fusion 5 gold plus & how to play .TP files

[valterra]

I'm putting the final touches on my HTPC. My Fusion 5 Gold Plus (PCI)
arrives tomorrow. In the meantime, I've been playing around with the
sample HDTV (.tp) files that I downloaded from DViCO's website.

I can play them in PowerDVD, and in my trial version of BeyondTV. But I
GBPVR does not list them as available to play, even though they're in the
same directory as my other video files. I changed the names to .mpg and
tried to play them without success.

I chose the Fusion 5 because I've read that GBPVR will work with it.
Here's my question: What does GBPVR do with the signal? Does it record to
that .tp format or does it transcode it to something else?

If it records .tp files, how can I get it to play the ones I've downloaded?
What am I doing wrong?

Thanks for the forums and for the software itself. I'll be honest -
BeyondTV plays these files perfectly. But I really like GBPVR better -
especially because of the price.

[sub]

Sorry, there is no built in support for playing transport stream files in GB-PVR.

Here's my question: What does GBPVR do with the signal? Does it record to
that .tp format or does it transcode it to something else?

No, it doesnt record transport stream files. It records either .mpg files or .dvr-ms files.

[valterra]

so it essentially captures the signal to an mpeg-2 file, and that's what's used for timeshifting, etc.?

With that being the ca e, can I set the capture resolution? For example, since currently I only have SDTV's, can I capture to something like 720p?

And, one last question. I'm taking back my Radeon 9250 because it doesn't have quite enough guts to play the .tp files when tv-out is selected. (tv-out and hardware acceleration seem to be mutually exclusive) Will gbpvr's mpegs be easier for my system to play?

Thanks!

[sub]

so it essentially captures the signal to an mpeg-2 file, and that's what's used for timeshifting, etc.?

Yes.

With that being the ca e, can I set the capture resolution? For example, since currently I only have SDTV's, can I capture to something like 720p?

No, you cant do this. It pretty much saves the data as it as transmitted by the broadcaster. Its not re-encoding it. You'd need to re-encode it to change the resolution.

And, one last question. I'm taking back my Radeon 9250 because it doesn't have quite enough guts to play the .tp files when tv-out is selected. (tv-out and hardware acceleration seem to be mutually exclusive) Will gbpvr's mpegs be easier for my system to play?

No, they'll probably be about the same. Its just a different container file format.

[valterra]

ok. that makes sense.

last question I hope...

if I had a choice of graphics cards, do I choose the one with the fastest processor or the one with the most memory?

[sub]

if I had a choice of graphics cards, do I choose the one with the fastest processor or the one with the most memory?

Sorry, I dont like to answer these sorts of questions.

[-stattik-]

You'll probably be using the dvr-ms muxer since it tends to work best with DVICO cards. GBPVR will play dvr-ms files fine although you might want to let gbpvr convert the dvr-ms files to mpg. Get a video card that supports DxVA so you can offload the decoding to the card. If you have no HDTV's you might want to transcode all recordings to a more suitable size/resolution.

[daveid]

to find a graphics card read lots of reviews. head to guru3d.com & pcper.com & htpcnews.com to find reviews & links to loads of other review sites. there is a lot more to consider than clock speed & amount of memory these days. for example, a 256mb card with a 128bit memory bus is not worth the cost difference from a 128mb card with a 128bit memory bus, and a card with a 500mhz clock speed and only 8 pixel processors is slower than a card with 350mhz & 16 pixel processors. if it is too much to think about, just read reviews of the different cards in your price range.

[valterra]

are the mpegs created by gbpvr "real" mpeg-2 files?

What I mean is lots of software transcoders choke on things like VOB files.

If gbpvr makes files my transcoder likes, I can do a batch transcode on my recordings. I'm playing around with a transcoder called Super Fast Mpeg2 Tranacoder. It's a commercial sw, but the only one that will do a whole movie in about 10 minutes.

Thanks for all the help!

[sub]

are the mpegs created by gbpvr "real" mpeg-2 files?

As far as I know they are "real". They may or may not be with the resolution or bitrates requirements of your other software, but thats defined by your broadcaster.

I should point out though, some US based HDTV people have problems producing .mpg files, so end up opting for .dvr-ms files, since these are a bit more resilient to faults in the digital stream (signal dropouts etc).