

[decto]

Hi,

What is your CPU usage when playing 1080p. It should be low ish if the HD2600 is doing the work. It could just be a driver/codec issue or you may be better using powerdvd or similar. Was software supplied with the HD2600? have you tried that ?

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[ubern00b]

First of all ditch VLC. Use this version of MediaPlayerClassic:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=17846427

and install AC3 Filter. With that version of MPC ANY 720p MKV will playback with DXVA accelleration but only L4.1 encoded 1080p MKV's will playback with accelleration. To get around that install CoreAVC for 1080p's that wont accellerate. You will need PowerDVD in order to play back Blu-Ray and again this will be GPU accellerated by your HD2600. Give it a go and see how it works out for you.

 

[Chris C]

Its maxed out on 1080p so im assuming im not using the 2600 properly. Im mainly watching x.264 encoded media files. I will give it a go with PowerDVD and that version of MPC and see how it goes, thanks.