HTPC Configuration advice

Cilus

laborare est orare
Use Media Player Classic Home Cinema or Splayer. Both can use GPU acceleration and offers lots of Post processing filters to improve video quality.
Go through the following guide to cofigure your player
Accelerate x.264 1080p movies over the GPU Guide
 

whitestar_999

Super Moderator
Staff member
@mohsin20,problem is that no quad core runs cool enough to set up in a mini-itx cabinet that too in a space as restricted & with poor ventilation as yours.you can setup such a system but i seriously doubt that the system will be stable if you leave it on for long duration of time.also kaspersky is cpu intensive during scan & most people usually schedule scan during night when going to sleep.

the best renderer when it comes to picture quality is madvr & is supported by MPC-HC, Zoom Player, J.River Media Center, PotPlayer and KMPlayer.it is best because it acts just like a computer game & use graphics card processing power to render video.also since it is the best it is also the most difficult to configure & needs a decent graphics card costing ~4000 or above.if you are not comfortable with experimenting with settings,driver installations etc my suggestion is continue with evr.
forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=146228

@cilus,gpu accn is used by video decoder to decode video & does not affect the picture quality which is solely dependent on renderer.madvr is the only renderer which uses graphics card shaders to process & render image & hence superior than any other renderer or post processing filter.it can bring a GT440 to its knees on a 30/60fps 1080i video :)
 
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Cilus

laborare est orare
Buddy, I've used MadVR too. But configuring it is a hell of a Job, in my case I have to configure the Video setting from Catalyst Control center Video setting menu. It also uses lots of GPU resources and can't really be used with actual HTPC Gfx cards. Although Post processing Shaders don't provide as good quality as madVR, they are easy to use and configure and can be used with low end HTPC Gfx cards. That's why I have suggested that. Similarly Splayer also does have most of the Post processing shaders included which can be applied very easily to improve the overall picture quality, up-scaling the Video etc.

And madVr is not the only renderer, most of the Post processing filters present in MPC-HC and sPlayer use DXVA acceleration. The new versions of MPC-HC does come with Pre-Processing filters too.
 

whitestar_999

Super Moderator
Staff member
@cilus,i agree that configuring it is a bit difficult but after reading almost 200 pages in madvr thread i think i can manage:grin:

this is why i recommended op to continue using evr in vlc/bs player & if he does need post processing filter mpc-hc like you said is a good choice.also i think mdvr uses a different logic than other post processing filters when accessing graphics card & that is why it consumes much more gpu processing power much similar to a pc game.still i think a 6670 or 5670 in a micro-atx cabinet is enough for all but most demanding videos(not usually available here anyway).i know this is not exactly a htpc setup but this is the price one pay for best possible quality :)
 
OP
M

mohsin20

Broken In
All this techno detailing about rendering is making my head fuzzy.
Question
1) will the 6550 gpu will be able to handle full hd rendering with madvr
2) which is better gpu for full hd the 6550d or 5570
3) the is the speed of the 6550. Like when i purchase a separate graphic card it tells me
that the speed is 512mb or 1gb or 2gb.
 

whitestar_999

Super Moderator
Staff member
will the 6550 gpu will be able to handle full hd rendering with madvr
yes with most videos but in such a closed space with poor ventilation cpu temp wll easily cross 70C & above.there is a very high chance of system shutdown because of high temps.

which is better gpu for full hd the 6550d or 5570
55705670 is much more powerful than 6550D
edit:my mistake :D i mistook 5570 for 5670 in a hurry

the is the speed of the 6550. Like when i purchase a separate graphic card it tells me
that the speed is 512mb or 1gb or 2gb
that is amount of ram in a graphics card.speed in graphics card usually means clock speed.also 6550D is on A6-3850 cpu.with A6-3650 you will get 6530D,a reduced clock speed version of 6550D.

you seem to be confused about what exactly you want & how much are you willing to pay/sacrifice for it.if you want a mini-itx setup playing hd videos using players you know & used then you already have your answer.if you want quad core processor & powerful graphics then you can't have it in a mini-itx cabinet in a closed space.

edit:mad:mohsin20,it seems that ico's post got deleted which he posted just after this in the database crash.he posted that 5570 is just ~20% faster than 6550D & in llano graphics is on the cpu chip itself so if you want graphics other than 6550D/6530D etc you have to buy a separate graphics card.ico also mentioned that cpu will not reach 70C & it may be true for normal usage but if you use madvr then i have read posts about people reporting temp crossing 70C easily because madvr will use cpu integrated graphics resulting in high cpu usage which will increase the temp & especially in your situation.
 
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