GB-PVR & Via EPIA M-series Decoder

[Cairo]

Does GB-PVR support the hardware decoder on the Via EPIA M-series motherboards?

I noticed in the quick start guide it says it supports the Xcard and Hauppauge PVR 350 decoders, but does it have any support for the above mentioned board?

I was thinking about throwing together an easy PVR setup, but am hoping the hardware decoder is supported to reduce CPU strain.

The setup I was going for:
Casetronic 2699R
Via EPIA ME6000
Maxtor 160GB 8MB buffer HD
256 MB pc2100 DDR Ram
Hauppauge PVR-150 (Not the MCE version, since i want the remote. Or possibly just get a 250)

[sub]

Unfortunatley the MPEG decoder on EPIA boards is more marketing than substance.

They do not have a real MPEG decoder. They do have some special instructions that can be used to assist the software decoders. To use this, you'd need to have a software decoder installed that can take advantage of these special instructions. The Cyberlink decoder than comes with Power DVD5, can do this. Even when these special instructions are being used, you'll probably only notice 5% - 15% drop in CPU usage. The picture will only be as good as the software decoder is capable of producing.

Contrast this wil real hardware decoders like the XCard and PVR350, which use virtually no CPU, and produce a stuning picture.

I found the ME6000 just too slow, but I know some find it "acceptable". Sorry.

[Cairo]

What if i used the same setup only with an M10000?

Even with using only the software decoding, would it run close to what you find to be "good"?

[sub]

Obviously the faster the machine the better, but I suspect you'd find the M10000 ok. Much better than the ME6000. If you get a M10000, get one of the Nehemiah ones, which has a full speed FPU. Some of the earlier M10000s came with a half speed FPU. One of these 1Ghz M10000s is about the equivalent of a celeron 600-700Mhz.

[Cairo]

By me finding it ok, would it perform every function adequately? or would I be limited in what I could do?

Would watching live tv be choppy?

Sorry to be a pain, but I'm just curious if by going the mini-itx route is going to be at best sub-par, then it's really just a waste of money.

Would it be necessary to up to the PVR-350 to get the hardware decoding necessary to make sure it doesn't chug along?

[Huw]

I tried using an M1000 and even with a pvr-350 card installed it struggles to do anything, changing channels in GBPVR is a certain crash. In fact I tried several machines before getting my final setup (2.4Ghz Shuttle PC) and in my trials basically figured that anything under 1.5GHz is not even worth the bother, they were all as unstable as ####.

I tried a
VIA EPIA800
VIA M1000
a full size 1300+ AMD system (still crashed)
I then tried my brothers 3GHz AMD machine which worked flawlessly, so I purchased a bare bones shuttle and stuck a 2.4GHz Celeron in it and it has worked flawlessly.

I have nothing against VIA's I use them as webservers and they perform great (I own about 30 of them), but they just don't have enough oomph to make a decent HTPC (IMHO)

[sub]

My experience with the M10000 I tried wasn't that bad, but I did still find it quite clunky.

I know the Via EPIAs are among those machines that the PVR350 drivers tend to not like, which can lead to lockups. With software decoding things generally worked, but dealing with video the CPU is maxed out nearly the whole time, leaving not much CPU head room for anything else.

Quote[/b] ]Even with using only the software decoding, would it run close to what you find to be "good"?

As I said, the faster the better, but I probably wouldn't run it myself on anything less than a  *PIII* 1Ghz (which should do a good job).

[Huw]

if you want the mini-itx form factor, then try the P4-itx board and get a 2.4Ghz p4 or celeron or get one of the shuttle barebones systems (slightly bigger than mini-itx), they are reasonably cheap (although you may need to look at the old model, the newer ones are quite a bit more expensive). it's one of those, "depends how much you want to spend" scenarios

[nkh]

Maybe it's the little plastic man I have standing on my M10000 that makes it cooperate with a PVR-350 and GBpvr, maybe it's just luck, but it does work. I always have other programs running, but when I run GBpvr I usualy set it to a higher priority (above normal or something) then everything is smooth both via tv out on a geforce4 mx440 and through the tv out on the happauge card. The only problem is that the controls lags for the first few seconds after the video is started (only with the geforce tv out, pvr 350 is flawless), so you have to wait a bit befor you can do all the fancy "0" - "Skip" stuff

I think choosing the right codecs has a lot to say, and so does getting the right drivers.

[Huw]

I tried many drivers and various codecs, didn't stop it locking up everytime I tried to change channels. what bios version was your M1000 and what version drivers are you using ? I wouldn't mind trying to get mine working too.