Our native mobile app has a new name: Fora Communities. Learn more.

HTPC with Seperate HW Upscaler

544 Views 8 Replies 4 Participants Last post by stanger89, Dec 25, 2005

arcticool

Discussion Starter · Dec 23, 2005

Recently I've wanted to get better quality out of my HTPC and found it just doesn't have the horsepower. Its a lowely p4 2.4 and can barely upscale to 1080i with overlays and can only handle VMR9 on native DVD resolution. I was hoping some PureVideo solution would help me offload some work to the GPU, but no dice. If you're using PV for DVD playback, you can't use an upscaling filter (like FFDShow) without fully reverting back to software...

So I'm looking for a seperate piece of hardware that can do the upscaling for me so I don't have to upgrade my whole PC, and also so I can keep using my PC for media storage.

Does anyone know of such a hardware solution, and how does it compare to a high-end HTPC upgrade? Specifially I'm thinking about using my PC for media storange, playing the DVD with PureVideo and VMR9 (ok at max cpu usage now), then sending signal to some kind of hardware upscaler. *Note an upscaling DVD player might not work if it can't take an external signal input, that would defeat the purpose of the 'DVD jukebox' if I had to go back to swapping disks.

Any suggestions appreciated.

Thanks,

AC

Save

Status: Not open for further replies.

1 - 9 of 9 Posts

stanger89

· #2 · Dec 23, 2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by arcticool
So I'm looking for a seperate piece of hardware that can do the upscaling for me so I don't have to upgrade my whole PC, and also so I can keep using my PC for media storage.

External scalers are about $1000 on up.

BTW, if DXVA DVD playback maxes out your CPU, something is horribly, horribly wrong. Actually come to think of it, something's not right if you can't use ffdshow. You should be able to get to at least 2x DVD with that CPU.

Save

arcticool

Discussion Starter · #3 · Dec 24, 2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by stanger89
External scalers are about $1000 on up.

BTW, if DXVA DVD playback maxes out your CPU, something is horribly, horribly wrong. Actually come to think of it, something's not right if you can't use ffdshow. You should be able to get to at least 2x DVD with that CPU.

I've seen upscaling DVD players for 200 bucks- so all it would take would be a line-in instead of using the DVD tray... Seems like some motivated entrepreneur should do it if the closest competition is charging a grand. Really surprised this isnt out yet...

And I should clarify I am upscaling now with this CPU.

I'm getting 1776x1000 with some sharpening and denoise.

But this is with overlays not VMR9 which I'm sure would look far better.

With VMR9 my cpu is maxed at low resolutions- thats why I'd like to use external HW to upscale from there.

Hmm, maybe I should start a small business, sounds like theres bank to be made if all I have to do is put a vga input on this:

http://www.***************.com/htsth...iew.php?rev=81

See less See more

Save

tetsuo55

· #4 · Dec 24, 2005

there is something wrong with your system

your system should do 1080i with ease

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...4&page=1&pp=30

http://free.hostdepartment.com/f/ffd...des/index.html

make sure all your drivers are updated, and you have defragged the harddisk

See less See more

Save

stanger89

· #5 · Dec 24, 2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by arcticool
I've seen upscaling DVD players for 200 bucks- so all it would take would be a line-in instead of using the DVD tray... Seems like some motivated entrepreneur should do it if the closest competition is charging a grand. Really surprised this isnt out yet...

Note that I said external scalers. I doubt an upconverting DVD player is better than your video card's native scaling. If you want ffdshow/lanczos/denoise/sharpening you're looking at probably $1500+ for Genum or HQV level scalers.

Quote:

And I should clarify I am upscaling now with this CPU.

I'm getting 1776x1000 with some sharpening and denoise.

But this is with overlays not VMR9 which I'm sure would look far better.

With VMR9 my cpu is maxed at low resolutions- thats why I'd like to use external HW to upscale from there.

Something is broken in your setup if your CPU is maxed out "at low resolutions"

Please detail (perhaps in the other thread where it might be more OT) what exactly your settings/configuration is that's maxing out your CPU in VMR9.

Quote:

Hmm, maybe I should start a small business, sounds like theres bank to be made if all I have to do is put a vga input on this:

http://www.***************.com/htsth...iew.php?rev=81

Now I honestly haven't compared (or researched) but I'd be quite surprised if that were better than your 6800's scaling (ie without ffdshow).

See less See more

Save

Mark_A_W

· #6 · Dec 25, 2005

My Athlon 2400+ will Resize to 1920x1080 with Lanzcos2 (sharpen 1.3) with VRM9 Windowless on a Radeon 9500. Actually it does it fairly easily and I can add more filters if I like (not Denoise3d though).

There is something wrong with your PC, if should do pretty well. You should be using VRM9 Exclusive Renderless on a 6800.

Save

arcticool

Discussion Starter · #7 · Dec 25, 2005

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark_A_W
My Athlon 2400+ will Resize to 1920x1080 with Lanzcos2 (sharpen 1.3) with VRM9 Windowless on a Radeon 9500. Actually it does it fairly easily and I can add more filters if I like (not Denoise3d though).

There is something wrong with your PC, if should do pretty well. You should be using VRM9 Exclusive Renderless on a 6800.

OK agreed, there must be something wrong with my system...

I do PC gaming and haven't seen any issues there so I don't think its my drivers, directx etc, but from this thread I'm suspecting my 6800gt:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=621694

If so I'll be pretty upset b/c I bought this card for my HTPC specifically. Anyway, can someone enlighten me as to what is the issue with this card?

BTW, I am using Lanczos (1?) anyway it doesn't say Lanczos2 so could this be a factor? I've had it running for over a year now...

And I am setting ZP DVD setting to VMR9 Windowless, but not sure how to get 'VRM9 Exclusive Renderless' don't think that was out when I built this PC. Please fill me in.

Also- I checked with perfmon, and sure enough, the problem is *not* CPU as its only running at around 75%.

Thanks again,

AC

See less See more

Save

arcticool

Discussion Starter · #8 · Dec 25, 2005

Please respond in the thread below, since the title is probably more on topic at this point (I don't think I need a seperate HW upscaler, I think I need to fix my HTPC for some 6800GT specific issue)

Thanks,

AC

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=620888

Save

stanger89

· #9 · Dec 25, 2005

http://forum.inmatrix.com/index.php?...6&hl=exclusive

Save

1 - 9 of 9 Posts

Status: Not open for further replies.

Top Contributors this Month