mvp/gbpvr and effect on host pc

[Soul]

hi guys...

I've been looking for a way to look at photos, play mp3s etc on my tv from my main pc for a while and looks like mvp/gbpvr might be the way forward.

I'm also considering getting a hauppage 150 and passing tv from my sky+ box through to my pc in office and then back to tv. That way I can record what i'm watching for archive purposes and also live tv, music etc will all be controlled via gbpvr back on the tv. sounds ideal...

ok so now for my question....

what sort of affect on host pc performance will this have?

specs are:

athlon64 3500+
2gb corsair low latency ddr3200
twin 75gb raptors for OS, slower drives for media

basically is gbpvr going to affect my gaming? will the tuner card have an effect? what sort of cpu/ram usage does gbpvr generate? is it different while recording, just streaming or just browsing menus?

any info would be useful before I take the plunge

Cheers!!!!

[soccerdad]

I am pretty sure GBPVR will fill your needs quite nicely. Your system should not feel GBPVR running very much at all. That said, I am not a gamer but I have heard some programs can use all the resources you can give them. I guess that will depend on the game and your video card memory. The 150 tuner card has onboard encoding so it does not task the system much at all. The MVP is a pretty light load unless you are doing transcoding for file conversions or have several MVPs running. I have an Athlon XP 2000+, and 1 gig of pc2700 memory and can watch recording shows over the MVP while my son plays a Harry Potter game on the machine. Hope this helps.

[Pioneer4x4]

The only issue I have ever had with GBPVR on my machine is it's memory usage. To minimize memory usage, only run as many mvp clients as you actually require, unload any plugins you don't really need or use too often. It doesn't such up much CPU at all. Also if helps alot if if recordings are on their own physical drive seperate from the os and any apps.

[Soul]

thanks for the replies. I noticed that running gbpvr used about 130mb if actually running in a window on my pc, but if i use the gbpvr mediamvp server it only uses approx 30mb

also when moving around the menus when running normally my cpu spikes to 20-30%. will I also see such spiking when I have an mvp using the mvp server, or will this be reduced as my pc isnt having to display anything to my pc monitor?

cheers again!

[sub]

Yes, you'll still get these spikes.

[wtg]

Soul, you can reduce the spikes significantly by disabling the Next Recording panel and the clock panel in the skin your MVP uses. The Next Recording panel refreshes every 5 seconds, causing a redraw which is the source of the spikes. The clock I assume updates once a minute, forcing a redraw.

I copy the Blue skin to a new directory called Blue MVP and set both panels visible attribute to false in the skin.xml in the main directory, and then use that skin for my MVPs. Doing so will keep the MVP's practical invisible from a CPU resource perspective. An MVP may spike temporary while using the menus, but you won't see the spiking you get every 5 seconds with the base skin.

[Soul]

very interesting info. so assuming I turn those options off, and am just watching live tv taken from my tuner card and streamed to mvp, will I see neglible cpu usage?

also my only other wish is to be able to play dvd using the mvp from my pc. is that possible? i saw some info about a plugin that transcodes on the fly but not seen much info about how well it works. anyone got any comment?

cheers again!

[wtg]

so assuming I turn those options off, and am just watching live tv taken from my tuner card and streamed to mvp, will I see neglible cpu usage?

Yes, that's correct as long as you're viewing MPG files. I was able to have two MVPs streaming from a 1.1 GHz Celeron and hardly notice it. However, AVI and DVD's are a different story since they have to be transcoded real-time. They put a fairly significant burden on a box.

also my only other wish is to be able to play dvd using the mvp from my pc. is that possible? i saw some info about a plugin that transcodes on the fly but not seen much info about how well it works. anyone got any comment?

Yes, it is though I haven't went there yet. It takes some tuning as I understand it but some people have had good results.

[UncleJohnsBand]

Soul, you can reduce the spikes significantly by disabling the Next Recording panel and the clock panel in the skin your MVP uses. The Next Recording panel refreshes every 5 seconds, causing a redraw which is the source of the spikes. The clock I assume updates once a minute, forcing a redraw.

I copy the Blue skin to a new directory called Blue MVP and set both panels visible attribute to false in the skin.xml in the main directory, and then use that skin for my MVPs. Doing so will keep the MVP's practical invisible from a CPU resource perspective. An MVP may spike temporary while using the menus, but you won't see the spiking you get every 5 seconds with the base skin.

Great idea....I never thought of that before.....Thanks.

[wtg]

I can't take credit for it... someone else gave me the idea when I was complaining about the problem myself, but I forget who. It works well.