[mythtv-users] hd-pvr playback plans - sanity check

[Ron Garrison]

On Wed, Nov 18, 2009 at 9:35 PM, Mike Schiller
<mdschiller.mythtv at gmail.com> wrote:
> I have an older frontend box that I would like to upgrade so that it
> could playback recordings from my HD-PVR. The processor is an Athlon
> 64 2800+ running at 1.8 GHz, and the motherboard has a PCIE x16 (it's
> not a PCIE 2 motherboard).
>
> From what I've read in a few threads, including this one
> http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/407875 , I think I
> should be able to get good HD playback of the recordings if I upgrade
> my video card to:
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814187034
>
> But, as my processor is pretty old, and rather underpowered, I'm
> looking for feedback from the community to see if anyone has had
> success with similar hardware.
>

Since my old hardware was AGP I went ahead and updated my MB to an i5,
so I can't comment from that side.  What I will tell you is I ordered
this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125274

and playback from my HD-PVR has been smooth.  OSD is smooth.  When I'm
playing back an HD-PVR recording (720P) it uses about 2% of one of my
i5 cores.  When I playback an HD recording from my Air2PC HD card, it
uses about 20% of one of my cores (as mpeg2 hardware excelleration is
only partial whereas H.264 is full).