[mythtv-users] Advice on cheap video card for low-spec mythtv box

Stephen Tait tait at digitallaw.co.uk
Tue Jul 6 09:29:01 EDT 2004


>
>* XvMC in mythtv does not support the via hardware.

I think it's more that the via hardware doesn't really support Linux that well.

>What I was really wondering was does anyone have any experience with using
>the "mpeg" feature on a radeon card? Specifically, I'm looking at the
>Sapphire Radeon 7000 PCI card, which has tv-out and claims to have mpeg
>"acceleration". Whether that means just scaling and colour features, or
>whether it means full-blown decoding I'm not sure. The card only costs
>around £25-30, and I'd be willing to pay that to get video-out working at
>least until the open-source VIA support is more mature.

I've never used it myself, but I imagine the open-source GATOS project is 
even less mature. You'll either need GATOS or the ATI binary drivers. Lots 
of ATI users on this list are very happy with the 9200SE, which works fine 
with open source drivers (including the TV-out IIRC).


>Anyway, what would be *really* useful is if someone can confirm that they're
>using a similar setup (i.e. xorg-x11 6.7.0, a radeon card and an epia m/b)
>and what their experiences have been.

Umm, my experience is that the EPIA boards don't have AGP slots...

>For what it's worth (and to avoid this request becoming an nvidia / radeon
>discussion), I have read a number of the postings regarding relative
>benefits of nvidia / radeon cards, and most advise that nvidia is preferred.
>However, it's my understanding that nvidia cards would likely require binary
>drivers to do what I want, and I'd like to avoid that if possible.

Sounds like a 9200SE is your bag, if you can get it cheap enough and if 
other people can confirm my comments.



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