[frederic]

I need help playing 3D movie content with my HTPC. After using my good old sony hs20 projector for over ten years (crazy isn't it) I finally bought the epson 5030ub projector. WOW, what an upgrade!



I already have an HTPC - I had one since win2005 media center edition. I am now running win7 ultimate with media center, with an intel core i3 that must be a few years old. Everything is working great. I have a few TV tuners.


But of course now I want to play 3d content on it. And this is where I need some help.


I read many post on this forum on this topic. But I am now more confused than ever...

Here are a few questions around playing 3d movies on my HTPC:


- do I need a new video card to play back 3d video? Or can my old core i3 handle the task? If I need a video card which one is the easiest to set up and would give the best picture for 3d content. I don't play game on the HTPC - so I am only concerned about video and sound quality.

- do I need a bluray software player? I think I do, but just to be sure. If I do, which one works best with windows media center?

- I obviously need a bluray drive as well. Which one should I buy that would be region free?

- I already use anydvdhd on the HTPC to make backup of DVD. how can I make a copy of a bluray 3D? And play the backup from my hard drives? Will I need to create MKV files? What is the easiest solution to accomplish this task?



Thank you very much for your help with these questions, hopefully this will help other people as well.

 

[frederic]

Just a quick update about the setup:


I have an old onkio rt260 AVR. I finally received the 3d bluray player. I hooked it up to the AVR and to my surprise, everything worked great. The AVR is passing 3D video from BD player without any issue, I was afraid the old receiver would have issues with 3D, and I am using an old and long (40+ feet) hdmi cable between receiver and PJ. But everything is working great.


Now back to HTPC, win7 recognized the PJ via the onkio to be a 1920x1080, but when I setup MCE to send a progressive signal, the video playback was stuttering, like the built in GPU could not keep up. I then switch mce to output a 1080 interlaced and now the video playback is good.

Does this make sense to you guys? Do you think the intel core i3 GPU is too little for a 1080P signal?

It looks like it, and this makes me think I am not going to be able to do any 3D with the core i3 CPU if that is the case.

I read some post that maybe I should buy a new graphic card. Seems like the R7 series is recommended by renethx.

Do you guys think I can just add an R7 240, 250 or 260 into my built and that would allow me to play 3D?

If I do this, how do I switch off the GPU in the CPU?


Is there a great Bluray drive for HTPC that people would recommend?

 

[ikkuranus]

I have hooked up plenty of lower end intel sandy and ivy bridge systems to my projector and none of them have issues with 1080p. (lower end being celerons, pentiums, and I3s)

My guess is either there is something wrong with yours or you have a first generation I3 which I can't comment on.