[mythtv-users] Low power AMD processors

[John Drescher]

On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 6:09 PM, David Schlenk<mythtv at schdav.org> wrote:
> With the fall season approaching I'm contemplating an upgrade for my
> only non-HD capable FE. I've been doing my research and came upon
> these newish AMD chips, Athlon II X2, specifically the 250 chip
> (technical details available here:
> http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/processors/athlon-ii-x2/Pages/AMD-athlon-ii-x2-processor-model-numbers-feature-comparison.aspx).
> They're dual core and are 65W TDP and unlike say the Phenom II X2 550
> its actually dual core not a "quad core but oops those other two might
> not work" which makes it more power efficient at the cost of L3 cache
> and also it is $25 cheaper.
>
> Anyway, has anyone tried one of these with MythTV? Specifically
> wondering how well they can play back 720p/1080i MPEG2 and whatever
> format the HDPVR uses. I'm interested in playback performance without
> hardware acceleration ala XvMC or VDPAU, not that I won't use one or
> the other, but because I'd like to be able to not use it if need be.
>
> Normally I'm an Intel guy but for some reason they don't have
> virtualization tech on the chips in the budget I'm looking at.
>
> David
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Not having one of these I do not know about performance however I used
K8 processors at lower frequency with 1080i successfully.

One thing that is very attractive to me is idle power and if you
believe the following link the 250 is excellent at that:

http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=59&Itemid=42&limit=1&limitstart=6

-- 
John M. Drescher