Integrated ATI Radeon HD3200 graphics (DirectX10) - Blu-ray support

[tanman]

Hi all

hopefully i can sort of piggy back on this topic

i have an elonex media center thingy and i bought a ati low profile card ATi HD3450 and it plays hd movies all day long but when i put a blu ray movie in it stuuters something chronic. now i have a program powerdvd that checks your system to see if you can play blu ray and hd all the boxes are green but again when i play a blue ray disc the box goes red for the grahics card citing driver not updated but it is ???

any help would be great

thanx

Tan

[eden188]

tanman,

Sorry, not going to be much help here as I have yet to build mine.

What are you using to play your HD movies? PowerDVD? Just got the Ultra 8 version and there is an update available to resolve some issues with Blu Ray play back, not sure if it helps.

Issues fixed in this release:
Resolved video jumps forward 4 -5 seconds after resuming Blu-ray Disc playback.
Video distortion for a duration of 1 second.
Resolved BD Live issue, enabling playback of downloaded content.
Resolved BD Live playback issues for the Blu-ray Disc title "Transformers".
Resolved playback issues for the Blu-ray Disc title "Good Luck Chuck".

Cheers

[Salazar]

Hi Eden,

790GX?.... nice! £40 difference nearly doubles the cost of the board though! ouch

I havent tried a HD DVD yet, only Blu-ray. Yeah I have used Any-dvd before, dont have it installed right now but might actually install it again because...

This whole HDCP malarky is a pain in the ass!

Cyberlink Blu-ray Advisor is now saying my montior is not HDCP compliant! Which it is. When I have both lcd tv and monitor on at the same time, Powerdvd 8 Ultra crashes saying something about copyright protection (HDCP). If I turn one or the other off then no probs, so this leads me to believe its a graphics card issue. Its one of those issues that just started up out now-where, it seems.

Anyway, Im actually sending back my ATI Radeon 3650 and going for the 4850. Might be a bit noisier but I'm starting to get into pc gaming a bit now, so I want the extra graphical power!!!

[Salazar]

Originally Posted by tanman

i have an elonex media center thingy and i bought a ati low profile card ATi HD3450 and it plays hd movies all day long but when i put a blu ray movie in it stuuters something chronic. now i have a program powerdvd that checks your system to see if you can play blu ray and hd all the boxes are green but again when i play a blue ray disc the box goes red for the grahics card citing driver not updated but it is ???

Hi Tanman,

Hows the tan!?

I've recently successfully built my HTCP (still having the odd issue here and there see above post)

Firstly...

What HD optical drive do you have? Is it a combo drive?(HD-DVD+Blu-ray)

Which edition of Power DVD are you using?

How is your monitor connected, DVI? VGA? What monitor/s are you using and is it/are they HDCP compliant?

Have you tried using Slysofts Anydvd software as Eden mention a few posts ago? It runs in the back ground whilst you play a copyright protected and strips off the HDCP in real time.

Also it might be worth updating the optical drives driver, doing that actually solved a lot of my initial problems.

This process does prove to be a bit of a pain but its worth it in the end!! HD playback rules and the sound quality is stunning

[Salazar]

Originally Posted by tanman

when i play a blue ray disc the box goes red for the grahics card citing driver not updated but it is ???

On Cyberlink Blu-ray advisor, my grapihcs card driver also shows up as red but I have the absolute latest driver installed and it hasn't actually affected my blu-ray playback as of yet. Even my dual playback decoders on the second tab show up as red but my graphics card is fully capable of all 3. So I wouldn't put too much faith in the Blu-ray advisor.

[eden188]

Hi Salazar,

Good to hear from you again! So did you install AnyDVD in the end? My colleague has had a lot of HDCP issues prior to installing the software, now it works like a dream for him, he's actually gone out and bought it. I will probably do the same when I (eventually) get to build my HTPC (as soon as Scan's Today has most of my bits ).

You going for the 4850?? Nice one, that is currently on my mind at the moment. The main reason going for the 4850 is that it handles the 7.1 and HD audio (DD TrueHD, etc) via HDMI, so rather than spending the extra £40, I will probably get the same mobo as you have and go for the 4850 as well, BUT!! not straight away. Couple of reasons - price, no passive cooler, consumes huge amount of power. I have a 300W passive PSU for my HTPC at the moment, so, if I am going for the 4850, I will need to upgrade my PSU (must be passive) as well. So a basic setup with the standard IGP from mobo, then move onto the 48xx series, which hopefully in a few months time, they will bring in a budget one, that uses less power and able to be passively cooled.

Will keep you posted!!

[Salazar]

Hi Eden,

Na havent installed AnyDVD yet, I haven't had time to play another Blu-ray and tweak the syncing issues..yet. Will do though, out of principle I want my system working as it should, HDCP compliant! If all fails then I'll use AnyDVD as a back up.

Couldn't return my HD3650 as I'd had it for more than 7days so I'm going to get my monies worth out of it for a few months and then upgrade. Hopefully the 4870? will have come down a touch in price and I'll go for that. The 3650 is doing me fine for the moment, my setup plays Half Life 2 v well at 1920x1200 on the 24'' so I lovin that at the mo. Crisis? now that'd be a different story, seroius upgrade will be needed by the time I get around to playing that.

Don't you just love it when you respond to someones query, offer advice and suggestions and then never hear anything again. I know, it's not a crime but I'd like to know how the advice faired... Tanman.

Anyway I'm off to Turkey with the girlfriend for 2 weeks, keep me posted hopefully you'll have started the build when I return.

Peace

[eden188]

Salazar, when you're back from your holiday (hope you had a good one ). Some interesting read if you haven't come across these already.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/showt...=810710&page=2
http://www.avforums.com/forums/showt...652538&page=20

[Salazar]

Originally Posted by eden188

Salazar, when you're back from your holiday (hope you had a good one ). Some interesting read if you haven't come across these already.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/showt...=810710&page=2
http://www.avforums.com/forums/showt...652538&page=20

Hi Eden,

How goes it?

Im not back from Turkey... yet! But managed to get online with our hotels crappy wireless.. no charge though. Been missing the web and my newly constructed pc! Dont get me wrong the holiday is great but I think 10days is enough for a decent hol, wanting to head home now, leaving Sunday.

Thanks for the links above. More avenues of complication to explore it would seem. The Project HTPC website is cool, looks like a great resource, just about to dig in and have a look!

Did you see the last issue of Custom PC mag? (issue 60) Had a large article on building a HTPC, shame I'd already built mine! And to be honest I did a better job than they did for the cash (even if I do say so myself!). Worth checking it out if you didn't read it, which you should by the way, current issue has a PC building master class article - building from scratch. Might help you out on some of the finer details, depends on your knowledge I guess, this was my first build.

Any how, much progress with your build? Any changes to the design?

Cheers

Salazar

[eden188]

Turkey...Ahh, nice kebabs....Mmmmm . Hope you are having a good one anyway!

Not read the CustomPC yet, is it in the latest issue? I'll pop out to buy it just to get some (hopefully) good advice from it. I've always built my own PC, but may be able to pick up some neat tips. Thanks for that .

I've been hanging on with doing a bit of research and certainly helped! I did want to go with the following setup but changed a few items:

AMD 4850e -----------------------------> Now Phenom 8750 (Scan reduced price massively on this cpu , and will be using HT v3.0 in case the BD playback problem (probably not related))
Gigabyte GA-MA78G-DS3H --------------> Now Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H (Scan out of stock and now the board costs more :|, plus the S2H has eSATA port as well)
4 Gb RAM
LG GGC-H20L HD/BD drive
Asus Triton 75 fanless heatsink

So far, only got the CPU, but hoping that the Scan's TodayOnly offer has the rest of the bits I need, then I will be complete. Saying that though, my Onkyo AV amp has gone back to repair, it's been 2.5 weeks now, I still haven't got it back .

[Salazar]

Chicken shish!!!!

Custom PC is an excellent read, just right for the PC builder! Check it out, you'll love it. Current issue is 061/Oct 2008 and features the PC building master class, but not really that relevant to you as you've built before. The one you want to read is the last issue with the HTPC build article. You can have my copy if you want it, def worth a read but not essential.

Mmm... yeah I wondered about going for a trip/quad core and taking advantage of the HT3.0(5200MHz). I liked the look of the Phenom 9850 (OC UK - £130) and then would be able to go for the 1066mhz memory as well instead of the 800mhz. The 9750 looks like great value from Scan, they are awesome. They just one the Custom PC Dream PCs award 2008 with they're 'Scan 3XS Great White' coming in at £11,162.49!!!

I decided in the end that I was getting carried away and would wait for a drop in price for the quads and perhaps upgrade then, reducing the cost of the initial build. Also, I've heard that quad cores aren't quite up to scratch yet, so for HTCP (mainly single task processing) purposes I'd actually have less power - 2.5ghz instead of the 2.9ghz I have now with the dual core for less than half the money. Also, the graphics card GPU now taking some of the weight off the CPU is an added bonus from the forced (and betrayed by gigabyte and my only lack of research during the build!) extra graphical purchase.

The GA-MA78GM-S2H looks good, looks to be no difference to the GA-MA78G-DS3H except for the e-sata connection on the I/O. Looks handy, do you know if I'm able to connect an external sata connection with some sort of pci slot insert and connect it to one of the mobo spare sata sockets? That'd be good for future purchaes if possible.

Sounds annoying about your amp, maybe take up to 4 weeks you think? You had it long?
I bought a 'cheap but does the job' AWIA of ebay for £30 a couple of years ago now. The guy listed it as not having any SPDIF optical inputs for surround sound and nobody bid on it but I did my research and it had 2. The guy evens delivered it as he was local... one of those rare and truely lucky deals! I'd like to upgrade it now for something with a HDMI input, any suggestions? I haven't started to look into it yet as spent all my spare cash on the PC!

[eden188]

Yep, read CustomPC before and quite tempted to subscribe.

TBH, I wasn't going for a x3/x4 cpu before as it seem over the requirement for the HTPC (the 4850e is more than suffcient and better energy efficient - 45W compares to the 95W of the Phenom, I just hope my 300W passive PSU will cope), but I was concerned of the BD playback which some people have reported, so I went safe and bought the x3, especially now AMD has dropped the price . I think you did the right thing about building a 'good enough' HTPC rather than paying over the odds for a mega machine.

I think the next upgrade for both of us would be the 4xxx series VGA card, this is true if they do deliver HD audio over HDMI .

I think this is what you might be looking for:

http://www.virtualvillage.co.uk/item...LAID=190620711

I've bought my amp about 8 months ago, although very good amp (Onkyo 875), it's been back twice for repair , it does handle everything you can throw at though. Great buy on your amp! Unless you want a tidy solution and the latest HD audio, then the Onkyo is pretty good. The one I have was about £1000 8 months ago, now it's about £599 , there are other slightly lower range but just as good ones, all depends on what you need it for. Remember though, upgrading the amp will tease you to upgrade the speakers, adding further costs

Anyway, have fun with the holiday!! It's chucking it down here at the moment, so bring the sunshine back with you .

[eden188]

Salazar,

Hope you had a good holiday. Finally built my HTPC with the following spec:

Phenom 8750
2Gb RAM
Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H mobo
LG GGC-H20L BD/HD drive

PowerDVD 7.3 Ultra (came with drive)
AnyDVD HD 6.4.6.6

So far (only built it yesterday and will be busy this weekend ), played both format without very little problem - tested 1 region A BD and 3 HD DVD movies. Did get a slight hiccup with the VGA driver, but downloaded 8.8 catylst drivers and now works fine. Blu Ray plays without a single stutter (more tests to be done yet), did come across a problem playing Transformers - The movie on HD DVD, I had to disable the network connection then it works.

My amp is still with the service center, and I'm not a happy chappy. Rang them yesterday and the engineer said they are not sure where the problem is, so won't be seeing my amp for a while!!

Anyway, will update you if I find any other 'interesting' bits!!

[Salazar]

Hey Eden!

Holiday was cool, thanks. Been a mad one since back at work though!!!
I took a pic of me with my isusse of Custom Pc in Turkey for the Custom Pc all over the world monthly article thingy. Sad I know, but I did jump of a large jetti into the sea whilst the girlfriend took the pic, quite amusing! Although as I was concentrating so much on thrusting the copy of CPC towards the camera that as I decended I landed fairly spread eagled in the water and got a proper ball bashing as i went in... ouch!!! Anyway, I'll let you know if they print it! Could get a free PSU, the only component I still need to update.

Ha! Glad you've finally got it built, you must be chuffed! Sounds like a decent setup. Good that it seems to be running smoothly straight away. My system now seems to be playing Blu-ray with no probs, watched 21 on the weekend. Quite a good film with cool casino close up cgi shots that look great on HD, bit of a gay ending though.

Project HTPC is cool, thanks for the heads up on that one. Check out my post and pics about my HTPC - http://www.projecthtpc.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=761 (you should get yours on there?)

Half Life 2 is amazing! Definately now looking at a new graphics card for around xmas time, prob a 4850 or 4870.

Currently looking at upgrading my 40'' Samsung 720p LCD to a 1080p 50'' plasma! But I want one with real 24p playback and 1:1 pixel mapping for the PC connection. Actually, thinking about it now I don't know if the LG GGC-H20L BD/HD drive can output 24p!? I'll have to check that out. Panasonic are doing some fairly decent panels but they are so ugly!!! So looks like I have to choose function over form. Have you seen the new LG PG7000 frameless plasma? Comes out in a few weeks and is just stunning to look at.

Sorry to hear you still havent got your amp back!!!! So now you've got blu-ray all setup but cant appreciate the sound quality yet!? Give the engineer on of these

[tanman]

Hi salazar

been a bit busy will get back to you over the week end but maybe an update is all thats needed


In fact that was all it needed thanx again

Thanx

[Salazar]

Hey Tanman,

Hows the tan!?

Glad you got it all up and running, you should post some pics on the ProjectHTPC forum in the new builds section.

Cheers

Salazar