[mythtv-users] Inexpensive, preassembled, VDPAU-friendly frontends

[Scott D. Davilla]

>On Mon, Dec 1, 2008 at 4:07 PM, Brad DerManouelian
><myth at dermanouelian.com> wrote:
>>  On Nov 30, 2008, at 6:50 PM, R. G. Newbury wrote:
>>
>>>  The arrival of VDPAU makes a whole bunch of low power hardware,
>>>  previously discounted  because of being incapable of HD, back into
>>>  scope.
>>>  I just ran out and grabbed an nvidia 8400GS for my main myth box, but
>>>  given the low cost (about $45Cdn).
>>>
>>>  But now, I think will grab a PCI board and resurrect the VIA SP13000
>>>  motherboard. That board, with 2 hard drives ran just under 50 watts
>>>  according the the Kill-o-watt. The on-board video chipset, although
>>>  great for SD was hopeless for HD so it was downgraded to a fileserver.
>>>  But WOW, it might make a really good mythbox again.
>>>
>>>  (And I can move my most powerful motherboard from my rec room to my
>>>  office. You *will* note that I do have my priorities in order: TV
>>>  first!)
>>>
>>>  The reason that no-one has discussed a low-power low-cost solution is
>>>  that this solution just DID NOT EXIST 2 weeks ago. And Isaac and the
>>>  un-named and un-known other toilers have done an amazing job getting
>>>  this working.
>>
>>  Exactly why I posed the question and was met with "View the other
>>  threads as people have posted some built machines for under $200."
>>  along with someone telling me to look into atom systems and then
>>  posting benchmarks of the VDPAU. Someone else posted about using an
>>  Acer AspireOne laptop for some reason which doesn't use an nvidia
>>  chipset. <sigh>
>
>I think people have been getting used to throwing CPU power at
>decoding HD, given the difficulties (until 2 weeks ago) of hardware
>decoding using any chipset in linux. With XvMC disappearing from the
>higher end nVidia chips and cpus becoming cheaper and more powerful
>its comparatively simple to say "throw a core2 duo and plenty of ram
>at it...."
>
>What we need is a machine with an atom processor and an nvidia onboard
>chip. Perhaps Jeff is right, EPIA with a PCI video card.
>
>Do any of those epia motherboards have a PCIe slot?

No, but the intel ITX with atom 330 is only $80 at Newegg. That's $80 
for motherboard AND cpu. That's less expensive than the epia cost. 
Add memory ($20 for 512MB) and $60 PCI nvidia 8400 (512MB) toss it in 
a enclosure with a HD and go. It does not get less expensive that 
this. I'm surprised that more people don't get how inexpensive this 
is.