[mythtv-users] Choppy HDTV playback

Scott list-mythtv at bluecamel.eml.cc
Fri Feb 9 23:20:05 UTC 2007


On Feb 9, 2007, at 10:59 AM, Steven Adeff wrote:

> ah, yea, my 1600+ can barely cut it at 720p, and if I try 1080i
> without deint its a no go, though with XvMC it seems to work fine,
> except when an OSD is up =(
>
> I just can't justify upgrading just the processor on this system, I'd
> sooner spend a little more and get a mATX and 3200+ system and that
> won't happen for a while. I really don't watch much HD in the bedroom,
> 21" vs 65" in the living room...

Before diving into MythTV, and knowing I wanted to do HDTV playback,  
I did lots of research on CPUs that could handle both 720p and 1080i  
streams. I ran into the same thing seeing recommendations for various  
CPUs where some people claimed the same CPU 'worked for them' vs  
someone else who said they couldn't get it smooth.

I came the conclusion that motherboard and video card selection was  
as important as the processor itself. (I'm not refering to xvmc  
here!) My first MythTV system _should_ have been able to play back  
HDTV. It was the Asus Pundit with the SIS onboard and a 2.8GHz P4  
(iirc!) but the onboard SIS had trouble with my projector. For  
compatibility with my projector I swapped in an ATI Radeon PCI card  
and then later an Nvidia 5200 card. Neither handled the HDTV playback  
as well as the onboard SIS did, even with xvmc. In the end I blamed  
the PCI bus on the Asus Pundit and later went to a new box.

To anyone building a new MythTV HDTV box I would recommend that they  
research CPU, motherboard, and video card equally as well. Dont'  
count on xvmc bailing you out if you make a poor motherboard choice!

--
Scott



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