[mythtv-users] Mini-ITX or standard PC?

[Adam Siegel]

It has an onboard "decoder".  Plus if you use the onboard decoder,  the 
sound comes out the sound card outputs.  With the PVR-350, both the 
sound and picture come out of the card, freeing up the sound card output 
for mp3 stereo output.  I have the sound card going into my stereo and 
the PVR going to my television.  If you wanted to use the onboard 
decoder, then you could get away with the PVR-250.

Piers Kittel wrote:

> Don't your EPIA motherboard have onboard MPEG encoder?  If so, why not 
> use that?
>
> Cheers - Piers
>
> Adam Siegel wrote:
>
>> I am running a VIA EPIA ME6000 (mini-itx).  It is fanless.  There is 
>> almost no noise from my box (power supply fan) and very little heat.  
>> The secret is using the PVR-350.  It does the mpg encoding and 
>> decoding on the card.  So you don't use any CPU.  My average load on 
>> the machine is around 0.5.  I use my EPIA box as the myth backend and 
>> frontend in my family room and have a MediaMVP hooked up to it from 
>> my bedroom over the network.  I bought a small shuttle style case for 
>> it that fits neatly in my stereo cabinet.  I put a DVD reader/writer 
>> and 120GB hard drive in the box.  It has 256MB of RAM which is more 
>> than enough.  I am quite pleased with the performance and have had no 
>> issues.
>