Hi:
I tried doing a search on these forums but haven't been very successful, hence this post. If it has been discussed before could someone kindly point me in the right direction please.
I have a HTPC at home. The machine/PC is a Shuttle SN27P2 with a PCI-e graphics card slot. As it is a Shuttle, it only has one other slot - a PCI slot, directly next to it which I would require for my capture card (a Hauppauge HVR-3000). I currently have a Gigabyte 7300GS graphics card and while it seemed to work fine for general video playback (AVIs & MKVs at highdef), including (quite surprisingly) Freeview|HD (even on TV3 @ 1080i), I suspect it will not be up to handling BluRay playback as it lacks hardware H264 decoding. Hence, my question - what would be a good/recommended (minimum) graphics card for BluRay playback for my HTPC?. As mentioned I'm going to use it on a Shuttle so space is a bit of a premium. Also as this is my dedicated HTPC sitting in the lounge, I want to be be absolutely quiet, hence I would prefer passive heatsink (rather than a fan) on the graphics card. I saw there was an XFX 8500GT with passive heatsink that might fit, but it looks like no one in NZ sells it anymore as it might be out of line already. I'm running MediaPortal 1.0 Final as the HTPC software. Running winXP SP3.
Anyone has any ideas/suggestions?
Oh, by the way I'm only ever going to use the PC as a HTPC and no games...
Thanks.