[mythtv-users] What to do...

[Rich West]

Brian Wood wrote:
> Stewart wrote:
>   
>> So, I have a working setup on ANALOG CABLE and I'm exceedingly happy 
>> with it.
>>
>> But, I got a new HD TV. Output on the new TV is sub-par. I think this 
>> has much to do with the output to the TV being NTSC and the TV having to 
>> stretch it to fit, so I'd like some advice or thoughts on how best to 
>> handle it.
>>
>> I've currently got a Hauppauge 150 and a 350.   TV out is through the 
>> 350.  This is running on an Athlon 950.
>>
>> The native resolution on the new TV is 1366x768.   Can I simply use the 
>> video output from the standard video card and change the resolution to 
>> 1366x768?  What kind of load would that put on the machine?  It's an old 
>> Athlon 950Mhz box.
>>     
>
> Without help from XvMC you have just about no chance of playing back HD
> with that CPU. Even with XvMC I doubt you will have much luck.
>
> I wish I had better news, but that's pretty much the conclusions of the
> folks here.

I think he meant up-scaling the SD video to display nicely on the 
1366x768 screen.

With TV-out via the 350, you're limited to S-Video, right?  
Unfortunately, there isn't much you can do with S-Video.. you're locked 
in to interlaced video and forcing the TV to attempt to scale.

If you dropped a decent nVidia video card in to the machine, you could 
do DVI->HDMI out (if the TV has HDMI) an display at 720p. Also enable 
"de-interlace video" and enable "Bob (2x framerate).  This would make 
the SD recordings a bit more bearable.  There would still be some 
stretching involved because you would be taking a 4:3 frame and 
expanding it out to 16:9, but I think you would be happy with the results.

My main concern would be the speed of the box.  It should be able to 
handle it, but I can't make any guarantees.

-Rich