noob questions... again :) (1 Viewer)

[mague]

Hello,

i am planning to use a Hauppauge Nova S-plus on a Intel Atom330. My screen is a 1280x1024 LCD. I want a single box solution with access to a NAS.

I do not need lots of features. Just Sat TV, AVI/MP4/MKV and DVD once in a while. I dont record TV much. The main goal is to get rid of 3 remote controls and merge TV, video and DVD into one device I dont need HD support.

I searched this forum an it seems this will work out well. I have a few questions though..

How well is scaling working ? Some Sat channels are HD or HD ready, others are good old PAL. Will the Atom board and the GMA 950 be fine when scaling HD widescreen down to 1280pix ?

Does Mediaportal have adjustable scaling ? I have a huge collection of digitized VHS movies. I digitized them 1:1 which includes the overscan (if someone still remembers overscan ) I tried SesamTV and its video player has realtime scaling. Its possible to scale the picture with the cursor keys or up/down on the remote. That way i can scale those old overscan videos to fit and look like VHS on PAL. Unfortunately SesamTV doesnt seem to support my Nova S-plus.

Is the video player able to access the file system using the remote control ? I am not a big fan of databases tbh. I just want to access drives and folders and play the movies on them. Be it NAS or USB stick or whatever is available. I am getting almost daily legal AVI and just want to plug the USB stick in and watch them. Usually i delete them afterwards. Right now i use the notebook for this, but really want to merge this all into one remote controlled TV set.

Is it possible to use an external movie player ? While i probably could bear with the codec insanity i really would like to use mplayer and forget about all the codes If it is possible, do the external players listen to the remote control when having focus ?

Is the Hauppauge remote sufficient or should i buy a MCE remote ?


Thanks in advance

Oh.. does standby/wake up work well with the intel atom board. And did anyone try to use a atom 230 board ? The easier i can cool it the less noise

 

[Owlsroost]

If you are think about Atom based boards, have a look at https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/hardware-selection-help-62/mediaportal-itx-59885/

MP is demanding of the graphics hardware (GPU) - it uses 3D rendering for the user interface, and the GPU on the Intel GMA950 is not very powerful......especially if you need de-interlacing for HD content.

Tony

 

[thebalance]

I've had an atom 230 board, single core 1.6ghz from intel with 2gb 667 ram.

It could cope perfectly with 720p resolution (pretty much maxed out though so don't try anything else at the same time) - I only changed to a "normal" board when I decided I wanted more power for full HD content. The intel board was very very noisy with the stock fan.

I wouldn't worry about how MP does the media files - I have several hundred AVI files and MOV files (from digital cameras) and was testing and the system picks up changes to the file system seamlessly (at least as well as Explorer responds) - I would guess the database is only really used for IMDB type of information.

In terms of accessing the file system with the remote control, yes it can - if you set it up right and get the remote working - I have an Imon pad which is now working and I have registered 2 sets of folders for movies - 1 is my videos from camera and 1 is movies and I can seamlessly work with both.

Cannot help on the other questions, sorry.

 

[etheesdad]

Hello,

i am planning to use a Hauppauge Nova S-plus on a Intel Atom330. My screen is a 1280x1024 LCD. I want a single box solution with access to a NAS.

I do not need lots of features. Just Sat TV, AVI/MP4/MKV and DVD once in a while. I dont record TV much. The main goal is to get rid of 3 remote controls and merge TV, video and DVD into one device I dont need HD support.

I searched this forum an it seems this will work out well. I have a few questions though..

How well is scaling working ? Some Sat channels are HD or HD ready, others are good old PAL. Will the Atom board and the GMA 950 be fine when scaling HD widescreen down to 1280pix ?

>> see thread about Atom and HD https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/hardware-selection-help-62/mediaportal-itx-59885/

Does Mediaportal have adjustable scaling ? I have a huge collection of digitized VHS movies. I digitized them 1:1 which includes the overscan (if someone still remembers overscan ) I tried SesamTV and its video player has realtime scaling. Its possible to scale the picture with the cursor keys or up/down on the remote. That way i can scale those old overscan videos to fit and look like VHS on PAL. Unfortunately SesamTV doesnt seem to support my Nova S-plus.

>> YES, see VideoZoomModes - MediaPortal Manual Documentation

Is the video player able to access the file system using the remote control ? I am not a big fan of databases tbh. I just want to access drives and folders and play the movies on them. Be it NAS or USB stick or whatever is available. I am getting almost daily legal AVI and just want to plug the USB stick in and watch them. Usually i delete them afterwards. Right now i use the notebook for this, but really want to merge this all into one remote controlled TV set.

>> YES

Is it possible to use an external movie player ? While i probably could bear with the codec insanity i really would like to use mplayer and forget about all the codes If it is possible, do the external players listen to the remote control when having focus ?

>> YES, but codecs are very straightforward, Hoborg has done a lot of work on a self-installer that does it all for you. see https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...rtal-saf-dxva-ready-mpeg2-h-264-vc-1-a-44614/ also avoids the issue of having to program the remote for an external player.

 

[mague]

Hello,

thanks a lot for the answers. I think this all sounds promising.

I have set up an old AMD board yesterday to test Mediaportal but it seems the board died while installing Mediaportal. It went poof half way through the SQL installation No, i dont think it was Mediaportal's fault

I am going to buy an atom 330 intel board today and give it a go. The 2nd core should help a bit compared to the 230. The noisy little fan is no problem. My custom case has room for a huge passive northbridge cooler or a 8db Papst fan.