Home Theater project - need input

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Fri Jan 14, 2011 1:30 pm

Small update, I decided to get a fanless ATI HD5450 to help full decoding ability plus the bonus of being able to bitstream since the AMD processor is on the weak side with that.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102877&Tpk=N82E16814102877

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Fri Jan 14, 2011 1:47 pm

So here is the setup as of now:

CASE: COOLER MASTER Elite 360
MOBO: MSI MS-7184 v1.0
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3500+ w/Stock HSF
RAM: 2GB DDR SDRam PC3200
Optical: Older OEM HP DVD / CDRW
PSU: ZALMAN ZM500-RS 500 Watts
HD: Kingston SSD 64GB + 2GB WD SATA II
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD5450 (Cedar) 512MB 64-bit DDR2 (DVI/HDMI/DSUB)

I am loading some 720p movies now to Media Center with the suggestions from post above and had some issue with playback. I did some research and purchased / installed CoreAVC to help decode the video form .mkv files & AC3 filter to decode on the audio side. as a result I can now view 720p h/x.264 movies smoothly and output to my LCD TV via the HDMI cable. I am a happy camper!

Lots more to do and tweak but so far I like this setup alot.

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Sat Jan 15, 2011 10:42 am

Iwish I could find a IDE Blue Ray player for this rig as i have already occupied the sole 2 SATA connectors on this motherboard. I guess I'll have to throw in a SATA if I want a Blue Ray Optical Drive more drive when I run out of room which shouldn't be no time soon. (Yeah right!)

eGoCeNTRoNiX · Post by **eGoCeNTRoNiX** » Sat Jan 15, 2011 12:54 pm

PCI-E SATA card should fix that problem for you

eGo

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Sat Jan 15, 2011 1:10 pm

I have only one PCI-e slot which will house my video card so I need an older PCI slot card. I'll have to sacrifice speed for more storage but not an issue right now. So down the road I'll cross that bridge.

normalicy · Post by **normalicy** » Sat Jan 15, 2011 3:20 pm

There's also IDE-to-SATA adapters.

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 12:37 pm

Ugh, issues. Got the vid card in and for some reason no matter what I set the motherboard graphics card at it will not display anything. i tried the vid card on another machine and it works fine. Could my motherboard not support this vidcard? I just tried the DVI & D-Sub outputs, not the HDMI output.

Now to think of it, This motherboard is PCIe v1.0 and this card per Sapphire is backwards compatible to 1.0....but perhaps it is not. Could that be my issue?

I called Sapphire to ensure that this card & mobo are compatible, so mad now..

normalicy · Post by **normalicy** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 1:35 pm

I personally have had no issues with cards not working in 1.0 slots, but it's possible. Is it possible that you need to manually disable the onboard video first?

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 1:40 pm

normalicy wrote:I personally have had no issues with cards not working in 1.0 slots, but it's possible. Is it possible that you need to manually disable the onboard video first?

tried that, to no avail.

normalicy · Post by **normalicy** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 3:28 pm

BIOS update?

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 3:53 pm

I looked it up and all I could find is this one:

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex?softwareitem=pv-39428-1&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&os=228&product=1127351&sw_lang=

It is not citing any fixes to PCIe so I would probably be taking a chance in using it. My luck it will brick the darn thing.

I could go get another board on the forums or ebay I guess. Would a board like a DFI Lanparty NF4 Ultra-D be PCIe 2.1 compliant?

Otherwise, in the interim I'll have to stay with 720P only movies for now and tweak the settings in CoreAVC & AC3 to make the playback reasonable.

normalicy · Post by **normalicy** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 5:17 pm

I've found times where BIOS update changelogs weren't telling the whole story, but if you don't want to mess with it, I don't blame you.

Are you sure that the 4pin connector is attached on the Motherboard?

normalicy · Post by **normalicy** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 5:19 pm

Of course, you could try to contact Sapphire.

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Tue Jan 18, 2011 6:41 pm

normalicy wrote:I've found times where BIOS update changelogs weren't telling the whole story, but if you don't want to mess with it, I don't blame you.

Are you sure that the 4pin connector is attached on the Motherboard?

Yup 4 Pin is connected.

I'll call sapphire tomorrow thanks for chiming in.

DaMaN · Post by **DaMaN** » Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:37 am

Before you say it, yeah i know I am crazy...

I picked up a nice AM2 mobo / cpu / ram purchase for $80.00 which would enable me to use my HDMI vid card and future proof my build to enable the use of a Phenom II X2 processors which can be easily unlocked to work as a Quad. If anybody wants to buy any of the old build that is not listed here just send me a PM.

Here's the new specs:

CASE: Lian Li PC 65 (I needed more HD storage space!!)
MOBO: MSI 785GT-E63
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3200+ (AM2) w/Stock HSF
RAM: 2GB DDR2 Kingston HyperX
Optical: IDE OEM HP DVD / CDRW
PSU: ZALMAN ZM500-RS 500 Watts
HD: Kingston SSD 64GB (boot)
HD2: WD 2TB SATA II
HD3: WD 1TB SATA II DVD RIPS
HD4: WD 1TB SATA II DVD RIPS
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD5450 Fan-less (Cedar) 512MB 64-bit DDR2 (DVI/HDMI/DSUB)
OS: Windows 7 32 Bit w/ XBMC

I still haven't invested in a wireless keyboard, but otherwise what else do you think it needs to be up to the task I listed above + be a place to encode video? I think with 2GB more of ram and a Phenom II.