HTPC's and bluray

[biff]

Thanks for the help Dave. I've pretty much spent the day reading up on this - except for ducking out to peel wallpaper when the wife was watching. Looks like there are only two cars ATM that will do this, the Asus and an Auzentech. The high quality analog outs are important to me as one duty, and probably the main duty, is for music. With the analogs I can do what I want with the signals rather than having to rely on whatever presets a AVR may have. With the Auzentech I'd need to use their breakout cable then 3.5mm to rca adapters then the RCA's, at least the Asus is RCA's straight out. I've been reading though that the ASUS isn't without it's issues but I don't think they'll apply to me anyway. First is an issue of 24Hz video, not sure what even uses 24hz but it'd probably drive my eyes buggy anyway. Also an issue of HD DVD audio over the HDMI cable, well I just won't buy/rent any HD DVD's and I don't need audio over the HDMI anyway. So it looks like I might be OK.

[cadaveca]

I bought the HDAV becuase you can swap out the opamps on the analogue side to whatever suits your taste. I'm not fond of the X-FI processor either(I just hate creative's processing; you'll find very few musicians like it, at least, that's how it is locally.), so Auzen offers nothing for me personally. Either card is capable though, so don't let my opinion sway you in either direction.

24hz is for the 120hz monitors. Unless you have one, don't worry about it. 24hz does not = 24FPS, by the way. Well, it does, but only if the source(Bluray 1080p) is 24hz...most TV's do NOT support 24hz, and use 3:2 pulldown to deal with it(adding in extra frames by repeating). Either way, 24hz only works well with 120hz TVs, as 24x5=120, so each "frame" is displayed 5 times. I highlight "frame", becuase it coincides to an actual frame off of print film.

I say it's doesn't = 24FPS, because it's not 24FPS that's displayed...


And honestly, for bluray, a pc is not the best option currently. Any decent Bluray player has analogue RCA outs, just as these cards do, and the lack of fans(plus thier now lower price) wins me over. It's why I have all three...pc, PS3, and a Sony BDP-S350...

[Toronto122]

BIFF--- what system are you running? Receiver, TV, speakers, etc?

I'm having a hard time with this too...I like to think of myself as a pretty good PC builder, but the HTPC thing eludes me.

I'm having some difficulty understanding how this is supposed to work...Let's just say I have a theater, there's a projector, and a receiver with HDMI inputs (Pioneer SC-07). IF I were to buy an Asus HDAV sound card, what good would that do me? How do I get the sound AND the picture to my receiver?

Also, I'm assuming that when we're talking about 5.1/7.1 analogue outputs, we're referring to the minijacks on a sound card and going into the multi-channel input right? IF that's the case, then I can see this working (getting True HD ets).

ALSO...what is THE BEST ($$$ no object) DVD playback software? I'm NOT using the PC to play back Blu Ray discs, I have a dedicated player for that.

AND...I'm currently using VLC media player...When I enable the 5 channel audio on it, the thing starts to stutter...not the video, only the audio. I'm using on board sound at the moment. Is this a codec problem?

Thanks for any input

[cadaveca]

HDAV would allow you to get both sound and picture over HDMI. The analogue outs are optional. Plug the HDMI into a HD-audio capable reciever, and use the HDMI-out form the reciever to your display.

So, HDMI-out from VGA, into HDAV, into receiver, into display. VGA makes the video, HDAV adds teh audio, receiver decodes it, dispaly, well, displays.

Unfortunately, due to liscencing issues, you've gotta pay for good BLu-Ray playback. PowerDVD or WinDVD seem ot be the only options out there, and PowerDVD does a better job than WinDVD(I paid about $90 each for both).


For just DVDs, you don't need the HDAV...any recent soundcard will work...use HDMI from your VGA direct to your display, and either optical or coaxial digital-out to your reciever. The HDAV and teh auzentech HDMI-capable cards are for HD- playback, whether from HDDVD or BLuRay.


In comparing dvd-playback on PC, vs a seperate player...so far teh PS3 does the best scaling of DVDs to HD resolutions. The one benefit that the PS3 has over all teh others is that the firmware is upgradable, so as things change, the PS3 can be updated to dela with them properly. This is most evident in the example of BD-Live...alot of early BD players are NOT BD-Live capabel, becasue of a lack of onboard memeory...my BDP-S350 included(although this only really requires 1GB of storage). I paid $399 for the BDPS-350...and the same price for the PS3...of course, I can play games on the PS3 too...

[biff]

Toronto122,

I haven't got much figured out yet. I need to get something figured out for IR on my HTPC and get windows & on my main machine then put Vista on the HTPC and THEN I'll be able to start trying to figure out the setup. I read most of a LOOOOONG thread about the HDAV on AVSforum and the HDAV isn't without problems. One big one is getting to play nice with media center software. Apparently it will work fine but you will still need to use a mouse/kb so exit the media center software and run TMT. Maybe other solutions exist but they have a lot of experienced people there and they haven't found one yet. My goal is to run most common tasks with a remote (make it wife friendly) so I'm not sure if that card will work for me right now.

They were also mentioning that there are only a handful of blurays out right now that take advantage of the higher bitrate, IIRC they said ~20 disks that user 96kHz and only 1 that uses 192kHz so I'm not sure of the advantages of that card yet. I'm sure most new releases will start to take advantage of it though. I don't know if I should wait on this or not. I will be using analog out for my setup BTW.

Sorry for the wishy-washy reply but I'm just starting out on this and there's a lot to absorb.

[cadaveca]

I'd wait. I'd even suggest that using teh pc(as I have before) for BLu-Ray playback is not a good idea, so spending the extra cash trying to get it to work is a waste. I've already taken that route...don't follow me down it!

[Toronto122]

I agree with you about blu ray playback on HTPC....my client (this isnt' for me) is using an Elite Blu Ray player, Elite SC-07 receiver, and the Elite Projector....all with Monitor Audio Silver series speakers....STUNNING! The caveat (IMO) is his SVS sub....they just don't impress me. All lows, no impact. I like sealed subs. (he has the Cylinder).

What I want the PC for is to make ISO files of his movies (4tb of HDD space) and be able to use MyMovies ( My Movies - Home ) with an IR remote to control everything...the remote is pretty basic stuff. Ripping the movies...no problem...BUT, I'd like the best and friendliest playback software out there.

And it has to integrate to Windows Media Player somehow.

Much like you Biff, it has to be user friendly. No keyboards, no mice. Just a remote. Granted, a kb/mouse will be used for ripping the movies, but other than that....all simple button pushes.

I bought him a Creative X-Fi Platinum sound card. Hopefully this helps with the stuttering issue in the sound.

Thanks for the replies!