FullHD PC-Player

[feed_back]

I'd like transform my old pc into a mediacenter for my lcd 1080, so waiting my cables i'm looking around...

My problem is that my hw is not so powerfoul (integrated vga+p4 2.8+512mb), so i want to find the best codecs in cpu usage, considering also upscaling and post-processing.

My idea was to use for:

mpeg2
ffdshow+media player classic bicubic upscaling (dx9)+ffdshow full postprocessing

divx
dix codec+media player classic bicubic upscaling (dx9)+divx full postprocessing

h264
CoreAVC+no upscaling+no post processing

My questions are:
-do you know any better solution?
-is the ffdshow upscaling better/faster than the mediaplayer one? which setting (lancoz...h2qx..)?
-in mediaplayer classic upscaling which settings provide best quality?
-should i consider to buy a vga? ati or nvidia to use gpu decodig support (dvax,cyberlink+avivo,purevideo)?
-any link about the cpu and gpu playback performance?

grateful for any suggestion
Matteo

[Shakey_Jake33]

At the end of the day, you either go for speed, or you go for post-processing... you can't really have it both ways.

It's generally regarded that upscaling in ffdshow produces better looking results than upscaling in the renderer. I don't do this, I'm happy with the results given by Haali Renderer (though given Haali uses shaders etc to scale, it might benefit from a better GPU... I have a 7900 GTO, which while not the best, it still very decent), and I'm a bit fussy about speed. But upscaling in ffdshow will be slower than in renderer.
I point out that I personally use no post processing in ffdshow, though mainly because I am of the school of thought that believes the loss of detail caused by post-processing isn't worth the false polish that it results in (as well as the CPU usage)... but we all have our own opinions on the matter.

A new graphics card would be helpful for codecs that use DVAX for acceleration (such as Cyberlink). However, be aware that CoreAVC and ffdshow do not use GPU acceleration (the latter probably never will), and CoreAVC is by far the fastest H.264 decoder, despite being pure software. Something to think about.

If you want to decode 1080 video, then post-processing is the first thing you will be disabling.

If worst comes to the worst, Overlay Renderer is the fastest, though I'm far too used to Haali Renderer to be able to bear with it!

[markrb]

If you were able to pick up a newer low cost video card with hardware acceleration that would help greatly.
Look at Nvidia 8500GT or 8600GT(S). Make sure it is HDCP compliant though. All 8600GTS's are, but 8500GT and 8600GT depends on the individual card.
You could also look at the 3850 from ATI, but they cost more at the moment. The 2600 from ATI doesn't have as much acceleration as the newer ATI cards, but may have enough for you.
For about $100 you could greatly increase your systems ability for video.

Mark