Computer specs: Dell Dimension 4700, 1GB RAM, 3.0GHz CPU, 160GB HD, WinXP Pro, DVD-ROM drive, PCI-Express. Neither me nor my future wife EVER watch television, just movies, so we don't want to get a TV when we get married in a couple of months. We just want to get a good setup for watching DVDs on the computer. Right now, I just have the Intel integrated video card which is VGA-only, and the quality on the DVDs isn't so great. Dark colors are washed-out, sometimes the video skips to catch up, etc. I have a 17" Dell Ultrasharp 1704 LCD digital-ready monitor (though I think we'll be getting a 20" widescreen because everything we watch is widescreen). I want a video card that works well for watching DVDs and DivX files. I don't play any PC games so it doesn't need to be a super high-end card. I just want the cheapest card I can find that does what I need... Could I do something as inexpensive as a Radeon X300, or do I need something like a GeForce 6600, or something even better? Thanks!
you might want to look at a new DVD drive as well... i would have said moitor too, but you already are, also, what are you using to play the movies... sometimes they give you shit programs when you get the puter 55
I'm using a Dell factory-installed CD-RW/DVD-ROM drive with PowerDVD (or ALShow sometimes). Would it be better if I got a different configuration?
is the disc clean? this is weird, it should be able to play just fine... when you run the video, do you have anything else going on in the background? you have one gig ram so you should have plenty of sys. Resources yet thats what it sounds like the prob is... hhhmm 55
It really only happened when I watched AVI files, like TV episodes. Every five or ten minutes the video would skip a little bit and then catch up with the audio. I ended up getting a GeForce 7800GS video card with 256mb of RAM, and everything is lightyears better. Thanks for the help.
can anyone suggest a good but not crazy expensive capture card that would work well with chris tv? also maybe one with the mpeg decoder as ive heard those are better..thx
Highly recommend the Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150 (Pricegrabber Link) You can get it for around $79. I recently picked one up for $39 after an additional rebate. The card is awesome. Captures are beautiful and very configurable. I personally use GB-PVR (the best free PVR software made, IMO). I capture DirecTV satellite signal using the s-video input on the card. I love the ability to be able to capture at up to 12mbs. I have a P4 3.4ghz with 2 gigs of RAM and even at the maximum capture rate I've never experienced a single hiccup or problem with a capture even when running many apps at the same time. The hardware encoding on this card is excellent. Whatever you do, get a card with a hardware encoder - well worth a few extra $$. If you pick up this card you can tweak it with ChrisTweak (I use the free Hauppauge Tweak Tool (Link) which does a reasonable job, although ChrisTweak seems more in-depth). The PVR-150 has a large support community and seems to be very highly regarded on all the video forums I visit. I'm extremely satisfied with it. If you're looking for a hardware encoder AND decoder, then I'd recommend taking a look at the Hauppauge PVR-350, though I'm not sure if it is supported by ChrisTV. Not too many cards have hardware decoders and personally I'm not sure it's really necessary because there are quite a few excellent software players/decoders around. The difference in price is significant as well (I think the 350 is about double the price of the 150).
i got the 150 a while back, yet i never got the Remote working, maybe it was just my setup, but i got fed up and took it beack 55
thx for all the help..im all about freeware with the pvr so ill have to check it out. what exactly do you have to tweak with the cards? Yea i imagine with 2 gigs of ram it would be pretty smooth ..ha. I was planning on also buying the dsm-520 to get the full dvr experience and also play divx from the hd... before i purchase all this want to make sure everything will play nice and run smooth as possible...thx again sweet5588, did you just get fed up because of the remote setup? how was the product overall otherwise?
don't know... no matter what you do the quality of a capture card will be nowhere near that of actually getting a box from whatever TV company you use... after realizing this i decided to go ahead and have two boxes, using the 150's Remote to control my home-built Media Center PC.. but since it didn't work... i didn't test out the other features. Just so you guys know, i think it's Tivo just came out with a box to transfer all of your recorded shows onto your pc... that looks like a great option. 55
My future wife doesn't watch TV either. She just cooks and cleans and gives me compliments. She'll be graduating high school in the spring and is smoking hot. My current wife isn't going to like her very much. I know she's out there somewhere.
hehe That's funny, if only all women were like that... but i like girls w/ a bit more experience... high school is a little young.. haha j/k 55
