Need Advise on running HD on a low end system

[bogyver]

I know this isn't what most people want to hear, but have you thought about trying vista and using evr. From what I have read evr on xp cant use hardware acceleration because xp lacks the media foundation stuff that vista and server 2k8 have.
I have been meaning to set up a system with vista to try evr but just haven't got to it.
If you can get access to a vista cd you can install and not use a key and try it out, I think you get 30 day's before you have to put in a key.

[ToughRowToHoe]

WTG, have you tried the PDVD7 decoder lately? Your setup would be a good opportunity to see if it does indeed work exactly the same (perhaps better) than the PureVideo decoder. PDVD7 is supposed to enable all of the PureVideo features on the card -- hardware acceleration, pulldown, etc.

A general note about the newer cards for those who don't know since they are being mentioned. The extra acceleration chip on the cards is strictly for h.264 video. Well, and ATI does VC1. The extra chip will not help accelerate mpeg2, which is what the U.S. and half the other countries broadcast.

Deus, both the ATI and NVidea cards accellerate mpeg2. This is from the specs for the 2600:

"ATI Avivo™ HD Video and Display Platform
Dedicated unified video decoder (UVD) for H.264/AVC and VC-1 video formats
High definition (HD) playback of both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats
Hardware MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4/DivX video decode acceleration"
http://ati.amd.com/products/radeonhd2600/specs.html

The Power DVD 7 decoder does indeed enable accelleration for H.264/AVC and VC1. The new decoder in MPC-HC does also. The MPC-HC decoder also doesn't have the problem with reference frames in x.264. The MPC-HC decoder seems to be slightly less efficient than the PDVD decoder.

[Deusxmachina]

According to 3 different websites the 780g offloads the mpeg2 to the uvd

I hope so. Not having it on the cards was a head-scratcher.

[wtg]

WTG, have you tried the PDVD7 decoder lately? Your setup would be a good opportunity to see if it does indeed work exactly the same (perhaps better) than the PureVideo decoder. PDVD7 is supposed to enable all of the PureVideo features on the card -- hardware acceleration, pulldown, etc.

Missed this comment earlier.

No I haven't tried it. No use really. I'm pretty happy with my setup though I'm sure if I had a copy of it I'd try it just for curiosity's sake.