Also, do you know where I may fine 18" Straight to straight SATA cables at an affordable price? I don't see why the ones I am finding cost 6-7 bucks a piece.

http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartment.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10226

Thanks renethx, So a gigabit ethernet connection will work fast enough for what I want to do, I do have an pentium 3 with xp on it that I could install a PCI gigabit ethernet card and put all the TBs hard drivers on it as a server right?

Can this server PC be away from the HTPC laptop somewhere on the basement connected to the basement router via an 5e ethernet cable that is able to support gigabit speed? Or that would be too far from the main laptop on the main floor, for the HD content play and record without issues or delays?

By the way I found my self another deal, I guess this one is a better one because it has Bray player, so I can put all my Bray disc on the server.


Please renethx, can you take a look at the specs of this new laptop and tell me if I would be loosing on performance for gaining a BRay player? http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938
Wow that's expensive. I got almost the same thing from Gateway without the discrete graphics for $500, but that was a one off Best Buy deal. You can still find cheaper stuff than that though. I think there was a Sony with Blu-ray and Core i5 for $700 from Best Buy.

It's mysterious for me why some people get HD audio bitstreaming and others don't. In my case I don't get bitstreaming with ASRock/GIGABYTE+TMT3; WinDVD and ffdshow are just fine; PowerDVD is the worst (no proper H.264 decoding). Tomorrow I will test ASUS P7H55D-M EVO.
I'm confused about what exactly bitstreaming is and why it's so important.

I've got the Intel Core i3 530, ASRock H55M Pro outputting to a Sony HT-CT100 soundbar, which supports Dolby Digital/DTS/ProLogic II. How does bitstreaming apply to this setup? The manual says to output sound in Multi-channel PCM. Where would I do that?

I'm confused about what exactly bitstreaming is and why it's so important.

I've got the Intel Core i3 530, ASRock H55M Pro outputting to a Sony HT-CT100 soundbar, which supports Dolby Digital/DTS/ProLogic II. How does bitstreaming apply to this setup? The manual says to output sound in Multi-channel PCM. Where would I do that?

I believe it means support for the original bitstream blueray hd audio over HDMI, such as TrueHD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truehd) and DTS-HD Master Audio (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DTS-HD_Master_Audio).

Both wikipedia articles list -
hd audio type may be transported to AV receivers in 5.1, 6.1 or 7.1 channels, at full uncompressed quality, in one of three ways depending on player and/or receiver support[3]:

* Over 6, 7 or 8 RCA connectors as analog audio, using the player's internal decoder and digital-to-analog converter (DAC).
* Over HDMI 1.1 (or higher) connections as 6-, 7- or 8-channel linear PCM, using the player's decoder and the AV receiver's DAC.
* Over HDMI 1.3 (or higher) connections as the original hd audio type bitstream, with decoding and DAC both done by the AV receiver.


I think over HDMI 1.3 is what we're talking about (original bitstream), though the HDMI 1.1 lists PCM. However I haven't heard yet of a motherboard that supports it with Clarkdale. The H55/H57 boards I've looked at have reported trouble (though I haven't seen any comments on the intel MBs). Clarkdale supports it, but I haven't seen any successful reports out there in my (limited) searching...

I don't claim to be an expert here though and am trying to get a handle on it myself, so someone else please jump in...

A lot of people have it working in the Core i7, i5, i3 thread.

A lot of people have it working in the Core i7, i5, i3 thread.

Yup, I am one of the them (Zotac H55 Mini-ITX + Core i5). Note bitstreaming only applies to the core i5/i3, I believe it does not apply to i7 (correct?)

Yup, I am one of the them (Zotac H55 Mini-ITX + Core i5). Note bitstreaming only applies to the core i5/i3, I believe it does not apply to i7 (correct?)

It's the on die GPU of the i3/i5 that enables bitstreaming, so yes not the i7 or any others w/o on die GPU.

First off, renethx, AWESOME post. Easily one of the best guides I have ever seen.

I do have a question though.
I have decided to go with the Mini-ITX Standard Build for my HTPC (Bottom of Post).

I need to be able to play video not only on my own HDTV (Using HDMI) but I also need to be able to connect to SDTV's.

I am thinking doing this for Standard Definition:
3.5mm to RCA Cable for Sound
Apple DVI to Video Adapter for Video (Plus RCA Cable)

My big question is, will that work?
I can find nothing that says whether that ZOTAC board has DVI-I ports (although they look like it). Also, if there is any other reason it wouldn't work?

______________
Standard System
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

Intel-Intel (iGPU)

System

CPU: Core i3 530 2.93GHz LGA1156, $113.
CPU Cooler: Stock cooler, $0.
Motherboard: ZOTAC H55-ITX WiFi H55ITX-A-E LGA1156 Intel H55 chipset Mini-ATX, $129.
Memory: G.SKILL F3-12800CL9D-2GBNQ DDR3-1600 2 x 1GB Kit, $65.
Graphics Card: Intel HD Graphics (integrated in the chipset), $0.
HDD: WD Caviar Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB SATA 3.0Gbps, $63.
PSU: ATX12V 250W SFX PSU (included in the case): $0.
Case: Apex MI-008 Mini-ITX, $40. An alternative is Apex MI-100BK Mini-ITX, $50.
Total Cost: $410

Thanks renethx, So a gigabit ethernet connection will work fast enough for what I want to do, I do have an pentium 3 with xp on it that I could install a PCI gigabit ethernet card and put all the TBs hard drivers on it as a server right?

Can this server PC be away from the HTPC laptop somewhere on the basement connected to the basement router via an 5e ethernet cable that is able to support gigabit speed? Or that would be too far from the main laptop on the main floor, for the HD content play and record without issues or delays?

By the way I found my self another deal, I guess this one is a better one because it has Bray player, so I can put all my Bray disc on the server.


Please renethx, can you take a look at the specs of this new laptop and tell me if I would be loosing on performance for gaining a BRay player? http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938
Yup, you can use your existing system as a server and can place it anywhere on your local network.

That's good, except for a 5400 rpm HDD.

Are you dead set on a laptop? I had a space limitation and I built my HTPC using the M350 case. The hardware cost was right around $500.

Thanks for the replay MurrayW, For starter the system that you put together will cost me around an extra 200 bucks or so in Canada, plus I kind of see the saving differently, in 3 years or so if I want to upgrade my HTPC, I just buy another laptop and I could give this laptop to my wife to replace her existing one, and should still be fast enough for what she needs, but if in the other hand in the future I want to upgrade my HTPC using the one that you bought I really have no use for the old at all. So I kind of see it as paying more up front but saving on the long run.

Thanks again renethx for all you help on this site.
I plan on using Unraid with this MB GIGABYTE GA-MA785GT-UD3H Is it fine to use one of the external USB ports for the pen drive that will contain the Unraid OS?
You will use a USB flash drive instead of a HDD for UnRAID.

I'm confused about what exactly bitstreaming is and why it's so important.

I've got the Intel Core i3 530, ASRock H55M Pro outputting to a Sony HT-CT100 soundbar, which supports Dolby Digital/DTS/ProLogic II. How does bitstreaming apply to this setup? The manual says to output sound in Multi-channel PCM. Where would I do that?
Bitstreaming means sending compressed audio streams instead of first decoding compressed data to LPCM in PC, then sending LPCM. So your receiver must be able to decode compressed audio formats (typically Dolby Digital, DTS, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD HRA, and DTS-HD MA).

HT-CT100 does not decode TrueHD/DTS-HD. So you can ignore this aspect.

Mini-ITX system, that's a lot cheaper and better in performance. If Apex MI-008 is too large, you can find a smaller case

By going with a laptop will I be loosing a lot of performance even if I find a similar laptop but with 720rpm HD?
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

How much in performance will I be loosing compare to a desktop HTPC using the same i5 CPU and this mother board: Asus P7H55-M Pro Socket 1156 Intel H55 Chipset Dual-Channel DDR3 2133 ?

Yup, you can use your existing system as a server and can place it anywhere on your local network.

Using Media Center can I record OTA tv shows in a hard drive that is located in another computer somewhere in the network?

I have never build a server before so this may be a silly question.

Do I need to set up anything differently to have a server with the TBs hard drivers in the basement? How fast should it be? Can it be just a Pentium 3 with 2G of ram, running XP?

First off, renethx, AWESOME post. Easily one of the best guides I have ever seen.

I do have a question though.
I have decided to go with the Mini-ITX Standard Build for my HTPC (Bottom of Post).

I need to be able to play video not only on my own HDTV (Using HDMI) but I also need to be able to connect to SDTV's.

I am thinking doing this for Standard Definition:
3.5mm to RCA Cable for Sound
Apple DVI to Video Adapter for Video (Plus RCA Cable)

My big question is, will that work?
I can find nothing that says whether that ZOTAC board has DVI-I ports (although they look like it). Also, if there is any other reason it wouldn't work?
The DVI port of H55ITX-A-E is DVI-I so it supports VGA too. But perhaps Apple DVI to Video Adapter for Video won't work; it is designed for specific ATI graphics cards (which perhaps has an VGA to SDTV encoder).

You'd better add a discrete graphic card that has a 7-pin mini-DIN connector (http://pinouts.ru/Video/svideo_7pin_pinout.shtml) (e.g Radeon HD 4xxx) and use a S-video cable.

By going with a laptop will I be loosing a lot of performance even if I find a similar laptop but with 720rpm HD?
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

How much in performance will I be loosing compare to a desktop HTPC using the same i5 CPU and this mother board: Asus P7H55-M Pro Socket 1156 Intel H55 Chipset Dual-Channel DDR3 2133 ?

Using Media Center can I record OTA tv shows in a hard drive that is located in another computer somewhere in the network?

Do I need to set up anything differently to have a server with the TBs hard drivers in the basement? How fast should it be? Can it be just a Pentium 3 with 2G of ram, running XP?
It depends on the task. For video playback, there should be no difference.

Yes.

A server (processor, HDD etc.) doesn't need to be fast if its purpose is streaming videos to multiple PCs. 1-2TB 5400rpm HDDs with 64K clusters and Gb LAN will be enough.

A server (processor, HDD etc.) doesn't need to be fast if its purpose is streaming videos to multiple PCs. 1-2TB 5400rpm HDDs with 64K clusters and Gb LAN will be enough.

When using WHS (with no underlying hardware RAID), are 5400 rpm drives fast enough for streaming HD content? I can't imagine the drives being the bottle neck, but just want to make sure.

Sorry for the noob question :confused:

Yup, I am one of the them (Zotac H55 Mini-ITX + Core i5). Note bitstreaming only applies to the core i5/i3, I believe it does not apply to i7 (correct?)
The one exception is the Core i7m Arrandale series. They are based on the same architecture as the Core i3/i5s.

When using WHS (with no underlying hardware RAID), are 5400 rpm drives fast enough for streaming HD content? I can't imagine the drives being the bottle neck, but just want to make sure.

Sorry for the noob question :confused:

I have 14 drives in my WHS, all either 5400 or 5900 RPM, never had one issue streaming HD content to multiple players at once.

Dell is "special" and uses proprietary connectors. :mad:

CJ

Maybe for a PC bought in the early 90's. Dell has been using standard power connectors for years!

The power supply in the 537s is not a standard power supply in regards to its PHYSICAL size. I believe it is a 2u sized power supply. The motherboard, drive and other power connections are all standard.

The one exception is the Core i7m Arrandale series. They are based on the same architecture as the Core i3/i5s.

Yes. The naming convention for the mobile Cores is a mystery to me, but anything Arrandale has integrated graphics.

I'm confused about what exactly bitstreaming is and why it's so important.

I've got the Intel Core i3 530, ASRock H55M Pro outputting to a Sony HT-CT100 soundbar, which supports Dolby Digital/DTS/ProLogic II. How does bitstreaming apply to this setup? The manual says to output sound in Multi-channel PCM. Where would I do that?

It looks like I do have bitstream working already. I was looking at the Sony soundbar panel which just showed Dolby during a movie. However when no movie is playing it says PCM. When I started Inglorious Basterds, which is apparently the only movie I have with a DTS soundtrack it does change to DTS during playback.

Yup, I am one of the them (Zotac H55 Mini-ITX + Core i5). Note bitstreaming only applies to the core i5/i3, I believe it does not apply to i7 (correct?)

Ok, this is the first board I've heard that supports it. It looks like a nice board, though I was hoping to stay in the micro form factor to be flexible. Anyone know of any other boards that support Clarkdale bitstreaming?

Anyone using 802.11n? I'm curious if it's actually faster than 100Mb wired in the real world.

This may sound repetitive because you answered these questions already, but this would be a big purchase for me and I need to double check ;)

It depends on the task. For video playback, there should be no difference.

So if for video playback there should be no difference by going with the laptop. What about for multitasking?

Watching live OTA 1080i TV shows and recording, playing back other prerecorded TV shows, watching ripped Blue Ray 1080p movies and listening to music would be demanded of this laptop simultaneously by using Media Center extenders by 3 family members.

So is a little more than just video play back by a single party.

Still going with the laptop will be as fast as going with the desktop HTPC using the same i5 CPU and Asus P7H55-M Pro Socket 1156 Intel H55 Chipset Dual-Channel DDR3 2133 ?

A server (processor, HDD etc.) doesn't need to be fast if its purpose is streaming videos to multiple PCs. 1-2TB 5400rpm HDDs with 64K clusters and Gb LAN will be enough.

Since the HTPC laptop will be controlling this server, the same simultaneous demands will be apply to this server.

Does this multiple tasking may require faster hardware for the server?

Bitstreaming means sending compressed audio streams instead of first decoding compressed data to LPCM in PC, then sending LPCM. So your receiver must be able to decode compressed audio formats (typically Dolby Digital, DTS, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD HRA, and DTS-HD MA).

Can I get Bitstreaming with the specs of this laptop?

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

Can I get Bitstreaming with the specs of this laptop?

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

Yes

Ok, this is the first board I've heard that supports it. It looks like a nice board, though I was hoping to stay in the micro form factor to be flexible. Anyone know of any other boards that support Clarkdale bitstreaming?

There are plenty of MicroATX boards that support core i3/i5:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=H55+Micro+ATX

Maybe for a PC bought in the early 90's. Dell has been using standard power connectors for years!

The power supply in the 537s is not a standard power supply in regards to its PHYSICAL size. I believe it is a 2u sized power supply. The motherboard, drive and other power connections are all standard.

Thanks, that's what I needed to know before testing on a spare motherboard I own.

For those of you that are thinking of building a gaming htpc, I would wait until the silverstone sg07 is released. It can accomodate even a 12.2″ (309mm) ATI Radeon 5970 card! 600 watt PSU also! Think of all the power you can cram in that little beast...I know I am.

Check the possible causes listed here:

http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/t/79957.aspx

(long thread, but the last page or two contains a summary of various causes with diagnostics to help determine which one is responsible)

Maybe for a PC bought in the early 90's. Dell has been using standard power connectors for years!

The power supply in the 537s is not a standard power supply in regards to its PHYSICAL size. I believe it is a 2u sized power supply. The motherboard, drive and other power connections are all standard.

They're connectors are standard but the wiring is different and so are a couple of voltages. You cannot connect a standard PS into a Dell or the MB will fry. To replace a Dell MB with a non-Dell mb you will also have to change the PS. I was going to replace the PS and MB on my Dell that I bought just 2 1/2 years ago and found out that the outputs on the mATX Gigybyte MB are reversed from the Dell too. I did all this to reuse the case. It was pointless and I ended up just buying a Coolermaster case for $50 and the Dell is still sitting in the corner collecting dust unles I want to go back to Dell for a new MB.

So if for video playback there should be no difference by going with the laptop. What about for multitasking?

Watching live OTA 1080i TV shows and recording, playing back other prerecorded TV shows, watching ripped Blue Ray 1080p movies and listening to music would be demanded of this laptop simultaneously by using Media Center extenders by 3 family members.

So is a little more than just video play back by a single party.

Still going with the laptop will be as fast as going with the desktop HTPC using the same i5 CPU and Asus P7H55-M Pro Socket 1156 Intel H55 Chipset Dual-Channel DDR3 2133 ?

Since the HTPC laptop will be controlling this server, the same simultaneous demands will be apply to this server.

Does this multiple tasking may require faster hardware for the server?
You shouldn't too much worry about the laptop performance. All of your intended tasks are easy for mobile Core i5.

Of course a mobile processor can't be as fast as a desktop processor in the same price range.

The only serious multitasking in a server in your scenario would be streaming multiple videos. As I wrote before, an older system with a bunch of 5400 rpm 1-2TB HDDs + Gb LAN is enough.

Really??? My dell pc is running just fine with the Antec 500 watt power supply I installed a few weeks ago. Maybe you should "dust off your Dell":rolleyes:

They're connectors are standard but the wiring is different and so are a couple of voltages. You cannot connect a standard PS into a Dell or the MB will fry. To replace a Dell MB with a non-Dell mb you will also have to change the PS. I was going to replace the PS and MB on my Dell that I bought just 2 1/2 years ago and found out that the outputs on the mATX Gigybyte MB are reversed from the Dell too. I did all this to reuse the case. It was pointless and I ended up just buying a Coolermaster case for $50 and the Dell is still sitting in the corner collecting dust unles I want to go back to Dell for a new MB.

I just bought an gateway DX4831 with intel core i3 530. I installed a Lg blu ray burner(bh08). I keep getting an hdcp error during bd playback.

Error is fail to enable HDCP. Please switch to analog output and try avian. (error code=0107).

Hi, I'm new here. I've built many computers as in game machines, but I'm new to this type of build. I would like to build a machine that will record my OTA broadcast TV, play Hulu videos, and Netflix. I already have a PC setup that records 2 HD programs via my HDHomerun on Windows 7 64bit, but I want to build a new machine for this. I will be using a 720p TV with HDMI, and I do not need to play games on the machine, but it needs to run Windows 7 64bit well. What would be my best bet as far as an Intel solution goes? My current setup has two 3g raided HDD'S, and there is no problem with recording 2 HD streams, and watching Netflix at the same time, so I would need to know if I would be OK with a single HDD as well. Plus, are video cards/or built in video able to output a true 720p/1080p screen, or will I run into TV edge problems like the old days? Thanks for your help.

I just bought an gateway DX4831 with intel core i3 530. I installed a Lg blu ray burner(bh08). I keep getting an hdcp error during bd playback.

Error is fail to enable HDCP. Please switch to analog output and try avian. (error code=0107).



Use Anydvd to get this problem fixed. It is a well known problem.

Worked for me..

Worked for me..

So I am good then with the onboard Graphics processor that comes with the I3 530? I tried anydvd and it does work now.

There are plenty of MicroATX boards that support core i3/i5:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=H55+Micro+ATX

Supporting i3/i5 Clarkdale graphics doesn't mean you get bitstreaming.

See http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18223589#post18223589 - the ASRock and Gigabyte boards don't seem to support it.

Supporting i3/i5 Clarkdale graphics doesn't mean you get bitstreaming.

See http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18223589#post18223589 - the ASRock and Gigabyte boards don't seem to support it.

Correct, hopefully the manufacturers resolve this already with an update is there is no excuse for this feature not working. I guess I lucked out with the Zotac

Supporting i3/i5 Clarkdale graphics doesn't mean you get bitstreaming.

See http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18223589#post18223589 - the ASRock and Gigabyte boards don't seem to support it.

I am not planning on replacing the mobo. It's a new pc I just wanted to make sure it's good enough to backup my collection of blu rays.

Maybe in the future I will replace it so I can overclock the i3 530. ;)

Supporting i3/i5 Clarkdale graphics doesn't mean you get bitstreaming.

See http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18223589#post18223589 - the ASRock and Gigabyte boards don't seem to support it.

Gigabyte H55M-UD2H i3-530 bitstreaming for some time. WinDVD2010 and TMT3 .170

__________
Workstation
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

Workstation here is a PC intended for various HTPC-related tasks other than video/audio playback. The CPU and the motherboard chosen here are good enough for the most demanding tasks and future upgrades (4 cores/8 threads, supporting PCI Express 2.0 x16, x16 / x16, x8, x8 / x8, x8, x8, x8 links). The selection of other components depends on the tasks you are going to do. The system below is a consumer-grade high-performance video editing machine.

System

CPU: Core i7 860 2.80GHz LGA1156, $284.
CPU Cooler: Xigmatek Dark Knight-S1283V, $45, with Xigmatek Crossbow ACK-I5361, $9 (necessary to attach the cooler to the LGA1156 socket).
Motherboard: ASUS P7P55 WS SuperComputer LGA1156 Intel P55 and nForce 200 chipsets ATX, $230.
Memory: G.SKILL F3-12800CL9D-4GBNQ DDR3-1600 2 x 2GB Kit, $105.
Graphics Card: GeForce GTX 275 DDR3 896MB, $255.
HBA: Adaptec RAID 51645 20-port SAS/SATA RAID Controller PCI Express x8 Card, $1,040.
HDD: Intel X25-M SSDSA2MH080G2R5 80GB SATA 3.0Gbps SSD, $246.
PSU: Seasonic M12D 850W, $156.
Case: Chenbro SR109 EATX/ATX, $250.
HDD Cage (optional): Chenbro 84H210910-010 5-in-3 Hotswap HDD Cage, $99. The case supports up to 15 HDDs (besides the OS drive) with three cages.
Total Cost: $2620 (optional HDD cages and drives for data storage are not included)

Remarks

You can even use:
CPU: Core i7 920 2.66GHz LGA1366, $284.
Motherboard: ASUS P6T6 WS Revolution LGA1366 Intel X58 and nForce 200 chipsets ATX, $330 (supporting PCI Express 2.0 x16, x16, x16 / x16, x16, x8, x8 / x16, x8, x8, x8, x8 links), or ASUS P6T7 WS SuperComputer LGA1366 Intel X58 and dual nForce 200 chipsets ATX, $417 (supporting PCI Express 2.0 x16, x16, x16, x16 / x16, x16, x16, x8, x8 / x16, x16, x8, x8, x8, x8 / x16, x8, x8, x8, x8, x8, x8 links).
Memory: G.SKILL F3-12800CL9T-6GBNQ DDR3-1600 3 x 2GB Kit, $150.
if your applications can utilize that expandability.

renethx, is there any particular reason you suggest the GTX 275 for a workstation build over say, something like the HD 5750 which is $100+ cheaper? The only reason I ask is because I'm looking to do an i7 930 build and since I will be using it really only for encoding and video editing (no gaming) and was wondering if I would benefit at all stepping up to the 275.

Worked for me..

If I just use a VGA cable going to my pc and monitor will that get rid of the HDCP error?

Of course a mobile processor can't be as fast as a desktop processor in the same price range.

I know that one have to pay more money for the same speed processor on a laptop than desktop, I was just trying to double check that I was going to get a similar performance on the laptop in the link, than if I was buying an i5 and the Asus P7H55-M for a desktop.

renethx, what do you think about this combination, buying this laptop and replacing the main hard drive by the one on the link bellow? http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

http://canadacomputers.com/index.php?do=ShowProduct&cmd=pd&pid=023760&cid=HDD.517.47

renethx, is there any particular reason you suggest the GTX 275 for a workstation build over say, something like the HD 5750 which is $100+ cheaper? The only reason I ask is because I'm looking to do an i7 930 build and since I will be using it really only for encoding and video editing (no gaming) and was wondering if I would benefit at all stepping up to the 275.
Using another card is no problem. You should choose a card that best fits your requirement.

renethx, what do you think about this combination, buying this laptop and replacing the main hard drive by the one on the link bellow? http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

http://canadacomputers.com/index.php?do=ShowProduct&cmd=pd&pid=023760&cid=HDD.517.47
That's a good idea. But you may be satisfied with a 5400 rpm drive...

Hi, I'm new here. I've built many computers as in game machines, but I'm new to this type of build. I would like to build a machine that will record my OTA broadcast TV, play Hulu videos, and Netflix. I already have a PC setup that records 2 HD programs via my HDHomerun on Windows 7 64bit, but I want to build a new machine for this. I will be using a 720p TV with HDMI, and I do not need to play games on the machine, but it needs to run Windows 7 64bit well. What would be my best bet as far as an Intel solution goes? My current setup has two 3g raided HDD'S, and there is no problem with recording 2 HD streams, and watching Netflix at the same time, so I would need to know if I would be OK with a single HDD as well. Plus, are video cards/or built in video able to output a true 720p/1080p screen, or will I run into TV edge problems like the old days? Thanks for your help.
Basically any system in my list should be good. I haven't seen an issue in recording multiple programs in a single HDD simultaneously.

Hi, I'm new here. I've built many computers as in game machines, but I'm new to this type of build. I would like to build a machine that will record my OTA broadcast TV, play Hulu videos, and Netflix. I already have a PC setup that records 2 HD programs via my HDHomerun on Windows 7 64bit, but I want to build a new machine for this. I will be using a 720p TV with HDMI, and I do not need to play games on the machine, but it needs to run Windows 7 64bit well. What would be my best bet as far as an Intel solution goes? My current setup has two 3g raided HDD'S, and there is no problem with recording 2 HD streams, and watching Netflix at the same time, so I would need to know if I would be OK with a single HDD as well. Plus, are video cards/or built in video able to output a true 720p/1080p screen, or will I run into TV edge problems like the old days? Thanks for your help.

I have just an i3-540, 4 gigs of RAM with a 1.5TB 5400 RPM drive and it records 2 HD OTA just fine at the same time as playing a Bluray or streaming Netflix. You really don't need all that much power or spend a ton of money for a top shelf HTPC if you're not doing gaming on it.

That's a good idea. But you may be satisfied with a 5400 rpm drive...

lol you said the 5400 was the down side of it, so i though it was a must to replace it.

Keeping the 5400 would make the whole system slower? I just don't want to pay all that money to have the hard drive slowing the whole thing down.

So just to double check, I can get Bitstreaming with that laptop right?

So with this laptop I should be able to record OTA HD TV shows with media center, using 2 HDHomerun TV tuners in the network right?

I think I'm ready to buy it, just waiting to see if there is any thing else I should be aware of before I do :)

lol you said the 5400 was the down side of it, so i though it was a must to replace it.

Keeping the 5400 would make the whole system slower? I just don't want to pay all that money to have the hard drive slowing the whole thing down.

So just to double check, I can get Bitstreaming with that laptop right?

So with this laptop I should be able to record OTA HD TV shows with media center, using 2 HDHomerun TV tuners in the network right?

I think I'm ready to buy it, just waiting to see if there is any thing else I should be aware of before I do :)
Playing back/streaming videos is a real-time job. As long as the jobs are done well, a slow system is perfectly OK. Of course you may notice slowness here and there in other jobs.

Recording multiple programs is easy with any decent system.

Whether HD audio bitstreaming works or not seems to depend on the player and AVR. Quite a few people reported this issue (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18087108#post18087108) with mobile/desktop Core i3/i5 + PowerDVD 9 Ultra. 23.976Hz is not supported. Radeon HD 5470 looks stabler but you may need EDID override (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1227161). So basically nothing is guaranteed (as usual). :)

Any news on a passive 5670?

renethx

Thanks for sharing your knowledge. I would never have attempted to build my Norco 4020 server and my LUXA2 HTPC without this valuable thread.

I'm in the process of building your suggested premium micro atx system [in post 12008]. I have a GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4 and a Xigmatek Dark Knight-S1283V CPU cooler. I want to install a LG CH08 BD-ROM player, but it doesn't fit with the CPU cooler being so high.

My question is: The only way I can see making it fit is if the CPU cooler fan and the LUXA2 case fan are back to back from each other and blowing in opposite directions [case fan out the back & Xigmatek blowing from the back to the front, being 2" from each other]. The seems to defeat the whole purpose of the case fan though.

I'm guessing, and this is where your suggestion is needed, do I just scrap the Xigmatek and go for the Cooler Master GeminII S? And, will the Cooler Master fit with my LG CH08?
This seems like the logical solution.

That being said, if a Blu-ray drive is in the mix then the Xigmatek should not be used.

Thanks -- donation made -- :D

I added a blu ray drive, 250gb sata drive and two ATI 650 HD tuners to this system. Can the 300 stock power supply handle all this? I provided the link below on all the specs of the system.


http://www.gateway.com/systems/product/529668380.php#prodBar

renethx

Thanks for sharing your knowledge. I would never have attempted to build my Norco 4020 server and my LUXA2 HTPC without this valuable thread.

I'm in the process of building your suggested premium micro atx system [in post 12008]. I have a GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4 and a Xigmatek Dark Knight-S1283V CPU cooler. I want to install a LG CH08 BD-ROM player, but it doesn't fit with the CPU cooler being so high.

My question is: The only way I can see making it fit is if the CPU cooler fan and the LUXA2 case fan are back to back from each other and blowing in opposite directions [case fan out the back & Xigmatek blowing from the back to the front, being 2" from each other]. The seems to defeat the whole purpose of the case fan though.

I'm guessing, and this is where your suggestion is needed, do I just scrap the Xigmatek and go for the Cooler Master GeminII S? And, will the Cooler Master fit with my LG CH08?
This seems like the logical solution.
Thanks for your donation and feedback!

A workaround is this: Attach the cooler turn around 180 degree and attach the fan so that it sucks air from the cooler. This is not the way the manufacturer intends, but there should be little difference in cooling efficiency. Or use Geminii S.

I will rethink of the cooling solution in this chassis. Thanks again for your feedback.

I added a blu ray drive, 250gb sata drive and two ATI 650 HD tuners to this system. Can the 300 stock power supply handle all this? I provided the link below on all the specs of the system.


http://www.gateway.com/systems/product/529668380.php#prodBar
Yes. The max power consumption of your system is well below 150W even with two tuners.

Thank you for the quick response:)

A workaround is this: Attach the cooler turn around 180 degree and attach the fan so that it sucks air from the cooler. This is not the way the manufacturer intends, but there should be little difference in cooling efficiency. Or use Geminii S.



OK, I'll try that. But I'll need 2 90 degree connectors to the BD-ROM drive. I will need a 90 degree sata adaptor for power. Are these easily available at my local fry's?

Thanks

OK, I'll try that. But I'll need 2 90 degree connectors to the BD-ROM drive. I will need a 90 degree sata adaptor for power. Are these easily available at my local fry's?

Thanks
Angled SATA/SATA power cables are available here (http://www.google.com/products?q=angled+sata+cable+power). I am not sure about fry's.

I am looking at the Mid-Range System Intel - Intel and appear to be able to find all the parts in the UK apart from the CPU Cooler. Are there any other reccomendations for the i3 530 and Antec Fusion Remote Case?

I also plan on putting a 1.5TB HDD instead and maybe an SSD for the OS and applications.

Great guide for people like me and getting a good set of components for a build!

Basically any system in my list should be good. I haven't seen an issue in recording multiple programs in a single HDD simultaneously.

We have 4 ATSC tuners in our living room rig. It does just fine. The only hiccups come from bad reception, not HD speed.

What's the recommended way to control & monitor the case fans that are powered by a 4 pin molex?
My Norco 4020 has one molex connector for the 2 back fans and another one for the board that the front 5 are powered by.

My LUXA2 has one back fan powered by a 4 pin molex as well.

How & what connector do I need to plug into the motherboard? Do I need an external controller for the Norco?

My Norco has a GIGABYTE GA-MA785GT-UD3H.
My LUXA has a GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4.

I would prefer to keep the controller (if needed) inside the case.

Is it as simple as using a splitter of an adapter? If so, which one?

Thanks

I am looking at the Mid-Range System Intel - Intel and appear to be able to find all the parts in the UK apart from the CPU Cooler. Are there any other reccomendations for the i3 530 and Antec Fusion Remote Case?

I also plan on putting a 1.5TB HDD instead and maybe an SSD for the OS and applications.

Great guide for people like me and getting a good set of components for a build!
The stock cooler is fine. Other good coolers are here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=17806172#post17806172) (except Nexus LOW-7000, that does not support LGA1156).

What's the recommended way to control & monitor the case fans that are powered by a 4 pin molex?
My Norco 4020 has one molex connector for the 2 back fans and another one for the board that the front 5 are powered by.

My LUXA2 has one back fan powered by a 4 pin molex as well.

How & what connector do I need to plug into the motherboard? Do I need an external controller for the Norco?

My Norco has a GIGABYTE GA-MA785GT-UD3H.
My LUXA has a GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4.

I would prefer to keep the controller (if needed) inside the case.

Is it as simple as using a splitter of an adapter? If so, which one?
- RPC-4020: No way to monitor fan speeds (no rpm sensor). If the fan noise bothers you, the quickest way is replace the stock fans with quieter fans (e.g. Scythe S-FLEX/KAMA-FLEX 1500rpm).

- LUXA2: The same as RPC-4020. Replace it with, for example, Scythe S-FLEX 800rpm and forget it forever. Or you can connect S-FLEX 1200rpm to the mb (SYS_FAN2) and control it with the mb's utility or SpeedFan. I recommend the former.

- RPC-4020: No way to monitor fan speeds (no rpm sensor). If the fan noise bothers you, the quickest way is replace the stock fans with quieter fans (e.g. Scythe S-FLEX/KAMA-FLEX 1500rpm).

- LUXA2: The same as RPC-4020. Replace it with, for example, Scythe S-FLEX 800rpm and forget it forever. Or you can connect S-FLEX 1200rpm to the mb (SYS_FAN2) and control it with the mb's utility or SpeedFan. I recommend the former.

OK, that confirms it then.

Thanks for the fan suggestions.

The DVI port of H55ITX-A-E is DVI-I so it supports VGA too. But perhaps Apple DVI to Video Adapter for Video won't work; it is designed for specific ATI graphics cards (which perhaps has an VGA to SDTV encoder).

You'd better add a discrete graphic card that has a 7-pin mini-DIN connector (e.g Radeon HD 4xxx) and use a S-video cable.

Eh, that's kind of what I was thinking, that it had some sort of special feature on the ATI cards Apple used.
I was looking at the cards, I know I need a Low-Profile card so it can fit in the small case. I was looking at a ATI Radeon HD 4350 on Newegg.
However, with a card I will need a larger power supply too! Unless you think the 250W that comes with the case would be enough (Card recommends 300W).

I guess I am looking for any other options and more specific components you would suggest.

Thanks again!

Does anybody know if the Sony Vaio CW from BestBuy (nVidia 330m, core i5 and blu ray) is able to bitstream full HD audio over HDMI to a receiver, either from Blu-ray discs or from .mkv files?

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Sony+-+VAIO+Laptop+with+Intel%26%23174%3B+Core%26%23153%3B+i5+Proc essor+-+Jet+Black/9723951.p?id=1218159867078&skuId=9723951

thanks.

I was looking at the cards, I know I need a Low-Profile card so it can fit in the small case. I was looking at a ATI Radeon HD 4350 on Newegg.
However, with a card I will need a larger power supply too! Unless you think the 250W that comes with the case would be enough (Card recommends 300W).
AMD's 300W recommendation is extremely misleading. Here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18150758#post18150758) is a real measurement of the system power consumption. If you use a discrete card, just add 20W (HD 4350/4550) or 50W-60W (HD 4650/4670).

Does anybody know if the Sony Vaio CW from BestBuy (nVidia 330m, core i5 and blu ray) is able to bitstream full HD audio over HDMI to a receiver, either from Blu-ray discs or from .mkv files?

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Sony+-+VAIO+Laptop+with+Intel%26%23174%3B+Core%26%23153%3B+i5+Proc essor+-+Jet+Black/9723951.p?id=1218159867078&skuId=9723951

thanks.

The audio would need to be coming from the core i5 and not the nVidia 330m. Assuming that the Laptop is using the nVidia for HMDI output I would say no (but I could be wrong)

Does anybody know if the Sony Vaio CW from BestBuy (nVidia 330m, core i5 and blu ray) is able to bitstream full HD audio over HDMI to a receiver, either from Blu-ray discs or from .mkv files?

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Sony+-+VAIO+Laptop+with+Intel%26%23174%3B+Core%26%23153%3B+i5+Proc essor+-+Jet+Black/9723951.p?id=1218159867078&skuId=9723951

thanks.
That's a good question, but one i'm sure no one has answer to unless they have the actual set up. You can always take advantage of Best Buy's return policy.

The audio would need to be coming from the core i5 and not the nVidia 330m. Assuming that the Laptop is using the nVidia for HMDI output I would say no (but I could be wrong)

But a laptop with a bluray drive and a Radeon Mobility 5000 series should be able to send out full HD DTS/Dolby over HDMI correct?

But a laptop with a bluray drive and a Radeon Mobility 5000 series should be able to send out full HD DTS/Dolby over HDMI correct?

Yes, the Radeon 5xxx bitstreams, any Nvidia card does not

Yes, the Radeon 5xxx bitstreams, any Nvidia card does not

Any recommendation for a decent laptop with bluray and Radeon mobility 5xxx series?

Any recommendation for a decent laptop with bluray and Radeon mobility 5xxx series?
Here (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/search.asp?keywords=ASUS+core+i5+radeon&searchbtn.x=0&searchbtn.y=0). But Core i5 can bitstream HD audio too.

renethx Do you think is worth it to pay an extra 175 for this laptop?

http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-Pavillion-DV8T-High-End-Notebook-Laptop-i7-BluRay_W0QQitemZ200445172913QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05 ?hash=item2eab769cb1

Or should I stick to the earlier one and maybe change the hard drive?

The stock cooler is fine. Other good coolers are here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=17806172#post17806172) (except Nexus LOW-7000, that does not support LGA1156).

The nexus low 7000 does support LGA1156. I just put one on my Core i3 530 because the stock cooler wasn't cutting it in my case. It was a royal pain to get on the board because of its design, but my temps were cut in half almost.

renethx Do you think is worth it to pay an extra 175 for this laptop?

http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-Pavillion-DV8T-High-End-Notebook-Laptop-i7-BluRay_W0QQitemZ200445172913QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05 ?hash=item2eab769cb1

Or should I stick to the earlier one and maybe change the hard drive?

If you are interested in bitstreaming HD Audio that laptop will not do

Thanks for the reply dbone1026,

I guess that make the other one the winner then. I will buy the one with the i5 and change the hard drive for a 7200rpm one.

The audio would need to be coming from the core i5 and not the nVidia 330m. Assuming that the Laptop is using the nVidia for HMDI output I would say no (but I could be wrong)

dbone1026, is there a way for me to know if this laptop is using the i5 for HDMI output or not?

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

thanks

dbone1026, is there a way for me to know if this laptop is using the i5 for HDMI output or not?

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

thanks

My guess that laptop is using the 5450 for HDMI output. Either way you will get bitstreaming as the 5xxx GPU supports. It is the NVidia GPU that does not support bitstreaming

Hello

I originally purchased a Asus GT 220. Gave me nothing but headaches, and I RMAed today. I know that the Asus GT 220 is a low profile card. But I am now using a full size case so its no longer an issue. I am in need of a ATI 5XXX card. I know this question is like a loaded gun but here it goes any way. Who is the best ATI card maker and which is the best 5770?

TIA,

My guess that laptop is using the 5450 for HDMI output. Either way you will get bitstreaming as the 5xxx GPU supports. It is the NVidia GPU that does not support bitstreaming

Thanks again for the reply dbone1026, so I guess to double check, this laptop has the compatible card for bitstreaming, so even if the HDMI is it not via the cpu I will get bitstreaming either way?

Thanks again for the reply dbone1026, so I guess to double check, this laptop has the compatible card for bitstreaming, so even if it not via the cpu I will get bitstreaming either way?

Yes sir, you are good either way

Renethx and others having PDVD H264 playback issues:

Install the latest Intel Management Engine Driver from Intel downloads. That solved it! Now H.264 plays back with HWA.

Guys sorry for the doumb question. I have been trying to finalize my decision for three weeks. Looking to to the core i3-540 recomended build for a HTPC. I also need to buy a 7.1 surrond sound receiver for the HTPC. Can anyone recomend what receiver to purchase. I dont need any special features I just want to bit stream and have it amplify the sound. I have mirage sats. Also will the AsRock mobo bitstream?

renethx -
x86 vs. x64: Currently the main advantage of Windows x64 is the support for more than 4GB memory. However Windows Media Center x64 is a 64-bit application and a couple of useful DirectShow filters are not available in x64 (e.g. madFlac Decoder, ReClock [a must tool for bit-perfect LPCM HD audio]). Unless you are sure you will take advantage of more than 4GB memory, you may want to stay with x86.

I plan on buying 4GB of memory to support the upcoming Ceton Digital Cable Quad-Tuner (http://www.cetoncorp.com/support_faq.php#faq_135). Fittingly I was going to purchase Windows 7 64 bit to accommodate all 4GB of RAM.

How detrimental would the loss of certain 32 bit codecs and filters be to audio/video HDMI playback strictly over HDMI?

Any insight would be appreciated.

Renethx and others having PDVD H264 playback issues:

Install the latest Intel Management Engine Driver from Intel downloads. That solved it! Now H.264 plays back with HWA.
I think you are using a laptop, so all the drivers are already installed by the manufacturer (i.e. no yellow exclamation mark in Device Manager, such as "PCI Simple Communications Controller"). How did you notice that? (Just from curiosity.)

Yup, I switched the mb from ASRock to ASUS and I did find Intel Management Engine Driver is necessary for ASUS.

Guys sorry for the doumb question. I have been trying to finalize my decision for three weeks. Looking to to the core i3-540 recomended build for a HTPC. I also need to buy a 7.1 surrond sound receiver for the HTPC. Can anyone recomend what receiver to purchase. I dont need any special features I just want to bit stream and have it amplify the sound. I have mirage sats. Also will the AsRock mobo bitstream?
ASRock H55M Pro with WinDVD/ffdshow supports HD audio bitstreaming, but with TMT/PDVD, no, at least in my environment.

Right now I recommend ASUS P7H55-M PRO or P7H55D-M EVO if you need USB 3.0; HD audio bitstreaming works with all three commercial players as well as ffdshow (I will soon post the March edition reflecting this change).

The major difference between the players is:

- WinDVD: Uses Media Foundation for BD playback, providing robust PAP.
- TMT/PDVD: Uses the older DirectShow pipleline for BD playback (Microsoft does not recommend it).
- ffdshow: DirectShow; does not need PAP.

That could be the clue.

I am not planning on replacing the mobo. It's a new pc I just wanted to make sure it's good enough to backup my collection of blu rays.

Maybe in the future I will replace it so I can overclock the i3 530. ;)

You could just get a video card that supports bitstreaming. It would be easier than replacing your mobo. I might do this when I get an internal blu ray player because I have the ASRock H55M Pro and still cannot get bitstreaming to work.

Well I continued to follow up with PowerDVD forum support:

http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/15/10082.page

I did a clean install of Win7 and that was one of the exclamation marks in Device mgr. BUT, I used the Intel Active Matrix Tech driver which removed the exclamation from Intel Management Engine. That didn't solve the powerdvd issue, so i follow the tech support's advise and installed the Managment Engine driver from Intel and that did the trick. Apparently Management Engine is required for PAVP playback so that could have been the reason things got screwed up.

So did that solve the PDVD issue for you?

Well I continued to follow up with PowerDVD forum support:

http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/15/10082.page

I did a clean install of Win7 and that was one of the exclamation marks in Device mgr. BUT, I used the Intel Active Matrix Tech driver which removed the exclamation from Intel Management Engine. That didn't solve the powerdvd issue, so i follow the tech support's advise and installed the Managment Engine driver from Intel and that did the trick. Apparently Management Engine is required for PAVP playback so that could have been the reason things got screwed up.

So did that solve the PDVD issue for you?
Strangely ASRock mb do not require Intel Management Engine Interface Driver. When I switched the mb to ASUS, I noticed the yellow exclamation mark next to "PCI Simple Communications Controller". So I installed "Intel Management Engine Interface Driver" and the yellow mark went away. PowerDVD H.264 as well as HD audio bitstreaming work fine with the ASUS mb. Then I switched back to ASRock. Now PowerDVD H.264 works, but no bitstreaming yet.

So I suspect that

- Intel Management Engine Interface Driver
- Proper support for PAVP in DirectShow playback pipeline
- HD audio bitstreaming by PowerDVD/TMT

are closely related with each other.

The ME driver is required for proper PAVP support.

So maybe the AsRock doesn't have proper Mgmt Eng implementation.

What about your Gigabyte board?

Hi folks,

I've got gigabit network connecting my HTPC and another PC I use in part as a server to hold some content. If I copy files back and forth in Windows 7 it seems a bit slow... I get practical throughputs in the 55 MByte/sec range according to the Copy dialogs.

The drives involved are Caviar Greens (mix of 1 TB and 1.5 TB) and there shouldn't be any other activity on the network that would impact throughput significantly.

The HTPC is relatively far away from the rest of the network; I've got it hooked up to a gigabit switch, which in turn gets hooked to a gigabit router (Belkin N+ series). Both MoBos have gigabit ethernet.

Are the speeds I'm seeing typical given the network architechture and hard drives I'm using, or is there the opportunity for worthwhile gains here?

Marc

Gigabit should allow you to get closer to 125 MBps but not many drives can read/write at that speed. You might be getting bottlenecked by one of your drives. If not make sure both computers have a gigabit NIC that is operating at 1000 full duplex.

A couple days ago I copied a 20GB file from a raid array (pretty fast) to a new 500GB single platter seagate drive and got 105MBps. A couple days later I copied from the seagate drive to the raid array and only got like 67/68 if that gives you any insight. I would have though that it would have been faster in the reverse but it wasn't.

Try out HDTach or HDTune and see what your drives are capable of.

Yah I'd say you are being limited by the drive. I dont get a whole lot more then that transferring between sata drives in my system.

Does Win7/WMC natively support legacy DVR-MS files or can it with the addition of some codecs?

I have about 300 DVR-MS recordings from my XP and Vista systems that I can't get to play on Win 7 in Media Center. I get an error "Trial Expiration" when I click play for these files. Win 7 is a clean install and fully activated with no problems on a new renethx/January update mid range ATX AMD/AMD build with Win7 Home Premium.

Sorry if this is the wrong place but I've searched far and wide, worked with MS support (they suggested MPC or VLC as solution!) and I know there is a ton of knowledgeable folks here. Appreciate being pointed to the right forum or any suggestions? Thanks!

Strangely ASRock mb do not require Intel Management Engine Interface Driver. When I switched the mb to ASUS, I noticed the yellow exclamation mark next to "PCI Simple Communications Controller". So I installed "Intel Management Engine Interface Driver" and the yellow mark went away. PowerDVD H.264 as well as HD audio bitstreaming work fine with the ASUS mb. Then I switched back to ASRock. Now PowerDVD H.264 works, but no bitstreaming yet.

So I suspect that

- Intel Management Engine Interface Driver
- Proper support for PAVP in DirectShow playback pipeline
- HD audio bitstreaming by PowerDVD/TMT

are closely related with each other.

Well hopefully this is fixed soon becuase if it is not I am going to buy an Asus H55 board.

Thanks! Just a quick question, what is the difference between these two mobo's? Do you have any other changes to your recomended build? I am trying to stay around $1000 for the build. Wondering what you recomend for a 7.1 receiver and a remote for the system as well.

Thanks for the input!

I don't know what the problem is but I am having inconsistent audio levels when watching mp4 video files. Is there a fix for this?

I built renethx's J&W MINIX 780G-SP128MB $361 build. I got it altogether. On start up it beeps once ,no post, just goes to flashing curser. I reset the the bios with the jumper, beep twice i think, it then started up into bios. So i thought battery, battery checks OK at 3 v. any help. I just got it from Amazon should i RMA it? This is my 4th PC build so i am not a complete noob, but close. Also thank you renethx !

Does Win7/WMC natively support legacy DVR-MS files or can it with the addition of some codecs?


Yes, native support. Does the error msg tell you what expired?

Yes, native support. Does the error msg tell you what expired?

No it doesn't say what expired - full msg "This trial version has expired and can no longer be used". Haven't installed any trials, PDVD 8 was full version upgraded to 9 ultra

Win Media Player gives error "Windows Media Player cannot play the file. The Player might not support the file type or a required codec might not be installed on your computer."

PDVD9 Ultra gives "cannot play this file because RealPlayer is not installed"

VLC plays it fine.

Very little s/w installed at time of problem- HD Homerun, Hauppage TV, PDVD9 Ultra, have since installed k-lite pack/vlc and mpc to try to solve.

How can I check what codecs are needed for DVR-MS vs codecs installed?

If any one has a drive cage out of a CM590 that there not using and would like to sell . Please pm me . Cooler Master does not seem to have any in stock right now.Thanks
SteveD1961

Hmmm...I chose that bc it seemed to have the least amount of negative reviews on the various forums. Considered the Haupauge 2250, but from reviews it seems even buggier, especially win7. I reviewed the homerun; it seems to be pretty well liked all around. I had initially ruled it out not wanting to have yet another box in my av rack, but I may have to reconsider it. Anyone else out there have any feedback?

I bought the A188 based off this guide as well. It's been a real problem. First WMC would not detect it even though it showed as working in the device manager. Don't know the cause but the fix was to re-install Win7 with the card already installed.

I have an i3 530 H55 based HTPC.

Anyway, now that WMC sees it, it is able to scan for 33 digital channels. I can watch them, and hear them, but the video playback is very slow, choppy, and pixelated. It reminds me of watching videos streamed from a file share when there is some but not enough bandwidth. It doesn't fail, but continues to play with horrible quality. It pauses from time to time and then catches up. It doesn't matter if the channel is HD or SD. All channels have the same problem. I know there is good signal because I ran the coax into the back of the TV for several months and it worked well. The problem is with how the HTPC is displaying the video.

The CPU is only 10% or less while an HD channel is playing so I know that CPU is not the problem (and it's also a good indicator that hardware acceleration is working). I've also heard others report that their i3 systems can record two HDTV channels at a time with hdhomerun so I know this system is capable of the same provided the tuner can send the streams fast enough (no reason it shouldn't).

I can watch other HD video sources such as H.264 or VC1 streams from HD-DVD or Blu Ray remux's (ts files) and they play very well. It is only the HDTV streams from the tuner that have the problem. I'm using the Microsoft decoder for this. I did try using ffdshow but it wouldn't decode the video at al that way so I set it back to the DTV-DVD decoder.

I'm not saying the tuner is at fault, but after the previous problem I had with it I would have a hard time recommending it.

Now I will admin that I have installed some things that might (albeit unlkely) be interfering (such as MPC-HC and ffsshow), but can also say that this problem was evident with minimal changes frm default install to include only the Intel VGA driver.

I tried running an older version of the Intel driver but the problem was stlll there so I'm back to 2086.

Any suggestions for fixing this?

Thanks,

M

I bought the A188 based off this guide as well. It's been a real problem. First WMC would not detect it even though it showed as working in the device manager. Don't know the cause but the fix was to re-install Win7 with the card already installed.

I have an i3 530 H55 based HTPC.

Anyway, now that WMC sees it, it is able to scan for 33 digital channels. I can watch them, and hear them, but the video playback is very slow, choppy, and pixelated. It reminds me of watching videos streamed from a file share when there is some but not enough bandwidth. It doesn't fail, but continues to play with horrible quality. It pauses from time to time and then catches up. It doesn't matter if the channel is HD or SD. All channels have the same problem. I know there is good signal because I ran the coax into the back of the TV for several months and it worked well. The problem is with how the HTPC is displaying the video.

The CPU is only 10% or less while an HD channel is playing so I know that CPU is not the problem (and it's also a good indicator that hardware acceleration is working). I've also heard others report that their i3 systems can record two HDTV channels at a time with hdhomerun so I know this system is capable of the same provided the tuner can send the streams fast enough (no reason it shouldn't).

I can watch other HD video sources such as H.264 or VC1 streams from HD-DVD or Blu Ray remux's (ts files) and they play very well. It is only the HDTV streams from the tuner that have the problem. I'm using the Microsoft decoder for this. I did try using ffdshow but it wouldn't decode the video at al that way so I set it back to the DTV-DVD decoder.

I'm not saying the tuner is at fault, but after the previous problem I had with it I would have a hard time recommending it.

Now I will admin that I have installed some things that might (albeit unlkely) be interfering (such as MPC-HC and ffsshow), but can also say that this problem was evident with minimal changes frm default install to include only the Intel VGA driver.

I tried running an older version of the Intel driver but the problem was stlll there so I'm back to 2086.

Any suggestions for fixing this?

Thanks,

M

This is a well known problem and I posted my same problem a few pages ago. It has nothing to do with the tuner because I am using a HDHomeRun. There is some problem with live playback of channels because my recorded tv shows are fine. Here is a link below from the green button with a few solutions that have been shown to work but non of them worked for me. They are on the top of page 20 of the post.

http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/t/79957.aspx?PageIndex=20

Interesting. I think my problem is a bit different because I tried recording and playing back and the problem happens with both. The other poster said live playback is good by playing back recorded episodes is not. But I'll look into the suggestions and try them out.

Now when I was recording I was also watching what it recorded. I'm assuming that if you record a show while not watching it that maybe it just records the mpeg2 (or whatever it is) stream without decoding it. If this is true/possible, how can I record without decoding? Might help me rule out the decoder.\

Edit: disabled aero (set to 'adjust for best performance') but still playnig very slow.
Edit: tried enabling AHCI but that resulted in blue screen so I switched back to IDE. Is this really necessary for WMC? I used resource manager and saw maybe 1.7MB per second of writes. Unless it is random writes or lots of seek times IO shouldn't be a problem. I think I'd have to reinstall windows to get AHCI working.

Interesting. I think my problem is a bit different because I tried recording and playing back and the problem happens with both. The other poster said live playback is good by playing back recorded episodes is not. But I'll look into the suggestions and try them out.

Now when I was recording I was also watching what it recorded. I'm assuming that if you record a show while not watching it that maybe it just records the mpeg2 (or whatever it is) stream without decoding it. If this is true/possible, how can I record without decoding? Might help me rule out the decoder.\

Edit: disabled aero (set to 'adjust for best performance') but still playnig very slow.
Edit: tried enabling AHCI but that resulted in blue screen so I switched back to IDE. Is this really necessary for WMC? I used resource manager and saw maybe 1.7MB per second of writes. Unless it is random writes or lots of seek times IO shouldn't be a problem. I think I'd have to reinstall windows to get AHCI working.
set a future recording and close wmc

Interesting. I think my problem is a bit different because I tried recording and playing back and the problem happens with both. The other poster said live playback is good by playing back recorded episodes is not. But I'll look into the suggestions and try them out.

Now when I was recording I was also watching what it recorded. I'm assuming that if you record a show while not watching it that maybe it just records the mpeg2 (or whatever it is) stream without decoding it. If this is true/possible, how can I record without decoding? Might help me rule out the decoder.\

Edit: disabled aero (set to 'adjust for best performance') but still playnig very slow.
Edit: tried enabling AHCI but that resulted in blue screen so I switched back to IDE. Is this really necessary for WMC? I used resource manager and saw maybe 1.7MB per second of writes. Unless it is random writes or lots of seek times IO shouldn't be a problem. I think I'd have to reinstall windows to get AHCI working.

If you read other posts in that thread some people have problems with live tv and some have problems with recorded or both. If you want to enable AHCI you need to make some changes in your registry first then change the BIOS after that. Here is a link on how to do that. I did it this way without reinstalling windows. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922976

So I scheduled a recording of CSI:NY then closed WMC and when it was done recording I played it back in WMC and it had the exact problems as when viewing live. Then I played it in WMP and it seemed to be correcting for the horrible quality seen in WMC but it was still pretty bad. Just instead of pausing/skipping it had serious ghosting and still some skipping. I tried playing in MPC-HC but it could not play the WTV file.

I'll check out enabling AHCI, thanks for the link.

Edit: the link worked to enabling AHCI but the live TV is still horrible. Will continue down the list of suggestions.
Edit: Write caching is already enabled on the hard drive

I've spent the last couple of weeks readings most of the threads on this forum, and I've got a severe case of information overload.

Basically, I'm trying to see if I can assemble a straightforward HTPC, which will be used to play Blu-Ray and DVD discs, as well as stream music and ripped DVDs stored on my WHS. The HTPC will be connected to my Denon 3808, which in turn is connected to my Panasonic HDTV, all via HDMI.

Since the Denon can handle True-HD and DTS-HD, I want to bitstream these formats from the HTPC when present. I want to have the minimum of software installed; just Win 7 + WMC + TMT (for Blu-Ray playback).

I've looked at renethx's excellent guides, and want to go for a mid-range system. I had thought that the Intel+Intel IGP might be the route (H55 mobo with i3 530), but now I see that renethx is saying that he only gets bitstreaming when using ffdshow - and this breaks my requirement of keeping things as simple as possible.

So, do I wait a while for the various manufacturers to get their software sorted, or could I switch to an AMD+5450 build and get proper bitstreaming from the minimum of software today?

Thanks.

I've spent the last couple of weeks readings most of the threads on this forum, and I've got a severe case of information overload.

Basically, I'm trying to see if I can assemble a straightforward HTPC, which will be used to play Blu-Ray and DVD discs, as well as stream music and ripped DVDs stored on my WHS. The HTPC will be connected to my Denon 3808, which in turn is connected to my Panasonic HDTV, all via HDMI.

Since the Denon can handle True-HD and DTS-HD, I want to bitstream these formats from the HTPC when present. I want to have the minimum of software installed; just Win 7 + WMC + TMT (for Blu-Ray playback).

I've looked at renethx's excellent guides, and want to go for a mid-range system. I had thought that the Intel+Intel IGP might be the route (H55 mobo with i3 530), but now I see that renethx is saying that he only gets bitstreaming when using ffdshow - and this breaks my requirement of keeping things as simple as possible.

So, do I wait a while for the various manufacturers to get their software sorted, or could I switch to an AMD+5450 build and get proper bitstreaming from the minimum of software today?

Thanks.
I will post the March edition soon. Use ASUS P7H55-M PRO/P7H55D-M EVO and you will be fine in HD audio bitstreaming with PowerDVD/TMT. Non-support for 23.976Hz playback still remains, though.

For proper 23.976Hz playback, I recommend adding a Radeon HD 5xxx card. Then the processor does not need to be Core i3, but if you can afford, I recommend it. Core i3-530 + ASRock H55M Pro + Radeon HD 5670 is one of the best combinations. If you want a cheaper system, look at the low-end Intel-Intel system (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972&page=401#MicroATX%20System:%20Low-End%20System:%20Intel-Intel).

Does Win7/WMC natively support legacy DVR-MS files or can it with the addition of some codecs?

I have about 300 DVR-MS recordings from my XP and Vista systems that I can't get to play on Win 7 in Media Center. I get an error "Trial Expiration" when I click play for these files. Win 7 is a clean install and fully activated with no problems on a new renethx/January update mid range ATX AMD/AMD build with Win7 Home Premium.

Sorry if this is the wrong place but I've searched far and wide, worked with MS support (they suggested MPC or VLC as solution!) and I know there is a ton of knowledgeable folks here. Appreciate being pointed to the right forum or any suggestions? Thanks!

I upgraded my Vista (x64) system to Win7 (x64), and don't have a problem playing the DVR-MS files recorded in Vista. Do you know if the files you have a problem with were from XP or Vista?

So I scheduled a recording of CSI:NY then closed WMC and when it was done recording I played it back in WMC and it had the exact problems as when viewing live. Then I played it in WMP and it seemed to be correcting for the horrible quality seen in WMC but it was still pretty bad. Just instead of pausing/skipping it had serious ghosting and still some skipping. I tried playing in MPC-HC but it could not play the WTV file.

I'll check out enabling AHCI, thanks for the link.

Edit: the link worked to enabling AHCI but the live TV is still horrible. Will continue down the list of suggestions.
Edit: Write caching is already enabled on the hard drive
I think it's a tuner problem, not computer. Is it a USB tuner? Those tend to be problematic. I have a Hauppauge 950Q and i always get random error messages in WMC. I've since switched to a HDHR and it works flawlessly.

I have set out to build this system based on Norco case, Gigabyte motherboard and Supermicro SATA controllers. Runs like a dream as base system (i.e. just the system drive connected to motherboard SATA).

When I install the Supermicro MV8 card and load the driver, I can boot fine as long as no disk drives are attached to the MV8. As soon as I attach one or more drives to the MV8, the operating system boot sequence fails at the point of loading the opsys (i.e. after disks show up in BIOS load) with a message that says "Warning have opt ROM can not be invoke" and a vendor ID and device field - the screen clears too rapidly to see the entries in these items. I am then asked to insert a system disk and reboot.

I have tried setting the disk boot priority in the motherboard BIOS. This is fine as long as no disks attached to the MV8. When disks are attached, the MB appears to lose sight of its onboard SATA controller.

I am reluctant to lose the Supermicro controllers, as nothing else is available for the price. But the server is useless if I can't attach any disks.

Has anyone else experienced this - and what did you do to make it work?

All help appreciated

Jonathan, depressed, on a freezing night in England :)

To clarify, which MV8 are you using, AOC-SAT2-MV8 or AOC-SASLP-MV8? What OS are you using?

I rma'd the tuner with newegg. Will try a different make/model. Hopefully an hdhomerun but need to verify I've got the coax to support it.

I upgraded my Vista (x64) system to Win7 (x64), and don't have a problem playing the DVR-MS files recorded in Vista. Do you know if the files you have a problem with were from XP or Vista?

DVR-MS files from both xp and vista 32 bit will not play in 7MC. I may have to live with playing them in VLC but it will not make the family happy for the inconvenience when they want to watch something (low WAF):mad:

DVR-MS files from both xp and vista 32 bit will not play in 7MC. I may have to live with playing them in VLC but it will not make the family happy for the inconvenience when they want to watch something (low WAF):mad:

I have not tested but didnt think there would be compatability issues (I assume the DVR-MS files are not cable card recordings?). You can use a program like DVRMSToolbox to convert DVR-MS to MPEG for playback. Assuming the recordings were not cable card, has anyone else confirmed that DVS-MS does not play in W7?

What are the differences between these two ASUS boards the PRo and EVO?

Rene,

Thanks for your awesome guide! I'll be sending you a donation as soon as I sell my extra copy of Windows 7!

Just placed my order for the following:

Cooler Master RC-310-BWN1-GP Elite 310 Mid-Tower Case - ATX, mATX 1 $ 44.99
Corsair CX400W Power Supply - 400-Watt, 120mm Fan, SATA-Ready, 80Plus, ATX 1 $ 54.99 - $15 MIR = $39.99
OCZ PC3-10666 Platinum RAM - 4GB, 2x2GB, 1333MHz, DDR3, Low Voltage, Dual Channel 1 $ 99.99 - $20MIR = $79.99
ASUS P7H55-M Pro Motherboard - Intel H55, LGA 1156, Micro ATX, DDR3, HDMI, USB 2.0, SATA II, Gigabit Ethernet Port 1 $ 99.99
Intel Core i3 530 Processor BX80616I3530 - 2.93GHz, LGA 1156, 4MB L3 Cache, Dual-Core, Retail Processor w/ Fan 1 $ 99.97
Subtotal: $ 399.93
Shipping Free
Tax $33.01
Total $432.94
Bing $33.19

Total came to $364.75 after Bing cashback and MIR!!! :D

I already have a BD drive and the hard drive! Can't wait for it to get here so I can finally play BDs that I have already ripped! :D

What are the differences between these two ASUS boards the PRo and EVO?

evo has USB 3.0

What are the differences between these two ASUS boards the PRo and EVO?

Evo has 2 USB 3.0 ports, one eSATA port, one 1394 port and takes one of the two PCI slots and turns it into one PCI-e x1.

Thanks for this guide, found it helpful in getting started.

I have a few questions...

What do I need to record stuff on my HTPC, from my DCT (HD & SD)? Would something like this (http://detonator.dynamitedata.com/cgi-bin/redirect.pl?user=u00000687&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.newegg.ca%2FProduct%2FProduct.aspx%3FIt em%3DN82E16815100049) work? Then I could connect my HD set top box to the card, and the card to the AVR? Right now, my set top box (which is a PVR) goes straight to my AVR, and works fine. I would prefer to buy a smaller non-PVR box, that can do HD, and have my HTPC record stuff.

What is the minimum speed/performance I need from my cpu (and ram) to achieve stutter-less blu ray playback, streaming, and so on? How much of a difference can video cards make here? Would I be fine getting a cpu+mobo that can do bitstreaming and have HDMI out, or is a discrete video card preferred? I have no intention of using this system for anything other than watching/recording/listening various media.

Is there a compelling reason, other than price, to go for Linux over Windows 7? I haven't used *nix since university, but I am willing to try any OS. My only concern is HDCP compliance, and I don't know if I can get that on Linux.

TIA!

I will post the March edition soon. Use ASUS P7H55-M PRO/P7H55D-M EVO and you will be fine in HD audio bitstreaming with PowerDVD/TMT. Non-support for 23.976Hz playback still remains, though.

For proper 23.976Hz playback, I recommend adding a Radeon HD 5xxx card. Then the processor does not need to be Core i3, but if you can afford, I recommend it. Core i3-530 + ASRock H55M Pro + Radeon HD 5670 is one of the best combinations. If you want a cheaper system, look at the low-end Intel-Intel system (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972&page=401#MicroATX%20System:%20Low-End%20System:%20Intel-Intel).

Are there any bitstreaming problems with the 5670? If not I am going to pick this up soon. Also are there any problems fitting it into nMeida 5000B? And I'm guessing the 512MB is good for video encoding, recording, etc and no gaming.

Rene,

Thanks for your awesome guide! I'll be sending you a donation as soon as I sell my extra copy of Windows 7!

Just placed my order for the following:

Cooler Master RC-310-BWN1-GP Elite 310 Mid-Tower Case - ATX, mATX 1 $ 44.99
Corsair CX400W Power Supply - 400-Watt, 120mm Fan, SATA-Ready, 80Plus, ATX 1 $ 54.99 - $15 MIR = $39.99
OCZ PC3-10666 Platinum RAM - 4GB, 2x2GB, 1333MHz, DDR3, Low Voltage, Dual Channel 1 $ 99.99 - $20MIR = $79.99
ASUS P7H55-M Pro Motherboard - Intel H55, LGA 1156, Micro ATX, DDR3, HDMI, USB 2.0, SATA II, Gigabit Ethernet Port 1 $ 99.99
Intel Core i3 530 Processor BX80616I3530 - 2.93GHz, LGA 1156, 4MB L3 Cache, Dual-Core, Retail Processor w/ Fan 1 $ 99.97
Subtotal: $ 399.93
Shipping Free
Tax $33.01
Total $432.94
Bing $33.19

Total came to $364.75 after Bing cashback and MIR!!! :D

I already have a BD drive and the hard drive! Can't wait for it to get here so I can finally play BDs that I have already ripped! :D
can you shoot me a email and let me know where you bought everything from?

Are there any bitstreaming problems with the 5670? If not I am going to pick this up soon. Also are there any problems fitting it into nMeida 5000B? And I'm guessing the 512MB is good for video encoding, recording, etc and no gaming.
HD audio bitstreaming works fine except that you may need EDID override (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1227161) depending on your AVR. It fits 5000B.

Thanks guys for all the previous help and specially renethx,

I just bought the one recommended here out of the choices I gave you.

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

I got my self a little dilemma to solve now, I know renethx said already that using a server via a gigabit speed should preform well to stream HD video, but what about when I have to tranfer HD movies to the server from the laptop after ripping them? Would that take a long time?

I could be wrong but a I think a friend told me that a 1080p movie could take up to 40 GB of HDD space?

A friend suggested trying to stick with e-sata connection for external hard drives when using HTPC, but I just couldn't find a laptop with everything I wanted plus an e-sata port.

So here is my dilema: Should I buy one of those usb to e-sata cables and connect the rest of the hdd that way in one of those multiples HDD enclosures?
http://techwiki.hardwarecanucks.com/productimages/390_Img10667.jpg

Wouldn't those USB to e-sata cables be limited by the USB connection and only work at the speed of the USB anyway?

Do you guys know of any other way to connect an e-sata port to a laptop?

I read some where that you can't get the speed that e-sata is capable of any way because hard drive speeds are not at to part

what is the difference of speed between e-sata, gigabit network and USB 2.0?

Thanks a lot and sorry for so many questions at once

Thanks guys for all the previous help and specially renethx,

I just bought the one recommended here out of the choices I gave you.

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5592724&CatId=4938

I got my self a little dilemma to solve now, I know renethx said already that using a server via a gigabit speed should preform well to stream HD video, but what about when I have to tranfer HD movies to the server from the laptop after ripping them? Would that take a long time?

I could be wrong but a I think a friend told me that a 1080p movie could take up to 40 GB of HDD space?

A friend suggested trying to stick with e-sata connection for external hard drives when using HTPC, but I just couldn't find a laptop with everything I wanted plus an e-sata port.

So here is my dilema: Should I buy one of those usb to e-sata cables and connect the rest of the hdd that way in one of those multiples HDD enclosures? Wouldn't those cables only work at the speed of USB anyway?

Do you guys know of any other way to connect an e-sata port to a laptop?

I read some where that you can't get the speed that e-sata is capable of any way because hard drive speeds are not at to part

what is the difference of speed between e-sata, gigabit network and USB 2.0?

Thanks a lot and sorry for so many questions at once

From what I am reading your movies will be saved on a server, correct? If so couldn't you just transfer your files over the network, it sounds like you are trying to connect your laptop directly to your server? It takes me about 15 minutes (average 20-45 MB/s) to transfer my Blu Ray rips from my desktop PC to my WHS over my gigabit network.

A Typical Blu Ray is about 40GB for the entire disc. Many people only grab the main movie/hd audio track which can cut the size down nearly in half depending on the disc.

Thanks for the reply Damian,

If it only takes 15 minutes to transfer a 40GB file over a gigabit network, I can live with that and I don't have to worry about e-sata alternative :)

Thanks for the reply Damian,

If it only takes 15 minutes to transfer a 40GB file over a gigabit network, I can live with that and I don't have to worry about e-sata alternative :)

Why don't you just set the destination of your rip as a folder on the server and let it transfer the file WHILE ripping?

thanks Mike, that is actually a great idea!!!, there is no need for ripping it on the laptop when it can just go straight into the server as you pointed out :)

thanks Mike, that is actually a great idea!!!, there is no need for ripping it on the laptop when it can just go straight into the server as you pointed out :)

Trying doing one rip each method and see which takes the longest. There are times where I would rip directly to my WHS and it would actually take longer then ripping to my HDD and then copying over.

I rip across the network.. takes about 1 hour at 100 speed :)

I rip across the network.. takes about 1 hour at 100 speed :)
+1 I just ripped Ponyo Blu-ray to my WHS it took 50 minutes.

Sorry for my ignorance but what does WHS stand for?

DVR-MS files from both xp and vista 32 bit will not play in 7MC. I may have to live with playing them in VLC but it will not make the family happy for the inconvenience when they want to watch something (low WAF):mad:

I have not tested but didnt think there would be compatability issues (I assume the DVR-MS files are not cable card recordings?). You can use a program like DVRMSToolbox to convert DVR-MS to MPEG for playback. Assuming the recordings were not cable card, has anyone else confirmed that DVS-MS does not play in W7?
DVR-MS recorded files playback fine on my W7x64 system (I have about 15 shows left over from when I converted from vista to W7). In fact I use a software application to automatically convert the new WTV formats to DVR-MS files that are then de-comercialized for my commercial free viewing in WMC.

Sorry for my ignorance but what does WHS stand for?

Windows Home Server. It is an operating system.

Sorry for my ignorance but what does WHS stand for?
Windows Home Server - I run a slightly modified renethx's Norco 20 bay server build with WHS software :D (currently have 19TB of HDD on the server almost all of which is full of BD & SD Movies and H264 Home Movies :eek:).

Thanks guys for the clarification,

Damn HTPCat, that is a lot of hard drives :)

I want to set up a server like yours :)

Can I use the Windows Home Server in an old Pentium 3 with 2GB of ram? I was going to set it up with XP but I guess this WHS is better for a server to stored HD movies, Music and Photos right?

I will be using media center in my HTPC runing in Windows 7 64 bits

I always find it hard to justify the time and power needed to remove commericals from WMC recordings. You need a powerful system to start and then add in almost a 1:1 amount of time to analyze each show.... I just use the handy 30sec FF button on the remote a few clicks.

I'm working to put my order list together for a medium level HTPC. I want to be able to play Blu-Ray and also write to the Blu-Ray drive. For the MB I'm looking at ASUS P7H55-M Pro and a Sapphire HD 5670 512GB GDDR5 graphics card. Will I see a difference in operation between using an Intel Core i3 530 2.93GHz LGA 1156 CPU or an Intel Core i5 Quad 750 2.66 GHz CPU for the needs of writing or playing Blu-Ray movies.

I always find it hard to justify the time and power needed to remove commericals from WMC recordings. You need a powerful system to start and then add in almost a 1:1 amount of time to analyze each show.... I just use the handy 30sec FF button on the remote a few clicks.
Yeah I use the 30 sec advance button for my Direct TV HD DVR recordings, but for my OTA recordings it is nice to not have to worry about hitting the advance button or going past and then having to go back :eek:. I use HD Homerun to record Local OTA to both of my HTPCs and WTV Watcher to convert to DVR-MS with Life Extender and Show Analyzer to remove commercials and relocate from HTPC's to WHS. This is completely automated once set up (I have it removing commercials and relocating while I am supposed to be sleeping or working ;)).

My HTPC's are not overly powerful but they do the job fine :cool: (main one is Gigabyte P35 mb with E8500 cpu and 6 GB of RAM W7x64. The other is an ASUS mb with nVidia 9300 onboard video with E7300 cpu and 4 GB of Corsair RAM W7x86).

I'm working to put my order list together for a medium level HTPC. I want to be able to play Blu-Ray and also write to the Blu-Ray drive. For the MB I'm looking at ASUS P7H55-M Pro and a Sapphire HD 5670 512GB GDDR5 graphics card. Will I see a difference in operation between using an Intel Core i3 530 2.93GHz LGA 1156 CPU or an Intel Core i5 Quad 750 2.66 GHz CPU for the needs of writing or playing Blu-Ray movies.

The i5 will not gain you anything over the i3 for ripping a BD or burning to a BD drive. It will help if you do any encoding or transcoding though.

Thanks guys for the clarification,

Damn HTPCat, that is a lot of hard drives :)

I want to set up a server like yours :)

Can I use the Windows Home Server in an old Pentium 3 with 2GB of ram? I was going to set it up with XP but I guess this WHS is better for a server to stored HD movies, Music and Photos right?

I will be using media center in my HTPC runing in Windows 7 64 bits
Man a P3 that is old :D. I use 2GB of RAM in my server so I think yours should be fine - I am not sure about P3 chips, but I know P4 chips work fine. WHS is nice because you can easily set it up to do folder duplication and automatic backups of all your computers which can be used to restore a complete system very easily. It is also nice to have the access to the server via remote desktop connection and/or the WHS control panel via WHS connector software that comes with WHS. I only use folder duplication for irreplacable stuff suck as my photos, Home Movies and Music that I have only digitally. All the other stuff I have hard copies of so if something fails I can replace (with some work :eek:).

Of course WHS is not free, I think I paid around $100 for a OEM version and XP will work fine so if money is a concern and XP is free go with it :)

Thanks a lot for that info HTPCat,

I may bother you again in the future if I finally go with WHS :)

HD audio bitstreaming works fine except that you may need EDID override (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1227161) depending on your AVR. It fits 5000B.

Do you know of any problems with the Gigabyte GA-H55M-S2H?

Thanks a lot for that info HTPCat,

I may bother you again in the future if I finally go with WHS :)
Your Welcome no bother at all - that's why we are here on these threads :D.

Tax return is back and I can finally pull the trigger on this build but would like to get one last look.

CPU: Intel Core i3-530 Clarkdale 2.93GHz LGA 1156 73W- $125
CPU Cooler: XIGMATEK nepartak - s983 92mm HYPRO Bearing CPU Cooler - $31
MB: ASRock P55 Extreme LGA 1156 Intel P55 ATX Intel Motherboard - $150
Memory: G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) - $105
Video: HIS H567Q512 Radeon HD 5670 (Redwood) IceQ 512M- $100
Power Supply: CORSAIR CMPSU-550VX 550W ATX12V V2.2 SLI - $105
Main drive: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD2500AAJS 250GB - $45
Storage Drives: 2 Western Digital Caviar Green WD15EARS 1.5TB - $110 ($220)
Keyboard/mouse: Logitech Black USB Wireless Desktop MK300 Keyboard and Mouse - $37
BD Drive: LG Black (CH08LS10) 8X BD-ROM 16X DVD-ROM 40X CD-ROM SATA - $130

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade - $115

I plan on using this setup with my Harmony 880.

The question I have is with the Case. Most cases recommended come with IR built in. However, a lot of people have posted their issues with IMON software.

So what Case would be recommended for this build? I plan on getting Miscrosoft MCE remote with IR - $35 if becessary

One other thing to add. In the future, about 3-4 months I plan on building a WHS around the NORCO RPC-4020 and add 2 more drives and take the 2 1.5 TB drives out of this rig and add to the WHS.

Thanks for all the work in this forum. Greatly appreciated.

Norton/Symantec heuristic analysis detected a signed MS system file as a virus (false positive).

Quite a few people were affected - it deleted encdec.dll. Per MS site encdec.dll is part of the original Win XP SP1 update that allows playing of DVR-MS files. Win 7 must use it for the same.

I restored the file from quarrantine and voila, can now play my files. Hope this helps someone else!

Thanks to those of you that responded and sure glad to find out I didn't screw up my first ever build, somebody else did!


I have not tested but didnt think there would be compatability issues (I assume the DVR-MS files are not cable card recordings?). You can use a program like DVRMSToolbox to convert DVR-MS to MPEG for playback. Assuming the recordings were not cable card, has anyone else confirmed that DVS-MS does not play in W7?

DVR-MS recorded files playback fine on my W7x64 system (I have about 15 shows left over from when I converted from vista to W7). In fact I use a software application to automatically convert the new WTV formats to DVR-MS files that are then de-comercialized for my commercial free viewing in WMC.

Tax return is back and I can finally pull the trigger on this build but would like to get one last look.

CPU: Intel Core i3-530 Clarkdale 2.93GHz LGA 1156 73W- $125
CPU Cooler: XIGMATEK nepartak - s983 92mm HYPRO Bearing CPU Cooler - $31
MB: ASRock P55 Extreme LGA 1156 Intel P55 ATX Intel Motherboard - $150
Memory: G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) - $105
Video: HIS H567Q512 Radeon HD 5670 (Redwood) IceQ 512M- $100
Power Supply: CORSAIR CMPSU-550VX 550W ATX12V V2.2 SLI - $105
Main drive: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD2500AAJS 250GB - $45
Storage Drives: 2 Western Digital Caviar Green WD15EARS 1.5TB - $110 ($220)
Keyboard/mouse: Logitech Black USB Wireless Desktop MK300 Keyboard and Mouse - $37
BD Drive: LG Black (CH08LS10) 8X BD-ROM 16X DVD-ROM 40X CD-ROM SATA - $130

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade - $115

I plan on using this setup with my Harmony 880.

The question I have is with the Case. Most cases recommended come with IR built in. However, a lot of people have posted their issues with IMON software.

So what Case would be recommended for this build? I plan on getting Miscrosoft MCE remote with IR - $35 if becessary

One other thing to add. In the future, about 3-4 months I plan on building a WHS around the NORCO RPC-4020 and add 2 more drives and take the 2 1.5 TB drives out of this rig and add to the WHS.

Thanks for all the work in this forum. Greatly appreciated.

I have built 2 recent HTPCs using the Antec Fusion Remote Cases, one with the mb that you are looking at and with the recent updated drivers for the IMON they now work fine. I love these cases, they go together easy, they look good and I can use the Timer funcition in IMON Manager to auto hibernate and wake at specific time.

When you say encoding or transcoding, does that mean video editing and rendering.
Thank you


The i5 will not gain you anything over the i3 for ripping a BD or burning to a BD drive. It will help if you do any encoding or transcoding though.

For Decommercializing W7 TV recordings I use 3 applications which totally automate the process for me.

First my TV recordings are going to the default TV Recordings folder on my HDD on my HTPC. They are of course in the new WTV file format which doesn't work with Life Extender (The commercial removing application I use) so I use WtvWatcher http://www.indesolutions.com/WtvWatcher/ freeware to automatically scan the TV Recordings folder and convert any WTV file to DVR-MS format.

Next, I use Life Extender http://www.lifextender.com/download.aspx freeware with ShowAnalyzer $30 http://www.dragonglobal.biz/download/ to capture and remove the commercials and then delete the old file and relocate the new smaller file to my WHS. You can use Commercial Skip which is included with life extender for free - it does a pretty good job at spotting the commercials, however I find that ShowAnalyzer does an excellent job and just prefer it. I suggest you try both and see which you prefer before you decide to buy ShowAnalyzer.

Life Extender is a great little application that allows you several different options regarding keeping the old file or deleting it, put the computer in hibernate or sleep mode after finished, when to start the decommercializing process, etc.

Hi,

I'm following the guide for an ATX mid-level system, which specifies Antec Fusion Remote Max ATX, with LCD/IR receiver/remote. I have a few questions:

1.) if I'm going to get another remote, like the gyration remote ( i like the idea of eliminating keyboard / mouse) , is there another case that would work and save me some money since I won't need the remote?

2.) Can this remote, or any other remote I purchase like the gyration or logitech harmony, power the actual system up? or do i have to turn it on like a normal computer?

Thanks!

So what Case would be recommended for this build? I plan on getting Miscrosoft MCE remote with IR - $35 if becessary
Here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=17984830#post17984830), and Zalman HD501.

1.) if I'm going to get another remote, like the gyration remote ( i like the idea of eliminating keyboard / mouse) , is there another case that would work and save me some money since I won't need the remote?

2.) Can this remote, or any other remote I purchase like the gyration or logitech harmony, power the actual system up? or do i have to turn it on like a normal computer?

Thanks!
1. Antec NSK2480, nMEDIAPC 1000B/5000B.

2. To turn on the system (not wake it up from sleep), you will need some modification in the 20/24 pin main power connector like this (http://www.techwarelabs.com/reviews/peripherals/antec_veris_multimedia_station_basic/index_2.shtml), and usually only a case with a built-in IR receiver support it.

Your Welcome no bother at all - that's why we are here on these threads :D.

HTPCat is all your fault, I didn't even knew what WHS was before, now that I went out of my way and check out some videos and info of what really is, I NEED ONE!!! lol

Damn, more money out the window lol. I got the perfect situation for that WHS thing, I usually back up all our data once a month, actually more like every few months or so, but proved not to be good enough because my wife's laptop hard drive just die and is going to cost a lot of money to get the data back :(.

We got tones of music, movies and photos so having one place for all the laptops to connect with easy access and the ability to upload for every one in the house, is just the thing we need.

My old p3 has a decent Antec case that I could install in up to 8 HDD and it has a 750Watts Antec power supply. Should I update the mother board CPU and memory to be able run WHS?

I am in the process of buying the parts for the Premium Intel/Intel system, but am having trouble locating the Xigmatek Crossbow ACK-I5361 for the 1156 CPU. Any ideas where I can buy one? I have tried all of the retailers listed on the Xigmatek web site.

I am in the process of buying the parts for the Premium Intel/Intel system, but am having trouble locating the Xigmatek Crossbow ACK-I5361 for the 1156 CPU. Any ideas where I can buy one? I have tried all of the retailers listed on the Xigmatek web site.
Newegg.com (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835233038) (if you are living in US).

HTPCat is all your fault, I didn't even knew what WHS was before, now that I went out of my way and check out some videos and info of what really is, I NEED ONE!!! lol

Damn, more money out the window lol. I got the perfect situation for that WHS thing, I usually back up all our data once a month, actually more like every few months or so, but proved not to be good enough because my wife's laptop hard drive just die and is going to cost a lot of money to get the data back :(.

We got tones of music, movies and photos so having one place for all the laptops to connect with easy access and the ability to upload for every one in the house, is just the thing we need.

My old p3 has a decent Antec case that I could install in up to 8 HDD and it has a 750Watts Antec power supply. Should I update the mother board CPU and memory to be able run WHS?

Definitely recommend WHS. I am running around 16TB right now and all my PCs/HTPCs/Media Players connect to it for playback.

For Decommercializing W7 TV recordings I use 3 applications which totally automate the process for me.

First my TV recordings are going to the default TV Recordings folder on my HDD on my HTPC. They are of course in the new WTV file format which doesn't work with Life Extender (The commercial removing application I use) so I use WtvWatcher http://www.indesolutions.com/WtvWatcher/ freeware to automatically scan the TV Recordings folder and convert any WTV file to DVR-MS format.

Next, I use Life Extender http://www.lifextender.com/download.aspx freeware with ShowAnalyzer $30 http://www.dragonglobal.biz/download/ to capture and remove the commercials and then delete the old file and relocate the new smaller file to my WHS. You can use Commercial Skip which is included with life extender for free - it does a pretty good job at spotting the commercials, however I find that ShowAnalyzer does an excellent job and just prefer it. I suggest you try both and see which you prefer before you decide to buy ShowAnalyzer.

Life Extender is a great little application that allows you several different options regarding keeping the old file or deleting it, put the computer in hibernate or sleep mode after finished, when to start the decommercializing process, etc.

Also take a look at MCEBuddy. It will scan WTV files (using comskip or Show analyzer), cut out commercials, encode, move, etc...

When you say encoding or transcoding, does that mean video editing and rendering.
Thank you

No, I mean converting a file from one form to another. Video editing and rendering will also be CPU intensive though so the i5 would help there as well.

I’m about to build my first HTPC, and there are just a few questions that I’d like a bit of input on. I think I’ll be building basically renethx’s low end Intel system, except with a different case (nMedia 5000B) and a different PSU (Antec Earthwatts 380). My plan is to use the system to replace a couple DVD players, as well as play streaming content from the web and any digital media I have now or will acquire in the future. Anyway, few basic questions. They’re probably stupid, but I’m kind of a noob at this HTPC thing.
First question: I currently have an upconverting DVD player. How will the picture quality of this HTPC compare to that player? It’s not a particularly fancy player, I think it’s a Sony I got for like $60. And it’s going into a Vizio 37” 1080i TV, so nothing high-end there either. Will I notice a difference in either direction?

Second question: Audio. My Onkyo receiver is HDMI passthrough only, so I’d have to use the home-made SPDIF out bracket that renethx describes. Given that I’m not really an audiophile and don’t own any BD movies (or a 1080p screen to play them on), do you think I’d be satisfied with the audio I get from this solution? It's an Onkyo HTIB 7.1 system that I have set up as a 5.1 system (no room for 7.1).

Second: Optical drive. Again, since I haven’t made the jump to true HD stuff yet, should I bother getting a Blu-Ray optical drive for $65 or just stick with a DVD drive for $20. I don’t plan to do any burning from this computer (that can happen on my desktop), but the faster DVD read speed of the non-BD drive would benefit me in the ripping department, right? I figure by the time I’m ready to get a new TV and convert to BD, drives will be cheaper.

Third: Input devices. I know, this has been done over and over on this forum. Been reading relevant threads for like 2 days. My current plan is to go with an AVS Gear Media Center remote and the Logitech PS3 Mediaboard Pro. Any glaring issues with that plan? I’m also considering the Moneual MK700, but there’s no mention of a scoll wheel or anything like that. Having become so accustomed to the mousewheel for scrolling, I’m thinking that might be a killer. Anyone have one of these keyboards and care to comment on whether or not it has any scrolling assistance? Can't post links yet, sorry about that.

Also, I know this is kind of asking you to tell the future, but renethx, do you anticipate any major changes to the low-end system in your March update? Thanks for the guide, by the way, it’s extremely helpful.

Thanks!

Thanks for the reply dbone1026,

wow 16 TB damn, that is a lot of space, what specs do you have in that WHS server?

I may need to buy a new mother board and memory, but I don't want to go over the top.

Thanks for the reply dbone1026,

wow 16 TB damn, that is a lot of space, what specs do you have in that WHS server?

I may need to buy a new mother board and memory, but I don't want to go over the top.

Here is my build:

http://www.mediasmartserver.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=5045

Using the Norco 4220 seems to be case of choice these days.

Wow nice machine Damian,

How much something like that without the hard drives goes for?

Wow nice machine Damian,

How much something like that without the hard drives goes for?

Probably cost around $1,000, much of the cost comes from the HDD cages, SATA Controller cards, and case

Damian why do you need the hhd cages for? what is the real benefit of those?

I guess you use the Sata controler cards because the mother board can't support so many HDD right?

Damian why do you need the hhd cages for? what is the real benefit of those?

I guess you use the Sata controler cards because the mother board can't support so many HDD right?

where would I put 15 hdds???? That is what the cages are for

Yes, the mobo only has 6 sata ports. Each controller card gives me 8, for a total of 16 ports (I just use the mobo sata port for the O/S drive and if I add a rom drive)

thanks for the reply Damian,

I was asking about the HDD cages because they look expensive, so my point was really can you get away with regular HDD brackets? or those cages have fans, heat sensors and things like that built in?

Hot-swap cage is usually expensive (5x3.5" in 3x5.25", ~$100). If you don't need hot-swapping, there are cheaper cages like this (http://www.google.com/products?hl=ja&q=Lian+Li+EX-23NB&scoring=p) (3x3.5" in 2x5.25", ~$25). Here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972&page=401#Media%20Storage%20Server:%20System:%2015%20HDD%20To wer%20System) is a price comparison of several tower cases+cages.

But for starters, you don't have to buy these cages; just use the cages built in the case.

Decommercializing W7 TV

For Decommercializing W7 TV recordings I use 3 applications which totally automate the process for me.

First my TV recordings are going to the default TV Recordings folder on my HDD on my HTPC. They are of course in the new WTV file format which doesn't work with Life Extender (The commercial removing application I use) so I use WtvWatcher http://www.indesolutions.com/WtvWatcher/ freeware to automatically scan the TV Recordings folder and convert any WTV file to DVR-MS format.

Next, I use Life Extender http://www.lifextender.com/download.aspx freeware with ShowAnalyzer $30 http://www.dragonglobal.biz/download/ to capture and remove the commercials and then delete the old file and relocate the new smaller file to my WHS. You can use Commercial Skip which is included with life extender for free - it does a pretty good job at spotting the commercials, however I find that ShowAnalyzer does an excellent job and just prefer it. I suggest you try both and see which you prefer before you decide to buy ShowAnalyzer.

Life Extender is a great little application that allows you several different options regarding keeping the old file or deleting it, put the computer in hibernate or sleep mode after finished, when to start the decommercializing process, etc.



Thanks, that is very helpful as I used Life Extender but the WTVWatcher is a great help for automating it all. The other great find is the Schoolhouse tool for ShowAnalyzer, which let's you fine tune the parameters for cutting out commercials.

1. Antec NSK2480, nMEDIAPC 1000B/5000B.

2. To turn on the system (not wake it up from sleep), you will need some modification in the 20/24 pin main power connector like, and usually only a case with a built-in IR receiver support it.

Thanks so much renethx,

and usually only a case with a built-in IR receiver support it.

Looks like the Antec NSK2480, as well as the NMediaPC 1000B/5000B do not have built-in IR receivers. So even if I purchase the Antec Veris Basic, this may not guarantee I can have remote power on/off on these 3 cases? Seems as long as I can plug into the motherboard it does the rest though...

I was thinking about get a SSD drive for my HTPC. I was going to pick up this OCZ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227393. How do I fit a 2.5" in a desktop that has 3.5" bays?

Update: I'm an idiot a 2.5" to 3.5" converter will do the job obviously.

some duct tape and a prayer

Guys beyond windows 7 what other software do you all recomend loading and for what uses on a mid range HTPC. I want to record OTA HD TV via my antenna and share with two TV's.

Thanks so much renethx,

and usually only a case with a built-in IR receiver support it.

Looks like the Antec NSK2480, as well as the NMediaPC 1000B/5000B do not have built-in IR receivers. So even if I purchase the Antec Veris Basic, this may not guarantee I can have remote power on/off on these 3 cases? Seems as long as I can plug into the motherboard it does the rest though...
Antec Multimedia Station Basic/Elite (= iMON) supports remote power on. The difference is that either you buy a case with built-in iMON (Antec Fusion, Moneual LAB, Thermaltake, SilverStone, Zalman etc.) or you buy an Antec-branded iMON for a 3.5"/5.25" bay later ("Basic" is IR receiver only).

renetx, there is a thread going on about 32 bit vs 64 bit for htpc. What do you recommend?

I was wondering if someone could provide me some feedback on my build. Finally got my tax return and I wanna spend it wisely. I'm aiming for a low/mid system. All I would like to be able to do on my PC is watch movies/hulu/etc and use it occasionally for everyday PC tasks, no gaming.

(Newegg Item numbers)

Case: Antec Black M FusionRemote 350 Micro ATX - N82E16811129046
CPU: AMD Athlon II 240 Regor 2.8 65W - N82E16819103688
Memory: Crucial 2GB (2x1GB) DDR3 - N82E16820148194
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-MA785GMT-UD2H - N82E16813128397
HDD: WD Cavier Black WD10001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM Sata 3gb/s - N82E16822136284

Thanks for your input!

renetx, there is a thread going on about 32 bit vs 64 bit for htpc. What do you recommend?
The basic limitation of Windows 7 64 bit is that Media Center is 64 bit only so that you can't use 32 bit codecs (e.g. madFlac, CyberLink, ArcSoft video decoders) for the internal player. Otherwise either one is OK.

Hello HTPC fans.

Just found this thread and wanted to add two thoughts for users w/o a need for TV functionality:

1. x64 (or correctly AMD64) is not only good for systems having more than 4GB of RAM. AMD64 has not only twice as large gp-registers, it has also twice the number of gp-registers. Additionally the software is capable of using a more sophisticated ABI.

If your CPU supports AMD64, you should use AMD64-Software too. Especially for media-related applications.

Regarding the CPU. Imho the Intel Atom is the way to go for an htpc. (e.g. : Intel Atom 330. AMD64-capable, dual core, HT)

2. When talking about HTPCs, Linux has to be taken into account, because it supports VDPAU x264 Hardware acceleration (nvidia only). 1080p with under 25 Watts was Linux only for the last years. Windows is catching up lately, but is not nearly as comfortable.

Depends on user need really, but you want that thing to be silent, right? :p

best regards

To clarify, which MV8 are you using, AOC-SAT2-MV8 or AOC-SASLP-MV8? What OS are you using?

Hello there, they are AOC-SAT2-MV8 cards with 8 discrete SATA connectors on each. We're using Windows Home Server with all updates installed.

I have been in touch with SuperMicro support and they say the problem is with the Option ROM setting on the Gigbyte motherboard's BIOS. Unfortunately I can't find a way of changing that, short of changing the motherboard (which is what SuperMicro suggested!)

There are no add-on cards apart from the two Supermicro SAT-MV2 boards.

The system will boot fine with SATA drives connected to the motherboard connectors and NO MV8 cards installed

The system will boot fine with motherboard drives and one or both MV8 cards installed, but no drives connected to MV8s

The system will boot fine with one or both MV8 cards installed, and drives connected to only one of them

The system will NOT boot with drives connected to both MV8s

Jonathan

Hi

Sorry guys I know this is a HTPC forum and not an audio one but I don't know where else to ask.

I have my subwoofer on the left side of my LCD TV, Just like the receiver's manual indicated.

Can I move it to the opposite side of the room, on right side of my sofa and still get the same quality bass?

Does it has to be where the manual indicates to be able to get the best possible bass?

Thanks

Alex

Does it has to be where the manual indicates to be able to get the best possible bass?

Nope. Human hearing is not very good at being able to sense direction of low frequencies.

Hello HTPC fans.

2. When talking about HTPCs, Linux has to be taken into account, because it supports VDPAU x264 Hardware acceleration (nvidia only). 1080p with under 25 Watts was Linux only for the last years. Windows is catching up lately, but is not nearly as comfortable.


Windows has hardware acceleration now and it's in the early stages, just as VDPAU is. There's no reason to run linux.

Hi

Sorry guys I know this is a HTPC forum and not an audio one but I don't know where else to ask.

I have my subwoofer on the left side of my LCD TV, Just like the receiver's manual indicated.

Can I move it to the opposite side of the room, on right side of my sofa and still get the same quality bass?

Does it has to be where the manual indicates to be able to get the best possible bass?

Thanks

AlexNot trying to be a smarta$$, but did you even look at the other AVS forums? There is one dedicated to subwoofers: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=113

Windows has hardware acceleration now and it's in the early stages, just as VDPAU is. There's no reason to run linux.

Not true.

Nvidia is supporting VDPAU for a long time now, and Linux has a wide varitey of players making use of it. Amongst them is XBMC, which can be considered the best mediacenter on both platforms.

Windows has dxva. Support for that is starting to appear in the last few months.

The 25 watts reason still holds true. So if anyone is interested, take a look to the linux side. You'll be pleased :)

best regards

I’m about to build my first HTPC, and there are just a few questions that I’d like a bit of input on. I think I’ll be building basically renethx’s low end Intel system, except with a different case (nMedia 5000B) and a different PSU (Antec Earthwatts 380). My plan is to use the system to replace a couple DVD players, as well as play streaming content from the web and any digital media I have now or will acquire in the future. Anyway, few basic questions. They’re probably stupid, but I’m kind of a noob at this HTPC thing.
First question: I currently have an upconverting DVD player. How will the picture quality of this HTPC compare to that player? It’s not a particularly fancy player, I think it’s a Sony I got for like $60. And it’s going into a Vizio 37” 1080i TV, so nothing high-end there either. Will I notice a difference in either direction?

Second question: Audio. My Onkyo receiver is HDMI passthrough only, so I’d have to use the home-made SPDIF out bracket that renethx describes. Given that I’m not really an audiophile and don’t own any BD movies (or a 1080p screen to play them on), do you think I’d be satisfied with the audio I get from this solution? It's an Onkyo HTIB 7.1 system that I have set up as a 5.1 system (no room for 7.1).

Second: Optical drive. Again, since I haven’t made the jump to true HD stuff yet, should I bother getting a Blu-Ray optical drive for $65 or just stick with a DVD drive for $20. I don’t plan to do any burning from this computer (that can happen on my desktop), but the faster DVD read speed of the non-BD drive would benefit me in the ripping department, right? I figure by the time I’m ready to get a new TV and convert to BD, drives will be cheaper.

Third: Input devices. I know, this has been done over and over on this forum. Been reading relevant threads for like 2 days. My current plan is to go with an AVS Gear Media Center remote and the Logitech PS3 Mediaboard Pro. Any glaring issues with that plan? I’m also considering the Moneual MK700, but there’s no mention of a scoll wheel or anything like that. Having become so accustomed to the mousewheel for scrolling, I’m thinking that might be a killer. Anyone have one of these keyboards and care to comment on whether or not it has any scrolling assistance? Can't post links yet, sorry about that.

Also, I know this is kind of asking you to tell the future, but renethx, do you anticipate any major changes to the low-end system in your March update? Thanks for the guide, by the way, it’s extremely helpful.

Thanks!

No one? I know, I'm new, and it's a post about a potentially non-HD HTPC in the HD HTPC thread, but... :)

Not trying to be a smarta$$, but did you even look at the other AVS forums? There is one dedicated to subwoorfers: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=113

oops thanks Murray for the reply I didn't even know there were other AVS forum, I though it was just for HTPC.

Sorry about that, I guess my own ignorance made me look lazy.

oops thanks Murray for the reply I didn't even know there were other AVS forum, I though it was just for HTPC.

Sorry about that, I guess own my ignorance made me look lazy.Well, at least you're not as ignorant as I am...I can't even spell subwoofers correctly! :D

Nope. Human hearing is not very good at being able to sense direction of low frequencies.

Thanks for the reply gcoupe,

I guess in the opposite side of the room hidden beside the sofa should be fine then, right?

Thanks for the reply gcoupe,

I guess in the opposite side of the room hidden beside the sofa should be fine then, right?
Try it and see... If you don't notice, or can live with, any perceptible difference in the colouration of the sound, then go for it...

Try it and see... If you don't notice, or can live with, any perceptible difference in the colouration of the sound, then go for it...

The reason I asked was because I couldn't do the test since I don't have a long enough cable. But you make a good point earlier, so even if I lose a little bit of quality or not, is better than looking at that box sitting there, when all my electronics are hidden away in a closet far away from the TV. So I'm just going to order a 75 feet subwoofer's cable and hide the box.

Thanks a lot gcoupe :D

Windows has dxva. Support for that is starting to appear in the last few months.

The 25 watts reason still holds true. So if anyone is interested, take a look to the linux side.
PureVideo HD Gen 2 (full H.264 decode acceleration under Windows) was released almost 3 years ago, in April 2007, while VDPAU, the Linux version of PureVideo HD, was released much later, only in Q4 2008. The following two articles are enough to prove it.

- AnandTech - NVIDIA GeForce 8600: Full H.264 Decode Acceleration (April 27, 2007) (http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2977)
- phoronix - NVIDIA Driver Brings PureVideo Features To Linux (November 14, 2008) (http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=nvidia_180_vdpau&num=1)

Well, there is no reason for NVIDA (and AMD, Intel too) to develop Linux driver first (consider the number of Windows users vs that of Linux users). If you are interested in the history of DXVA support for H.264/VC-1/MPEG-2, please go to the reference section (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972#Graphics) of the first page.

Is there any Linux-specific secret for 1080p with under 25W? The answer: NO. ;)

- H.264 video playback under Windows 7: 25W (x-bit lab's review on Zotac ION mb) (http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/mainboards/display/zotac-ion-itx-c_7.html)

Anyone know of a good graphics card that I can use with Windows 7 that will output to component in any reliable way??

Anyone know of a good graphics card that I can use with Windows 7 that will output to component in any reliable way??

There are HDMI to COMPONENT ADAPTERS but they cost more than the graphics card itself. Me thinks you'd be better served by getting a display that can accept HDMI in.

Decommercializing W7 TV





Thanks, that is very helpful as I used Life Extender but the WTVWatcher is a great help for automating it all. The other great find is the Schoolhouse tool for ShowAnalyzer, which let's you fine tune the parameters for cutting out commercials.

Agreed I use the schoolhouse tool from SHowAnalyzer which is great.

Is there any Linux-specific secret for 1080p with under 25W? The answer: NONE. ;)


Thank you for the link to article. It is referencing Windows Media Player 12, which is only capable of using hardware acceleration for VC1 content using dxva. Anything else is played unaccelerated :)

So. For a quiet and low power consuming HTPC with a mediacenter capable of accelerating all common HD content as of today you need Linux.


best regards

Thank you for the link to article. It is referencing Windows Media Player 12, which is only capable of using hardware acceleration for VC1 content using dxva. Anything else is played unaccelerated :)

So. For a quiet and low power consuming HTPC with a mediacenter capable of accelerating all common HD content as of today you need Linux.


best regards
WMP12 in Windows 7 has native Mpeg2 and AVC decoders leveraging Dxva.

Not sure where you are getting your sources.

Thank you for the link to article. It is referencing Windows Media Player 12, which is only capable of using hardware acceleration for VC1 content using dxva. Anything else is played unaccelerated :)

So. For a quiet and low power consuming HTPC with a mediacenter capable of accelerating all common HD content as of today you need Linux.
Sorry, you are completely wrong in either point. ;)

WMP12/7MC supports H.264 full hardware decode acceleration natively by Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder (a new addition to Windows 7, for DVB and AVCHD support). Ironically Windows' native VC-1 decoder WMVideo Decoder DMO lacks full hardware acceleration. (But this is not an issue at all as there are several VC-1 decoders supporting full hardware acceleration.)

Even in WMP11/Vista Media Center, H.264/VC-1 hardware decode acceleration is no problem; just use a proper decoder (free) in DirectShow pipeline.

Yeah, I understand that if you have never used Windows, it may be a bit hard to gather correct information. :)

Even in WMP11/Vista Media Center, H.264/VC-1 hardware decode acceleration is no problem; just use a proper decoder (free) in DirectShow pipeline.


Which both (WMP11/VMC) are not even capable of playing the standard container for HD material: mkv. And i'm not even starting about subtitles, ogg multichannel, online-scraper capabilities, reading directly from archives, etc.

As i already said: Depends on what you really want/need.

best regards

Which both (WMP11/VMC) are not even capable of playing the standard container for HD material: mkv. And i'm not even starting about subtitles, ogg multichannel, online-scraper capabilities, reading directly from archives, etc.
No, you are wrong. WMP11/WMP12/VMC/7MC supports MKV perfectly fine with TrueHD/DTS-HD audio bitstreaming. The internal player supports the DirectShow pipleline quite flexibly so that you can do many things.

If you haven't used Windows lately and/or you haven't tried to get correct information on Windows, then I would suggest you to stay away from discussing Linux vs Windows confidently. :)

The software mentioned has none of these features available out of the box. Neither mkv support, nor dxva acceleration nor any other state of the art media center functionality.

And regarding your ad hominem attacks to "stay out of the discussion", i'm gonna leave the fanboy talk now. :p

For anybody else: There are more sophisticated types of HTPCs than the one presented in this thread. Time for another build thread, i'd say :D

best regards

Ignore this tool. There are many many people who have, and continue to, benefit from your experience, knowlege and advice provided in this thread.

Edit: I usually don't arc up but more and more the forums I read daily are being taken over by people wanting to push their own agenda and beat their chests. This is one of the most formitive and up-to-date topics I have come across. Keep up the great work and let the negative trolls go elsewhere.

Thank you renethx for this great guide, I am planning to build an HTPC. Before that, could you please help me to clarify a doubt?

Currently I have a Bose Lifestyle V20 system for speakers but from another thread, I saw you mentioning that V20 doesn't support decoding TrueHD/DTS-HD, not even multichannel LPCM

<quote>
It looks like Bose Lifesytle V20 does not support multichannel LPCM via HDMI. It supports only stereo LPCM. It does not support even DD/DTS bitsream over HDMI. VIDEO IN (including HDMI) is completely separated from AUDIO IN. If you want surround sounds, you have to use optical S/PDIF.
<end quote>

Is there anyway I can use these speakers? If I buy any receiver or decoder?

Neelz

Currently I have a Bose Lifestyle V20 system for speakers but from another thread, I saw you mentioning that V20 doesn't support decoding TrueHD/DTS-HD, not even multichannel LPCM

<quote>
It looks like Bose Lifesytle V20 does not support multichannel LPCM via HDMI. It supports only stereo LPCM. It does not support even DD/DTS bitsream over HDMI. VIDEO IN (including HDMI) is completely separated from AUDIO IN. If you want surround sounds, you have to use optical S/PDIF.
<end quote>

Is there anyway I can use these speakers? If I buy any receiver or decoder?
Bose Lifestyle V20 is designed to work only with S/PDIF (Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS, stereo LPCM) and stereo analog. So connect an optical or coaxial S/PDIF out from the rear panel of the motherboard to V20 and you will be fine for 5.1 surround sounds.

BTW every BD movie contains a DD and/or DTS (or core DD in TrueHD, core DTS in DTS-HD) track. So S/PDIF is perfectly fine for surround sounds even for BD.

After some frustrations with DLNA/UPnP streaming instability and the limitations of media server software, I'm leaning towards building an HTPC. Uses would be playing internet content like Hulu, Youtube, Rhapsody, HD VOD, etc. I was thinking of using the guts of the "Mid Range" build here in this thread in a Lian li c37 case (minus the CPU cooler due to clearance) and with a low profile graphics card like the Sapphire 100293L Radeon HD 5570. I would add a logitech mini or some wireless Keyboard to control it due to the fact it has no remote. I'd also add a decent DVD/CD drive. I have a degree in electronics, but computer hardware and software have come a long way since my class days, so I'd welcome any suggestions or opinions from the experienced HTPC builders here.

Oh, and thanks renethx for this VERY detailed thread.:)

The software mentioned has none of these features available out of the box. Neither mkv support, nor dxva acceleration nor any other state of the art media center functionality.

OK, I seriously would like to know, what Linux install has all the functionality you mention "out of the box" on current hardware? In particular, I'd like to do a build with a Micro ATX, i3 and probably an ATI video card, and all I really need is a bullet proof client that the wife and kids can run, the OS really won't matter.

The software mentioned has none of these features available out of the box. Neither mkv support, nor dxva acceleration nor any other state of the art media center functionality.

And regarding your ad hominem attacks to "stay out of the discussion", i'm gonna leave the fanboy talk now. :p

For anybody else: There are more sophisticated types of HTPCs than the one presented in this thread. Time for another build thread, i'd say :D

best regards
natively? Does linux come with xmbc natively? man you got some one sided logic in your head.

Hey guys. The following link is my planned purchase. My only concern is if I am going overboard with the specs as my planned usage is just to replace my current bluray player, divx dvd player and SH*TTY TWC box. I plan on getting the ceton quad tuner card in the future. My HTPC Build (http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=18099688)

Hey guys. The following link is my planned purchase. My only concern is if I am going overboard with the specs as my planned usage is just to replace my current bluray player, divx dvd player and SH*TTY TWC box. I plan on getting the ceton quad tuner card in the future. My HTPC Build (http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=18099688)

No I don't think that is overboard at all for what you plan. I have the same processor and blu ray player in my system with a smaller hard drive. I went 4gb ram but that is probably not necessary. It's been a bitch getting the codecs in Win7 configured to play everything. I think I'm over 20 hours into it by now and I'm still not there. Maybe you will be better at it than I am. I've been ripping all my HD-DVD's and BD's to .TS and .M2TS files for playback in WMC. But I'm not a complete newb to computers just the HTPC portion, so it could certainly be much much better than it is.

I never got the PowerDVD8 working that came with the blu ray player. If I ever end up wanting that to work then I'll probably just buy TMT3.

My HTPC Build (http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=18099688)
You'd better add another stick of memory for dual channel mode (2 x 2GB or 2 x 1GB). The Ceton card is released soon (by March 31?).

It's been a bitch getting the codecs in Win7 configured to play everything.
Have you had issues just playing a blu-ray disk? I have no plans on ripping just want to be able to play all rented blu-rays and dvds. I guess I shouldn't just assume stuff like that should just work.

You'd better add another stick of memory for dual channel mode (2 x 2GB or 2 x 1GB). The Ceton card is released soon (by March 31?).
Yeah I was planning on adding another 2gb stick in the near future. Just trying to keep my initial price down where possible. The Ceton quad card is expected March 31 based on their website but I did see that a dual card is being released probably this summer sometime. I was gonna see the price on that based on the fact I have never needed more than two tuners with my current TWC box.

Appreciate the comments.

If you're just playing blu-ray and DVD you should be fine. DVD works natively but blu-ray requires extra software. The LiteOn drive you plan on comes with PowerDVD 8 which did not work for me. It is supposed to but I worked with Cyberlink and could not get it working. I downloaded the trial version of TMT3 and that worked great. Just put in the BD and hit play. But it's like $80 so I'm not going to buy it right away. If you put more effort into getting PowerDVD8 than I did you might be able to get it to work. The last suggestion they made before I gave up was for me to disable hardware acceleration.

The LiteOn drive you plan on comes with PowerDVD 8 which did not work for me.
If you mean gray pictures (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=18087108#post18087108), BIOS update + Intel HECI driver could fix it.

For anybody else: There are more sophisticated types of HTPCs than the one presented in this thread. Time for another build thread, i'd say :D

best regardsFeel free to start your own thread. :)

No I don't think that is overboard at all for what you plan. I have the same processor and blu ray player in my system with a smaller hard drive. I went 4gb ram but that is probably not necessary. It's been a bitch getting the codecs in Win7 configured to play everything. I think I'm over 20 hours into it by now and I'm still not there. Maybe you will be better at it than I am. I've been ripping all my HD-DVD's and BD's to .TS and .M2TS files for playback in WMC. But I'm not a complete newb to computers just the HTPC portion, so it could certainly be much much better than it is.

I never got the PowerDVD8 working that came with the blu ray player. If I ever end up wanting that to work then I'll probably just buy TMT3.
what problem are you having with PDVD8? Still the same old blu-ray playback issue? Did you try installing the MEI driver?

I have the MEI driver installed, yes. I think there might be one newer bios version than what I have on the GA-H55M-S2H. Website lists F5 and I think I'm running F4.

Sometimes I get the gray issue during previews, and it looks like the picture is zoomed in so you can't see half of it. Then when the root menu comes up there is color but it is really choppy and locks up repeatedly. I finally got it to play after about 5 reboots but a couple minutes into it the playback got worse and it locked up again.

The information screen shows that hardware acceleration is not working.

yup that seems like a PAVP issue. Renethx also has the gigabyte board and i think he said after installing the MEI driver, it fixed it.

Did you try using PDVD9 trial? I'm using that now and it works fine after installing MEI.

Noob question - Does the LiteOn drive require some special hardware on the host machine/mb to decode properly?

I just bought the LITE-ON IHOS104-08 drive, thinking I'd put it in one of my older machines which has a core2 processor. The video card is an nVidia card, but I don't know that there is a BD decoder on the card... Is there something else I should know?

Thanks.

@kevinqian - I'll try the F5 bios since I already have MEI installed. No, I thought about PDVD9 but wasn't willing to try another Cyberlink product when they can't get the one I already bought working, so I used the TMT3 trial. My way of showing CyberLink what I think about their support. Is there some way to validate that PAVP is enabled? My thought on this is that if TMT3 works then the problem is with PowerDVD not my system. Although I cannot confirm with certainty that TMT3 was using hardware acceleration, just that it played the movies well. It maybe have been software decode.

@Darkhog - You need software that can decode blu-ray movies like Cyberlink PowerDVD or TMT3. Your core2 processor should be able to handle the decode on it's own if it has to but a lot of video cards now offload the decoding to alleviate your processor. What model is your nvidia card?

I bought the Retail version of the BD, and I the comments say it includes software to play the discs.

I don't have the card info with me atm, but it was a mid to high range gaming card 2 or 3 years ago. Like a 6600 GT or some such card.

@kevinqian - I'll try the F5 bios since I already have MEI installed. No, I thought about PDVD9 but wasn't willing to try another Cyberlink product when they can't get the one I already bought working, so I used the TMT3 trial. My way of showing CyberLink what I think about their support. Is there some way to validate that PAVP is enabled? My thought on this is that if TMT3 works then the problem is with PowerDVD not my system. Although I cannot confirm with certainty that TMT3 was using hardware acceleration, just that it played the movies well. It maybe have been software decode.

@Darkhog - You need software that can decode blu-ray movies like Cyberlink PowerDVD or TMT3. Your core2 processor should be able to handle the decode on it's own if it has to but a lot of video cards now offload the decoding to alleviate your processor. What model is your nvidia card?
apparently TMT uses Media Foundation pipeline of Win7, which is a newer, better decoding platform than Directshow used in PDVD and WinDVD. So that may be the reason for it working. But nonetheless, I do have PDVD working now so i'm settled with it for now.

Interesting. If that is true I wonder how VC1 is decoded by TMT3.

So right now I have DirectShow enabled and installed PDVD8 to latest version and with Inglorious Basterds at the menu it is playing okay but the cpu core1 is 100% others 40% and DXVA is not working. DXVA worked for an mpeg stream before you get to the main menu. The video actually appears okay an hasn't locked once but I anticipate problems seeing the CPU this high. I'll try updating the BIOS to F5 now.

Edit: Updated to F5 BIOS but still no hardware acceleration. I noticed when VC1 was presented it was accelerated but on MPEG4-AVC it is not.

Can someone with the Gigabyte GA-H55M-S2H please tell me what version of the Intel Management Engine Interface that Device Manager is reporting installed? Mine is 6.0.0.1179 (9.17.2009). The newest on Intel's site is 6.0.31.1208 (at least for the DH55HC board). I don't know if this driver is specific to the board or chipset, if I can install it for a gigabyte board or not.

Renethx;

I would like you advice on hard drives for the unRAID 20 bay system using the NORCO RPC-4020.
I plan on starting with 6 Data ,1 Parity, and 1 Cache Drive.
The cache drive will be an older 500 GB SATA drive I already have. The other drives I would like them to be 2 TB drives.

I have an 2 TB external USB drive full of TV shows, I also have a 4 bay raid box with 4 1.5 TB drives that are nearly full of Movies, and more TV shows, as well as another 2 TB external drive with more than 200 GB of music, 100 GB of karaoke, and almost 1 TB of Games in ISO format.

Once my Norco is setup, I plan on moving the raid box and 2 two TB drives off site. I will not be able to add to them, but if anything happens to my server, I will at least be able to recover most of my collection.

I understand many would think 6 two TB drives are over kill to start with, but as you can see, I already have about 9 TB of files.

I am looking for a great price, but reliability is crucial.
Anyone else with input is welcome to chime in.

Thanks for all your time, and effort you put into this community.

Mike

So right now I have DirectShow enabled and installed PDVD8 to latest version and with Inglorious Basterds at the menu it is playing okay but the cpu core1 is 100% others 40% and DXVA is not working. DXVA worked for an mpeg stream before you get to the main menu. The video actually appears okay an hasn't locked once but I anticipate problems seeing the CPU this high. I'll try updating the BIOS to F5 now.

Edit: Updated to F5 BIOS but still no hardware acceleration. I noticed when VC1 was presented it was accelerated but on MPEG4-AVC it is not.

Can someone with the Gigabyte GA-H55M-S2H please tell me what version of the Intel Management Engine Interface that Device Manager is reporting installed? Mine is 6.0.0.1179 (9.17.2009). The newest on Intel's site is 6.0.31.1208 (at least for the DH55HC board). I don't know if this driver is specific to the board or chipset, if I can install it for a gigabyte board or not.
I had the exact same problem you described prior to installing the MEI driver from Intel. Namely, H.264 was not accelerated in PDVD, but Mpeg2 and VC1 were HWA.


I don't think that driver from Intel is board specific as I have a Core i5 laptop that installed fine with the driver listed under the Intel desktop board. Disregard the version number of the MEI device in device mgr. It didn't seem to change pre and post install of MEI, so my guess is the MEI driver installed something else into the system to enable PAVP.

Interesting. I installed the apparently newer version but PDVD8 is still not HWA. Is yours? The good news is that it seems to be working well in software mode. I can at least watch movies. I think it's just a 2ch version though. lame! But all I have now is 2ch anyway. Plan to get 5.1 in a couple weeks.

OK, I seriously would like to know, what Linux install has all the functionality you mention "out of the box" on current hardware? In particular, I'd like to do a build with a Micro ATX, i3 and probably an ATI video card, and all I really need is a bullet proof client that the wife and kids can run, the OS really won't matter.

Hi Scientest.

VDPAU is nvidia only. I'm using an Asrock ION 330 with XBMC and an xbox 360 controller as "remote". Can be considered quite women friendly :)

But i do not want to spoil this thread as it focuses on a different approcach. The xbmc+ION solution is discussed in this forum too. I just replied here because of the false information regarding AMD64 and to mention quieter (as in noise) solutions.

best regards

natively? Does linux come with xmbc natively? man you got some one sided logic in your head.

1. Add deb source to apt
2. 'apt-get install xbmc'

vdpau comes with the nvidia driver natively

That's all.

As i said before, i'm out of this thread. (sorry renethx)

best regards

apparently TMT uses Media Foundation pipeline of Win7, which is a newer, better decoding platform than Directshow used in PDVD and WinDVD.
TMT 3 uses DirectShow for DVD/BD (try to load ReClock (http://forum.slysoft.com/showthread.php?t=38869) or DirectShow Filter Graph Spy (http://alax.info/blog/777)). On the other hand WinDVD perhaps uses Media Foundation for BD (and DirectShow for DVD).

I have two issues I was hoping to get some help.

I have a Gigabyte H55M-S2H motherboard, Core i3 530 proc.

First, I cannot get audio to output via HDMI. I have not installed the Intel Audio update available in Windows Update, which I know was causing some problems with ASRock mobos. I right-clicked on volume and went into "Playback devices". The one that's active is labelled "TX-SR805" which is my Onkyo receiver. Under "Jack information" it says "HDMI Digital Jack". When sounds are playing it shows activity on the screen, but nothing comes out of the receiver. I didn't see anything in the Intel Control Center that would help. Anything else I should do? I've been struggling with this for awhile.

Also I have problems on system restarts getting a picture from my receiver. Once the HTPC starts up I have to switch over to another device and then back to the HTPC. Any advice on that?

I have two issues I was hoping to get some help.

I have a Gigabyte H55M-S2H motherboard, Core i3 530 proc.

First, I cannot get audio to output via HDMI. I have not installed the Intel Audio update available in Windows Update, which I know was causing some problems with ASRock mobos. I right-clicked on volume and went into "Playback devices". The one that's active is labelled "TX-SR805" which is my Onkyo receiver. Under "Jack information" it says "HDMI Digital Jack". When sounds are playing it shows activity on the screen, but nothing comes out of the receiver. I didn't see anything in the Intel Control Center that would help. Anything else I should do? I've been struggling with this for awhile.

Also I have problems on system restarts getting a picture from my receiver. Once the HTPC starts up I have to switch over to another device and then back to the HTPC. Any advice on that?

Concerning the ASRock problem with the current Intel drivers, that is non existent anymore. I have the most current version with the ASRock H55M Pro and it works fine now. Try updating your drivers and see what happens.

I have two issues I was hoping to get some help.

I have a Gigabyte H55M-S2H motherboard, Core i3 530 proc.

First, I cannot get audio to output via HDMI. I have not installed the Intel Audio update available in Windows Update, which I know was causing some problems with ASRock mobos. I right-clicked on volume and went into "Playback devices". The one that's active is labelled "TX-SR805" which is my Onkyo receiver. Under "Jack information" it says "HDMI Digital Jack". When sounds are playing it shows activity on the screen, but nothing comes out of the receiver. I didn't see anything in the Intel Control Center that would help. Anything else I should do? I've been struggling with this for awhile.

Also I have problems on system restarts getting a picture from my receiver. Once the HTPC starts up I have to switch over to another device and then back to the HTPC. Any advice on that?

I have H55M-UD2H working. Which player are you using? Under playback devices have you done configure? Currently Realtek and TMT don't mix.

Concerning the ASRock problem with the current Intel drivers, that is non existent anymore. I have the most current version with the ASRock H55M Pro and it works fine now. Try updating your drivers and see what happens.
I also have the same board (2 months) with all updates applied and everything is fine.

Likewise, in sounds properties (right click the realtek systray icon and click sound devices) I have TX-SR507 set to default. Then you can go into properties for the receiver and it will list supported codecs and such. On the advanced tab I switched the default format from 16 bit 48000 to 24 bit 48000. Honestly I don't know what this means I just set it to the highest setting my receiver supports. Some of them result in no/bad sound so make sure it's correct. On the general tab it should say "use this device - enabled" at the bottom. When you click on the main system volume icon on the systray (not the realtek one) do you see multiple volumes? You might be configured to send audio out the realtek device not the HDMI one. If this is the case you would see sound on one volume bar but the system would not be configured to use it.

The Ceton quad card is expected March 31 based on their website but I did see that a dual card is being released probably this summer sometime. I was gonna see the price on that based on the fact I have never needed more than two tuners with my current TWC box.

I just received email from Ceton today - the card's release has been delayed until May 31. They knew they weren't going to hit the March 31st date, but didn't want to announce anything until they knew how much they were going to be late.

The good news is they're starting to accept preorders through Zones.com. You won't be charged until ship, and the price remains the $399 they've announced. (They were having a pricing issue on Zones earlier today - $399 is the price.)

@mryerse, I also have the GA-H55M-S2H and TX-SR507. :)

A couple months ago I installed the HECI driver from MEI package 6.0.30.1203 and it contains version 6.0.0.1179. The latest package 6.0.31.1208 still contains the same driver. So, no reason to update unless you need the software to actually manage other machines.

BIOS F5 seemed to correct SpeedStep or at least its reporting/detection.

I cannot confirm if PDVD8 can make use of Clarkdale video acceleration. Have you tried testing with MPC-HC and Microsoft decoder?

I need a motherboard recommendation:

Background:
The main function of this machine is to transcode video. I have an unRAID server, so I don't need more than 2 hard drives in this machine. The most resource intensive game that will be played on this machine will be Minesweeper. This computer will probably be on 24/7, so energy efficient components are a plus. I would like to go with a MicroATX Mid tower case.

This is what I plan to use so far:

# CPU: Core i7 860 2.80GHz LGA1156
# Memory: Depends on which motherboard
# PSU: CORSAIR CMPSU-400CX 400W
# Case: Rosewill R101-P-BK

These are two boards in the January recommendations:
GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4 LGA 1156 Intel P55 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128404&Tpk=GIGABYTE%20GA-P55M-UD4)
ASRock H55M Pro LGA 1156 Intel H55 HDMI Micro ATX Intel Motherboard (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157181&cm_re=ASRock_H55M_Pro-_-13-157-181-_-Product)

Are they still the way to go? Are there any options with onboard video that will have no trouble playing HD?

Yes I get HWA with both the Microsoft decoder and the ffdshow decoder, except if the video is VC1. I recently read that PAVP requires 128m for GPU, and am not sure I've tried pdvd since raising GPU in BIOS from 64 to 128 so I'll try again. I'll probably have to upgrade pdvd though since it only supports 2ch audio and I'm getting 5.1 speakers so it's not a big deal anymore.

Right now my goal is to find a way in MPC-HC so it uses Gabest splutter for TS files, and Microsoft splutter for m2ts files.

Davinleeds, I'm using Windows Media Center, Zune and Hulu. I configured the device as 7.1 as well.

mryrse, I tried doing all you suggested, but it's still not working. TX-SR805 is Enabled. In my case the SR805 goes all the way up to 24-bit 192k DACs so I enabled that option as well, but if fact none of the formats are working at all. I've disabled all devices except for the Intel(R) Display Audio. The volume meter shows that it's trying to output some sound but it's just not getting through for some reason.

I also went to the Intel website and downloaded the latest driver, 2086. At this point, I'm really out of ideas.

Right now my goal is to find a way in MPC-HC so it uses Gabest splutter for TS files, and Microsoft splutter for m2ts files.
What's the Microsoft splitter for M2TS (object name, CLSID or file name as seen in GraphStudio)?

Anyway, if you disable the internal MPEG PS/TS/PVA source filter, then MPC uses the source/splitter filter according to first the registry key HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Media Type\Extensions, then the merit values.

Any idea when the system builder Tegra 2 boards will start showing up? The Boxee box looks interesting, but I want to do more w/ my HTPC than just media playback. I'd like to record some TV and have a blu-ray optical drive. I picked up the basic LiteOn reader a couple weeks ago for $52, but still need to get the rest of my parts.

Davinleeds, I'm using Windows Media Center, Zune and Hulu. I configured the device as 7.1 as well.

mryrse, I tried doing all you suggested, but it's still not working. TX-SR805 is Enabled. In my case the SR805 goes all the way up to 24-bit 192k DACs so I enabled that option as well, but if fact none of the formats are working at all. I've disabled all devices except for the Intel(R) Display Audio. The volume meter shows that it's trying to output some sound but it's just not getting through for some reason.

I also went to the Intel website and downloaded the latest driver, 2086. At this point, I'm really out of ideas.

There may be other ideas in the i core thread, but your Intel hdmi(your AVR) should be default and under supported formats, if it shows 2 channel, your AVR is configured for audio pass through to your display. Mine simply enabled by rebooting with AVR on but no display connected to AVR. Desktop connected with dvi.

Any idea when the system builder Tegra 2 boards will start showing up? The Boxee box looks interesting, but I want to do more w/ my HTPC than just media playback. I'd like to record some TV and have a blu-ray optical drive. I picked up the basic LiteOn reader a couple weeks ago for $52, but still need to get the rest of my parts.

I think Nvidia said that the Tegra II can only play back videos up to 10 MB/s, so no go for blu ray unless you want to encode down.

Davinleeds, I'm using Windows Media Center, Zune and Hulu. I configured the device as 7.1 as well.

mryrse, I tried doing all you suggested, but it's still not working. TX-SR805 is Enabled. In my case the SR805 goes all the way up to 24-bit 192k DACs so I enabled that option as well, but if fact none of the formats are working at all. I've disabled all devices except for the Intel(R) Display Audio. The volume meter shows that it's trying to output some sound but it's just not getting through for some reason.

I also went to the Intel website and downloaded the latest driver, 2086. At this point, I'm really out of ideas.

Can you get the realtek audio working? At least you can maybe get some sound in the meantime while you troubleshoot the HDMI. It might be time to start looking at settings on the receiver? Sorry, I'm out of ideas.

What's the Microsoft splitter for M2TS (object name, CLSID or file name as seen in GraphStudio)?

Anyway, if you disable the internal MPEG PS/TS/PVA source filter, then MPC uses the source/splitter filter according to first the registry key HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Media Type\Extensions, then the merit values.

Don't know the CLSID, but what I do know is that Gabest is not installed to be used by WMP, and Haali is also not being used for .M2TS files, and yet they play. This leads me to believe that Win7 natively supports splitting .M2TS files. Win7 cannot comprehend the audio (DTS HD Master) but it does play the H.264 video in the .M2TS files. Since MPC-HC does not use the Win7 pipeline it is able to use ffdshow for the audio (without having to disable media foundation or directshow) and somehow it splits .m2ts without gabest/haali.

The problem with disabling the internal gabest splitter in MPC-HC as you suggested is that it also disables for .TS files, resulting in Haali being used for .TS. For some reason this is causing there to be no video. I think the no video part can be fixed, but there is also the issue that Haali cannot comprehend TrueHD, for which some of my .TS files contain.

Temporary workaround is to manually change the setting for each movie type.

This is the source filter for .m2ts in HKCR\Media Type\Extensions: {1365BE7A-C86A-473C-9A41-C0A6E82C9FA3}

edit: You got me thinking on the right track though. I had .ts CLSID set to use Haali. Switched it to use Gabest and now MPC-HC can play both .m2ts and .ts how I want. .m2ts uses the above CLSID and .ts is using {1365BE7A-C86A-473C-9A41-C0A6E82C9FA3}. Neither are used as an "internal filter" but since I had already registered mpegsplitter.ax it is available.

Thanks!

edit: and now I realize both of the above are gabest. Hmm, wonder why it's not working when used as an internal filter. Maybe the .ax file that I downloaded as a standalone filter from SVN is newer than what comes with MPC-HC and contains fixes for DTS HD Master audio?

This is the source filter for .m2ts in HKCR\Media Type\Extensions: {1365BE7A-C86A-473C-9A41-C0A6E82C9FA3}

edit: You got me thinking on the right track though. I had .ts CLSID set to use Haali. Switched it to use Gabest and now MPC-HC can play both .m2ts and .ts how I want. .m2ts uses the above CLSID and .ts is using {1365BE7A-C86A-473C-9A41-C0A6E82C9FA3}. Neither are used as an "internal filter" but since I had already registered mpegsplitter.ax it is available.

Thanks!

edit: and now I realize both of the above are gabest. Hmm, wonder why it's not working when used as an internal filter. Maybe the .ax file that I downloaded as a standalone filter from SVN is newer than what comes with MPC-HC and contains fixes for DTS HD Master audio?

Are you trying to play in WMP/WMC or in MPC? If in WMP/WMC you need to disable Media Foundation and the Microsoft DTV Audio Decoder

I was correct about the gabest splitter from svn fixing the problem with DTS Master. After downloading MPC-HC lastest build from SVN and enabling the internal mpeg2-ts filter DTS Master bitstreaming works.

Not using WMP/WMC. Would like to but if I disable MF or DS I'm concerned it will have a negative affect on TV. Till a good solution is available I'll set WMC to use external player of MPC-HC.

I was correct about the gabest splitter from svn fixing the problem with DTS Master. After downloading MPC-HC lastest build from SVN and enabling the internal mpeg2-ts filter DTS Master bitstreaming works.

Not using WMP/WMC. Would like to but if I disable MF or DS I'm concerned it will have a negative affect on TV. Till a good solution is available I'll set WMC to use external player of MPC-HC.

Agreed, I just stick with MPC launching from Media Browser to get bitstreaming. I had too many inconsistencies with LiveTV and other when disabling MF to get bitstreaming in WMP/WMC. Anyway, I find PQ much better in MPC then WMP/WMC

At some point I'll do some calibrating but I need to take a break from this first.

I am looking to build a cross between the Intel/Intel High end and Premium (LGA 1156) htpc and hoped you would look at the list below and let me know if you see any problems, or reccommend different components - I know you said you were planning on updating the list shortly??

Here in Australia we don't always get the parts you list, so if it is something that is not on one of your reccommend list, it is the closest I could find.

I was thinking of the following;

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4 (as it has USB 3.0 and SATA 6.0Gbps)
CPU: Core i5 750 2.66GHz LGA1156
Cooler: Xigmatek CPU Cooler S1283 Dark Knight R3 + Xigmatek Crossbow I5361 for CPU Coolers w 3 HeatPipes Will this cooler work on the i5 in this motherboard?
RAM: G Skill 4G(2x2G) DDR3 1600Mhz PC12800 9-9-9-24(CL9D-4GBNQ)
Graphics Card: HIS ATI HD5750 PCI-E 2.0 1GB DDR5 700/4600 MHz
HDD: Western Digital 1.5TB Green 64MB SATAII WD15EARS
Optical: Samsung SH-B083A Blu-Ray Combo SATA
Case: Antec Sonata III MiniTower Case - Piano BlackW/500W PSU


Thanks for you help with this and I am off to donate now.

I am looking to build a cross between the Intel/Intel High end and Premium (LGA 1156) htpc and hoped you would look at the list below and let me know if you see any problems, or reccommend different components - I know you said you were planning on updating the list shortly??

Here in Australia we don't always get the parts you list, so if it is something that is not on one of your reccommend list, it is the closest I could find.

I was thinking of the following;

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD4 (as it has USB 3.0 and SATA 6.0Gbps)
CPU: Core i5 750 2.66GHz LGA1156
Cooler: Not sure what cooler to use in this build??
RAM: GSkill 4G(2x2G) DDR3 1600Mhz PC12800 CL8(4GBTD)
Graphics Card: HIS ATI HD5750 PCI-E 2.0 1GB DDR5 700/4600 MHz
HDD: Western Digital 1.5TB Green 64MB SATAII WD15EARS
Optical: Samsung SH-B083A Blu-Ray Combo SATA

Because of its location, I prefer a tower case - what is the minimum power supply I should go with, given I will aslo have 2 x dual digital tuner cards and possibly 4 HDDs?

Do you reccommend any particular tower case with an included ps?

Thanks for you help with this and I am off to donate now.
I'm looking to build an HTPC pretty soon and was directed to a site that helped me pick a power supply. Here it is:http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculator.jsp