Bamboozled by hardware, need guidance

[gaby]

I'm trying to put together a low budget PVR, nothing fancy but I'd like to have the facility to watch one channel while recording another, perhaps download and watch some HD or at least hi res videos, play a DVD and perhaps play a Blu Ray when I can afford a drive. I've worked out that GB-PVR is clearly the software to use but I'm a little misty on the hardware I should run it on.

Based on my research so far I've purchased a Pinnacle 3010iX dual DVB-T/Analogue card off eBay (absolute bargain) but I'm at a bit of a loss as to what system to build around it.

My options are that I can go Intel or AMD. In either case I can get a Mobo/CPU combo for about 100UKP and I'll probably spend another 150 on RAM, a silent CPU cooler (these are awesome and will fit in a small HTPC case), RAM and HD. I have plans to build my own case, or at least re-purpose an old chassis I have laying around.

I'm looking for good recommendations for what mobo to get. I don't really know what I'm looking for. Is it worth getting one with a GeForce IGP or one of the AMD variants? Does GB-PVR even benefit from an onboard graphics processor? Where should I spend the money, on CPU grunt, mobo quality or elsewhere?

So far I'm looking at these;

AMD Rig:

CPU: Sempron LE-1250 AM2
Mobo: Either the Gigabyte GA-MA74GM-S2H or the Asus M3N78-VM.

Both boards seem reasonable, both have HDMI, DVI, 6/8Ch Audio but the ASUS has a nice optical out, the Gigabyte has what looks like a digital coax output. The Gigabyte is based around the ATI Radeon 2100 platform, the ASUS is the NVIDIA GeForce 8200 Chipset.

Intel Rig:

CPU: Celery E1200 Dual Core 1.6Ghz
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H

This board is based on the GeForce 7100. I lost track of the Nvidia model numbers years ago, they just don't make sense any more.

So where do I go from here? Are my mobo choices wildly inappropriate for what will only ever be an HTPC? Have I missed an obvious bargain or have I already shot myself in the foot with the hardware I'm looking at? Any helpful suggestions or gentle nudges towards useful websites or reading material is greatly appreciated.

Better than that would be somebody telling me exactly which bits to buy

G.

[JonnyCam]

For DVB-T in England I would suggest using a discrete graphics card - the Nvidia 7100 /8200 & ATI 2100 will not give you hardware acceleration of the H264 HD streams.

If you have a grunty cpu, you could use software decoding, but the hardware de-interlacing etc which comes froma decent video card is hard to beat.

I use a Nvidia 8600GT, and works well for 720p & 1080i streams we have in NZ (and some 1080p samples) - anything above that should be fine.

Thats my opinion - although there are some more qualified to give you details, as they know a bit more, and also use DVB-T in England.

Also, the analog side of your hybrid card may not be able to be used within GBPVR unless it has an onboard hardware mpeg encoder - so you may want to check (not sure if you need that anyway - with 2 DVB-T tuners)

[gaby]

Also, the analog side of your hybrid card may not be able to be used within GBPVR unless it has an onboard hardware mpeg encoder - so you may want to check (not sure if you need that anyway - with 2 DVB-T tuners)

I'm pretty sure it doesn't have any MPEG hardware which explains the low, low price of those cards. For me it doesn't matter, I just want to get the normal digital freeview channels.

[gaby]

So if I were to beef up the video hardware, I'd be looking for cards that have any sort of hardware acceleration on them? This seems like a good value deal (cheap):

Gigabyte HD 4350

Reading the ATI page about that series of cards seems to suggest that it has enough power to do 1080p and beyond, it's PCIe and has an HDMI port. I wonder if there's any way to use that GPU as a hardware MPEG encoder?

[JonnyCam]

No, you can't use the gpu for encoding, as it's only for output, and would involve a lot of movement of the uncompressed video from the tuner to graphics card & back again (if it were technically possible)

I never had any success with ATI & HA, but pBS on the board seems to know how to get it working properly (thats why i went with Nvidia - ATI had some driver issue which didn't allow proper decoding of the H264)

He should be able to point you in the right direction, and let you know if his scripts apply for the HD3450, and if it's a good choice for what you want. (hopefully he reads the post)

[gaby]

Reading around a little more today, it seems that some of the latest Nvidia on board chipsets don't really match up to the 780g found in things like this Gigabyte board, which was one that I found mentioned in a lot of places. I think this is the winner, mATX, onboard video, HA capable (with some effort) and I can buy it here in the UK as well.

[gazoo]

Please, no sempron, don't do it. Get a cheap dual core non-sempron instead. 780g is uATX is good, but don't expect miracles with the HA, hence the slightly beefier processor.

[pBS]

i'd go with the HD3450 or the 780g mb[same thing basically] instead of the 4350 just yet, as the drivers don't seem to be quite there for 4xxx versions...3xxx and below seem to be golden w/8.11 drivers...tho i haven't had chance to test 9.1 drivers. [by tomorrow]
i waited a long time for them to completely fix the drivers, but when they work, can't beat the performance...

and technically i use ffdshow for mpeg2 and don't get *full* hardware accell...but it's like 90% accell and prefectly smooth...not even a hiccup... ati decoder does full accell but stutters on high bitrate material..probably worse for 1080p, but smooth on all others..

use cyberlink powerdvd for h.264 and the MS codecs for vc1 for the best results and *ultra* low cpu usage...[even less than mpeg!]

i would agree with everything on that page about HA except now the 8.11 drivers work out of the box..[came after that article] and try ati avivo decoder first, then ffdshow.. also MPCHC separate decoders work well..
if you have stutters after seeking there's a kb fix for that [windows xp issue]
if on Vista, try EVR w/latest drivers...easiest to accell..otherwise it should be same as xp only slower...lol

[gazoo]

i'd go with the HD3450 or the 780g mb[same thing basically] instead of the 4350 just yet, as the drivers don't seem to be quite there for 4xxx versions...3xxx and below seem to be golden w/8.11 drivers...tho i haven't had chance to test 9.1 drivers. [by tomorrow]
i waited a long time for them to completely fix the drivers, but when they work, can't beat the performance...

and technically i use ffdshow for mpeg2 and don't get *full* hardware accell...but it's like 90% accell and prefectly smooth...not even a hiccup... ati decoder does full accell but stutters on high bitrate material..probably worse for 1080p, but smooth on all others..

use cyberlink powerdvd for h.264 and the MS codecs for vc1 for the best results and *ultra* low cpu usage...[even less than mpeg!]

those are good combos of codecs pBS. I use MPC for h.264 and get like 2% CPU.

[gaby]

Please, no sempron, don't do it. Get a cheap dual core non-sempron instead. 780g is uATX is good, but don't expect miracles with the HA, hence the slightly beefier processor.

I found a nice Athlon X2 5050e, dual core, 2.6Ghz and only eats 45W. This goes into the Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H 780G quite happily, leaving room for expansion later on. I can easily fit in the Pinnacle card that's in the post and it should have space to take a full size PCIe GPU if the need arises.

Thanks for the input guys, I really appreciate it. Now, onto the case!