Freeview HD success with Intel (X4500) onboard video

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TangoNZ

115 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 3

Topic # 25244 16-Aug-2008 10:25

Hi guys,

I've been testing Intel's latest onboard video (X4500HD) the last couple of days using the following two boards from Gigabyte, and can say the results have been pretty good so far...

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=2878
http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=2877

I tried the EG45 board briefly, but have done most of the testing on the cheaper EG43 board. Using a Intel Dual Core 2180 CPU, 2GB RAM, HVR2200 via another TV Server box, Vista SP1 and Media Portal RC2. I'm using the Arcsoft TMT h.264 codec (tested the Power DVD 8 codec briefly but was getting a bit of picture corruption).

Using the chipset drivers that came on the motherbaord CD the picture was stuttering a bit, so I download the latest drivers from Intel's website and now everything seems to be running mint. Its connected to a Sony Bravia 1080P rear projection TV. Initially the desktop area was outside the borders of the TV and I couldn't find anywhere in Intel's very basic driver to fix it (like NVidia's resize HDTV desktop), but in the end randomly changing the apsect ratio sliders seemed to make the driver output a perfect fit for the TV so all good.

CPU usage is about 10% and all channels are pretty much perfect, and not having the problem with the Media Portal interface flashing like I did with the 780G board. Only glitch seems to be on some interlaced channels, the edges of red colours seems to jitter a bit, but nothing major.

So all in all pretty promising, beats the pants off AMD and NVidia onboard solutions from what I've seen so far and audio over HDMI worked straight away with no config needed. Anyone else had a play with this board?

Galex

7 posts

Wannabe Geek

Reply # 157490 17-Aug-2008 10:56

Hi, thats interesting, I was wondering about those boards.
One point, the Gigabyte website says that the GA-EG43M-S2H board has the Intel GMA X4500 chipset [ http://tinyurl.com/5z9697 while the GA-EG45M-DS2H has the Intel GMA X4500HD [ note the HD ] - http://tinyurl.com/6cxrct ] , do you think this is a typo on their site??

Quidam

291 posts

Ultimate Geek

Reply # 157521 17-Aug-2008 14:40

Sorry to go off topic, but it sounds like you are using a separate PC as a TV server, I assume using media portal, so I'm going to ask for some help, if you are able to offer any.

I was trying to set this up but have not had any success.

The client PC just seems to freeze when I select My TV. I've specified the hostname correctly + I've tried entering the IP address in diectly -but I just can't get it to connect.

If I run the client on the same PC as the server, it works fine. If you do have any ideas as to what the issue might be, I'd appreciate your thoughts.

Cheers
b

"There is no way to Peace -Peace is the Way" (A. J. Muste)

TangoNZ

115 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 3

Reply # 157639 18-Aug-2008 09:16

Hi Galex, I don't think it is a typo as Intel's own website has the same thing. Not sure what it means though in terms of performance, they both seemed the same in terms of hi def decoding from what I saw.

Quidam, the first thing I would look at is if you are having firewall problems. Try running the MP client in a window when you try and connect to see if a firewall dialog box is popping up in the background. I've had that issue before. Maybe also try temporarily turning off the server firewall to see if thats causing the problems. If it is turn it back on and set up an exception for the server.