<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, May 13, 2013 at 2:27 PM, Joseph Fry <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:joe@thefrys.com" target="_blank">joe@thefrys.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div dir="ltr">Cheap is easy... cheap and high quality a bit harder.... cheap, high quality, small, and efficient is almost impossible.<div><br></div><div>I would just pick up a used small form factor computer that has a 64bit Intel or AMD CPU and a PCI Express slot and get an NVidia card... if your patient you could have a frontend with Advanced 2x deinterlacing for under $100.</div>
<div><br></div><div>But it may not be silent or super efficient.</div></div><div class="HOEnZb"><div class="h5"><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, May 13, 2013 at 4:56 PM, Josu Lazkano <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:josu.lazkano@gmail.com" target="_blank">josu.lazkano@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">Hello all.<br>
<br>
I had an Nvidia ION1 board but it does not work now, I want to change it.<br>
<br>
I want to use as a frontend to watch TV, videos and play music. I need<br>
to watch HD films, so I think that it will be good to have a hardware<br>
decoding.<br>
<br>
Which hardware do you recommend? I need a cheap one.<br>
<br>
Thanks and best regards.<br></blockquote></div></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>I am also an Ion user, and I've been happy with it. There are still Atom / Ion nettop PCs available, why not just get another one of those? VDPAU works great for these small, quiet, low-power devices.</div>
<div><br></div><div>The two other options I have looked at, which as far as I know still don't measure up to the Atom/Ion/VDPAU are:</div><div><br></div><div>- Intel NUC: Nice small form factor, with good CPU choices. This will be a good option when VAAPI matches or exceeds VDPAU. Last I knew VAAPI in MythTV wasn't as good as VDPAU (someone please correct me if that's not accurate any more).</div>
<div><br></div><div>- Google TV + MythTV App: Lots of GoogleTV devices (be careful which you buy to make sure it supports your broadcast HD encoding format). They are small/quiet/low-power and very cheap. The MythTV app is a very nice start.. connects easily with my backend and does a pretty good job playing HD material. A few gripes: HD content appears (to me) to be displaying at a lower frame rate - which may be a limitation of my device's capabilities. Responsiveness for video start/skip is not to Myth frontend levels (what is?). Usability of GoogleTV is crap.. big step down from simple/quick MythTV recording navigation (of course, it does MANY other things, which may justify the hodgepodge of remote+mouse+keyboard controls. But, just as a DVR++ I find usability to be poor).</div>
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