[mythtv-users] Dell Studio Hybrid - success

[Greg Mitchell]

Jason wrote:

> 1)  How's the noise level?  Since the Hybrid has a fan, I was curious how
> loud it was, and whether it adjusts during higher CPU loads.  I've
> currently got an AppleTV that's very quiet and am looking for similar
> sound levels.

It's pretty quiet.  Not silent, but it's quieter than my PS3 by a large 
margin, and significantly quieter than the xbox that it replaced. 
Pretty similar to the mini that I'm working on right now - I'd be hard 
pressed to declare a winner between the two without some sort of sound 
measuring device.

The fan does pick up a bit when the processor is under heavy load, but 
it's basically the difference between inaudible and barely audible. 
Heavy load is something I haven't seen much of yet - basically when it's 
commercial flagging two shows and playing back HD.  I'm sure H.264 will 
be more taxing.

> 2)  Have you tested, or can you test, how well it plays back h.264 files? 
> (There's a couple samples on the MythTV wiki page for HD-PVR:
> http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/HD-PVR).  I'm curious if the 2.0GHz
> Core 2 is up to the task or not.

I'm in the process of downloading them now, I'll let you know how it goes.

> 3)  Did you get the bamboo skin for it?  :)

I decided to hold off on the bamboo skin.

Greg