[mythtv-users] Upgrading or replacing my frontend hardware?

Brad Templeton brad+myth at templetons.com
Mon Sep 28 19:05:03 UTC 2009


On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 12:04:00AM +1300, tortise at paradise.net.nz wrote:
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Brad Templeton" <brad+myth at templetons.com>
> To: "Discussion about mythtv" <mythtv-users at mythtv.org>
> Sent: Monday, September 28, 2009 12:04 PM
> Subject: Re: [mythtv-users] Upgrading or replacing my frontend hardware?
> 
> 
> On Sun, Sep 27, 2009 at 01:47:46PM -0700, Brad Templeton wrote:
> > My trusty SFF frontend&slave, an Aopen XC Cube with a 3ghz Pentium 4 and an
> > Nvidia 6200 AGP video card is getting a bit long in the tooth.  It still
> > works, but feels sluggish compared to modern machines, and it can't play
> > many of the h264 HD videos I come upon without skipping a bit.
> >
> > So I see a few options and wonder what people's thinking on the routes
> > available today are.   There are no geforce 8 and above cards for AGP, though
> > they can be had for PCI.   To use PCI I would have to remove the pvr-150 card
> > in the PCI slot, but that's not so bad because there's not much left on
> > analog cable, and the firewire port does the recording from the cable box.
> >
> > You can't really get new motherboards for SFF systems.  This mobo has SATA
> > and firewire and two spdifs which is good, but only older ddr and agp.
> >
> > So options include:
> >
> > a)    Give this system more life with a PCI based geforce 8400 or 9400 video
> >         card.  In theory, I should be able to play all those videos quite
> >         nicely with VDPAU, right?   There does not seem to be a PCI card with
> >         HDMI output but I can survive doing audio on its own wire.
> >
> > b)    Buy a micro-atx case and mobo, possibly with integrated geforce 8200 or
> >       9300 chipset, do vdpau from onboard video -- small and low power.  Toss
> >       on a cheap core 2 duo.
> >
> > c)    As above, but forget about onboard video, get a pci-e slot and put on
> >       a dedicated but low-power video card.
> >
> > d)    Buy another SFF barebones -- small and light and low power and usually
> >       pretty quiet.   But no upgrade ability, again.  Note that firewire
> >       is a must.
> >
> >
> > I am intereted in current popular choices.  If it works well I can just
> > drop in my old drive and Jaunty should largely recognize the new hardware
> > and hit the ground running.
> 
> Let me add that going with onboard video would mean no use of the advanced 2x
> deinterlacer, though I would be interested to hear how well people do at
> the Temporal 2x mode on the motherboard based video chips.  The wiki page
> is a little light on details here, with some reports of people only using
> simpler deinterlacers on 1080i.
> 
> You can get a geforce 9500 with a PCI interface.  Anybody tried this?  The
> wiki has one report of "minimal tearing" on a 9500gt, presumably on pci-e,
> with hope for fixing it.  Anybody have a report from a 9500 on PCI?  The 9500
> is supposed to match the 8600 in performance.
> 
> Finally, how big is the difference between Temporal 2x and Advanced 2x in terms
> of moving video quality?   It it worth going to a dedicated video card just
> to be sure I can get an 8600 or 9600 card?
> _______________________________________________
> 
> Brad
> I have a 9400GT PCI looking ok on an ASUS motherboard with a P 3000.  Temporal looks pretty good to me, how much better Advanced 2x 
> will be seems slight for me, (Having not done it) part of the equation is what is your screen, how good is it, could it show the 
> difference to any great degree and how long are you going to keep it?  I have the same card also on an AMD 2400 and it is still not 
> stable for reasons not yet apparent.
> 
> The P3000 has so far only crashed when changing stream from AV H264 to Radio H264, not sure why it does that but I think its a known 
> bug.  Restarting the Live broadcast works in the new channel still, just a nuisance.
> 
> I think there is a good chance a PCI 9500 would work well.  Be mindful your PSU requirement will also increase over a 6200 and is 
> the extra there or also need upgrading?  The question for me is what (apart from firewire) do you want in a box?  Quietness?  If you 
> want a silent box now is the time to jump ship, otherwise I'd do the 9500 PCI thing.  Worst case is you lose the investment on the 
> PCI card!
> 

Oh, I can use the PCI for something else.  The power needs of the 9500 are
not killer when it's doing 2D.  I don't know about when it's decoding video,
do people find that decoding video makes their cards heat up and draw lots
of power?

The TV is relatively new, 1080p TV, presumably will keep for some time and
it definitely shows the details.   In fact, I find the local PBS HD stream
hard to watch it has so many jaggies because they try to mux 3 SD streams on
top of it.

As far as I know an 8400 card is ok for Temporal 2x, so for low power it
might be the way to go.  The only choices are the 8400 and the 9500 it seems.

But I want to know if it's worth it.

Yes, a new box would also, presumably be quieter as well as more powerful
with its core 2 duo.  (I presume core 2 duo is still the winner when it comes
to wattage, or has AMD turned things around?)

Nvidia's higher end graphics chips are very high wattage, even idle, but their
latest, top end 280 chip actually reverses that and goes back to 25 watts idle.
Still too much for an idle graphics chip used mostly for 2D but it's the right
trend!


The new Intel i5 chip is also interesting with its 4 cores and ability to
supercharge one core for single-thread stuff.  But for an HTPC video playing
now seems to be both multithreaded if you need that and on the GPU in most cases.

Another use of a faster box would be a Skype videoconferencing station, now
that Skype has a linux beta out which claims to support 640x480 (but due to bugs does
not quite work right.)


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