Freeview DVB-T compatible videocards.

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#127531 1-May-2008 12:04

AceVPD:
Guys I need your advise.

Will a 8400GS be good enough or should I spend the extra money & get a 8500? It's for home theatre PC use only. PB Tech have a fanless Gigabyte 8400GS on special for $66 inc GST so might get that.

I have borrowed a 8500GT from a mate as he was selling it cheap. It is working well with the 1080i sample files the Fossie posted but it has a fan & is noisey so I'm not that keen on buying it from him.

Does brand matter much?

thanks

I was in the exact same boat as you a week ago. After spending a bit of time trawling the web looking at reviews etc (you will note there are hardly any real reviews for the 8400GS) and reading between the lines on the Nvidia site and others I came to the conclution that it was not worth taking the risk and got a xfx passive 8500GT. I would suggest doing the same.

On thing that I found very interesting was that the 8400GS was not going to be for general release but only be an OEM part preinstalled in hardware.

The 8500GT's are quite a bit more then the 8400GS's but I think there is a good reason for that..

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AceVPD

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#127623 1-May-2008 15:32

Nety - Where did you buy your 8500GT from?

HTPC: 3G P4, 2GB RAM, Nvidia 8500GT, HVR 2200 (for FreeviewHD), 2x Hauppauge PVR-150 (1 for analog TV + 1 for AV input), Windows 7
Display: 42" Panasonic Plasma
Blu Ray/Games: PS3

Nety

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#127643 1-May-2008 16:36

Just got it from Acsent, $114 including delivery. You can get them for less but not significantly (at least passively cooled) and I know Ascent have top notch after sales support + you know it will arrive the next day.

AceVPD

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Master Geek

#127650 1-May-2008 17:08

I just checked PB Technologies web site & they have the Gigabyte 8500GT for $99inc GST. It doesn't say but the picture looks like it is passively cooled.

They are on my way home from work so may pick one up from them after I've done a bit more research. I dont know if it makes any difference but my mate told me that it's bet to get the same brand Video Card as your motherboard so you know that they will work well together.
http://www.pbtech.co.nz/index.php?item=VGAGBV0069

HTPC: 3G P4, 2GB RAM, Nvidia 8500GT, HVR 2200 (for FreeviewHD), 2x Hauppauge PVR-150 (1 for analog TV + 1 for AV input), Windows 7
Display: 42" Panasonic Plasma
Blu Ray/Games: PS3

mentalinc

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#127659 1-May-2008 17:30

AceVPD:I dont know if it makes any difference but my mate told me that it's bet to get the same brand Video Card as your motherboard so you know that they will work well together.

Lies - They are all the same thing 99% of the time "reference boards" all that may change is what comes in the box or heatsink (not going to effect compatibility.

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huckster

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#127660 1-May-2008 17:37

Having accepted that the integrated ATI HD3200 is not going to work, I'm looking at the 8500GT as an alternative. How are you connecting these to the TV? I have VGA and HDMI on the TV so is a DVI to HDMI adapter ok? Is it better to get a card with HDMI output (e.g. Leadtek's PX8500GT)?

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breny

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#127678 1-May-2008 19:07

I am using the MSI 8500GT card with HDMI output to my Samsung 32" LCD.
Video and audio working very well over the HDMI connection with the TV decoding the digital audio ok.
We use the PC/LCD TV setup every night to watch TV1 news as the reception here of TV1 is rubbish and the digital reception through the PC setup is flawless.

I have no experience with a VGA cable but I can vouch that it's worth pursuing the HDMI option (or DVI to HDMI option if you don't mind running a separate audio cable).

Nety

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#127773 2-May-2008 06:43

breny:
I have no experience with a VGA cable but I can vouch that it's worth pursuing the HDMI option (or DVI to HDMI option if you don't mind running a separate audio cable).

Depends on the video card. The XFX I got has a passthrough for spdif sound which I am using so only have the one cable going DVI to HDMI.

I would say go DVI to HDMI if you can. Better then VGA.

AceVPD

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Master Geek

#127780 2-May-2008 08:15

I found that DVI gave me richer colours over VGA.

HTPC: 3G P4, 2GB RAM, Nvidia 8500GT, HVR 2200 (for FreeviewHD), 2x Hauppauge PVR-150 (1 for analog TV + 1 for AV input), Windows 7
Display: 42" Panasonic Plasma
Blu Ray/Games: PS3

Nirodha

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#128108 3-May-2008 05:27

huckster: Having accepted that the integrated ATI HD3200 is not going to work, I'm looking at the 8500GT as an alternative. How are you connecting these to the TV? I have VGA and HDMI on the TV so is a DVI to HDMI adapter ok? Is it better to get a card with HDMI output (e.g. Leadtek's PX8500GT)?

AMD-ATI seem to have some driver issues. I updated to the newest ones recently and it killed video on several Freeview channels - all I got was grabbled reception or just a green screen, although the audio was fine.

The 8.420.0.0 drivers work well with Freeview HD though, at least on the ATI HD 2600 XT they do anyway.

kind regards

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xlinknz

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#128440 4-May-2008 18:19

Has anyone got a PCI [non express] card working with DVD-T ?

I see on the list the ATI HD 2400 which does come in PCI which according to their web site supports HDCP and H.264 decoding and specifically hardware decoding of MPEG4

http://www.powercolor.com/Global/products_features.asp?ProductID=1715

I haven't found a HD 2600 yet in PCI
My current home PC doesn't have a PCIe slot and is only a Pentium 4 2.4Ghnz

Thoughts ?

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mentalinc

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#128443 4-May-2008 18:25

Do you not have AGP slot either?

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#128446 4-May-2008 19:00

mentalinc: Do you not have AGP slot either?

Very old PC only has a AGP 4x ADAPTER

Nety

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#128465 4-May-2008 20:32

I would be VERY supprised if you could get enough performace out of it. AGP is not really working for people so PCI which has a much much lower bandwidth is pretty much a right off I am afraid.

Mattv

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#128470 4-May-2008 21:01

Slightly off topic but can anyone confirm whether all the compatible cards that are mentioned here will work with blu-ray h.264 encoded discs at 1080p resolution? in particular will the 8500GT have enough "grunt" for 1080p or would you suggest going for a 9600GT? (Would rather save myself $150 odd but want to furture proof things a little too)

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