Computer build questions on motherboard brands and cpu specs- vid encoding

[deadrats]

distributors paid big bucks for those cpu's and they are not about to sell them at a lose, outdated or not.

you can bet that there will be some nice price cuts as retailers and distributors try to get rid of existing inventory to make room for the new stuff.

I sense a discord in the matrix neo?

the first statement refers to the core2quads, for some reason i've noticed that their prices have stayed high, asking price is still on par with i7 asking prices, despite being outdated processors.

the second statement refers to amd cpu's, which seem to be subject to significant price cuts if you shop around; my theory is that intel showed no mercy in bulk pricing with the core2quads and thus there is little wiggle room for retailers, i suspect that amd has been much more forgiving with their bulk pricing; you can get an 8 core opteron for $270:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819105266&cm_re=opterons-_-19-10...-266-_-Product

and a 115w 12 core opteron for $770:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819105267&cm_re=opterons-_-19-10...-267-_-Product

i expect to see prices of existing amd cpu's to make a decent drop if bulldozer comes out and kicks ass.

[usually_quiet]

The rated wattage on a PSU is the maximum it is supposed to be able to supply without failing. It actually only draws enough power to meet the demands of the hardware it is feeding, plus a little bit more due to less than 100% efficiency when converting from AC to DC.

you know what, you're 100 percent right; i just realized the logical inconsistency in providing a link showing a 6 core processor under load only using 220w and then turning around and implying that a 1100w ps would always be drawing 1.1 kilowatts, now that i think about it it's kind of a no duh, of course the ps isn't drawing max wattage all the time, it is was then it would also be supplying it to the computer parts all the time and it would fry your system in no time.

do i feel silly.

Think nothing of it. We all have a "duh" moment now and then.

Alternatively, if a 1.1 KW PSU it used all that power all the time without burning up the system, then it would be exhausting the excess as heat, and could substitute nicely for a hair dryer or space heater in a pinch. Goodbye 80 plus bronze certification.

[yoda313]

Ok after some serious consideration I've decided to put this project on hold indefinitely.

I believe it was deadrats who put the suggestion out there. I am beginning to realize I might be getting in over my head for two reasons - I really don't need it and I'm not sure what I'd do with it when I get it.

I tend to get into these bouts of GREED HIGH ANXIETY. I tend to fixate on one thing that I just have to have. It tends to get out of control sometimes.....

I can really do everything I need to with my dual core. Its just relatively slow compared to whats available now. Also I don't know where I'd use the new rig or what workflow I'd put it through. I don't even know what would be the first thing I"d encode with it. I have just about all my blurays encoded to dvd already. I really don't convert my commercial dvds to view on my wdtv - I just pop in the original dvd into my xbox 360 or ps3. So all in all I really can't see what I would really use it fo.

I think what I will do is take some of the money I've set aside for this project and upgrade my ram from 2gb to 4gb on my dual core pc. I think that should give me a satisfying power boost on my 32bit vista home premium dual core 2.7ghz pc. I may also look into getting a larger harddrive but I also don't really need that as I back up a lot of my stuff to dvdr anyway.

---------------------------------

But I do want to give a giant thanks to everyone who's contributed to this thread. I do feel like I could tackle this when the time is right. I just think I'd be doing this half-baked and not really get what I want anyway. I thinks its best to wait for a better opportunity and use what I have.

I started to realize I haven't been enjoying what I do have and spending lots of time and energy WANTING something when I have so much already. So I do want to end on a note of thanks for all the help and advice i've gotten. The time will come when I will upgrade and I will do it right.

Thank you again.

(I needed to do this confession online so I wouldn't run around in circles in my mind trying to convince myself to go ahead with it - it feels more final "publishing" it here).

[lacywest]

Yoda 313 ... " I just pop in the original dvd into my xbox 360 or ps3 "

My step grandson lives with us ... and he has a XBOX 360 ... and he plays DVD Movies with it in the living room. At the moment he has it elsewhere ... I guess he has it in his mom's bedroom.

Anyways ... he connects the cables to the front panel of my Pioneer VSX 1015 ... he uses the ... yellow red white cables.

[yoda313]

It bugs me that he is watching DVD Movies with it. Is there a Dolby Digital output on these units ??

It depends on how you are hooking it up. I don't know about the most basic rca connection cables. The next step up is the component cables that also includes the rca cables. If you are using these then yes you have a fiber optic port on it. Its a little bump out on the back of the cable. You just hook up the fiber optic to the connector and your set. FYI It does do DTS.

Come to think of it I'm not 100& sure the component cable has the fiber optic port. I'm nearly certain but its not in front of me right now. What I have hooked up right now is the vga cable that does have the fiber optic port. But I know they do have them and I can do dd and dts with it - well I haven't done dts in ages on the xbox but again I'm nearly certain it does do dts.

EDIT - yes the component cable for the xbox 360 has both component and rca on it AND a fiber optic port. It is on the back end where you physically connect the jack to the xbox. All you have to do is plug in a normal fiberoptic cable into the slot on the back of the connector and you are good to go.

I don't believe the basic rca cable jack that comes with the 360 has the fiber optic connector on the back of the jack. The 360 as you know does not have a dedicated fiber optic port. The new SLIM models MIGHT but I don't know, I have an early hdmi model - after my first non hdmi rrod'd. Both were bought used.


AND by the way it does DTS just fine. I popped in my Jurassic Park 3 dvd and selected dts and my dts indicator kicked on on my receiver. I played the t rex versus spinosauras scene and it shook the room beautifully.

[deadrats]

@yoda:

obviously i think you're making the right decision, i would even go one step further and hold off on upgrading the ram as well for 1 very big reason; namely the sandy bridge based celerons that are soon to be released.

they will have low clock speeds (the fastest will be 2.5ghz), no virtualization support, no hyperthreading, no turbo and only 2mb of L2 cache; basically they're the red headed step child of the sandy bridge family.

so why would you, or anyone else for that matter, want one? because they are slated to cost well under $100 and supposedly they will have intel's quick sync technology (they do have the decent integrated dx10 gpu).

if intel prices them attractively you would be able to mate a roughly $60-$70 cpu to a $50 motherboard, throw in 4 gigs of ddr3 (about $40) and for about $150 (sans tax) have a setup that can encode 1080p mpeg-2 and h264 at hundreds of frames per second as well as decode vc-1, h264 and mpeg-2.

throw in a $100 nvidia dx11 card and you now even have a pretty decent gaming system, assuming that the game makes use of nvidia's physx technology.

i'm just talking about myself right now, as much as i want to go out and buy a 12 core opteron or a 6 core 12 thread i7 or a 4 module 8 core bulldozer (as soon as it's released) i am confronted with the reality that for the vast majority of users, including me, it's a waste of money, unless you're compiling big projects on a daily basis or using some high end 3d rendering software or using purely software based open source video encoders coded by guys who know nothing other than cpu programming, most people will have a smoother computing experience upping the ram to the 8 gig range and using an OS that makes intelligent use of the ram (like vista, win 7, presumably win 8 or a distro with the latest kernel).

main concept has an sdk that uses their api as a abstraction layer for using intel's quick sync, considering the market penetration main concept has and how many popular apps use their sdk, it's only a matter of time before even a SB based celeron will run like stink on a monkey with most software packages.

the sad thing is that no matter how fast these cpu's get at h264 encoding it's going to mean jack if h265 becomes dominant, as h265 is so ridiculously demanding, in both encoding and decoding, that it makes vc-1 encoding look like x264 on the ultra fast settings (a core i7 took 6 hours to encode 8 frames, LOL!!!):

http://x264dev.multimedia.cx/archives/360

[yoda313]

@deadrats - this is the first I've heard of h265.

How very typical - high def video is hardly MATURE yet and they are already working on a new standard?

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Fyi I checked and my poor motherboard on my win vista pc MAXES at 2gb. I'm already at the max. So I have to pass on that upgrade.

But I'll stop fretting about some piece of hardware I don't really need right now and enjoy what I do have - software and hardware (ie movies and pcs). No sense in worrying about trying to get some substandard hobbled together kit working.

I think part of my realization came last night when I was trying to get some stuff working in Ubuntu. It is kind of fun learning new stuff. But in the end I realized I didn't really want to potenially waste a bunch of hours learning something new that I can already do on two pcs with xp an vista.

I don't mean to say learning ubuntu/linux isn't worthwhile. I will also probably get back into someday. I just figured I didn't want to commit to that endeavor now.

But I still appreciate everyones efforts to push me in the right direction.

[lacywest]

It bugs me that he is watching DVD Movies with it. Is there a Dolby Digital output on these units ??

It depends on how you are hooking it up. I don't know about the most basic rca connection cables. The next step up is the component cables that also includes the rca cables. If you are using these then yes you have a fiber optic port on it. Its a little bump out on the back of the cable. You just hook up the fiber optic to the connector and your set. FYI It does do DTS.

Come to think of it I'm not 100& sure the component cable has the fiber optic port. I'm nearly certain but its not in front of me right now. What I have hooked up right now is the vga cable that does have the fiber optic port. But I know they do have them and I can do dd and dts with it - well I haven't done dts in ages on the xbox but again I'm nearly certain it does do dts.

EDIT - yes the component cable for the xbox 360 has both component and rca on it AND a fiber optic port. It is on the back end where you physically connect the jack to the xbox. All you have to do is plug in a normal fiberoptic cable into the slot on the back of the connector and you are good to go.

I don't believe the basic rca cable jack that comes with the 360 has the fiber optic connector on the back of the jack. The 360 as you know does not have a dedicated fiber optic port. The new SLIM models MIGHT but I don't know, I have an early hdmi model - after my first non hdmi rrod'd. Both were bought used.

AND by the way it does DTS just fine. I popped in my Jurassic Park 3 dvd and selected dts and my dts indicator kicked on on my receiver. I played the t rex versus spinosauras scene and it shook the room beautifully.

He is not doing any of that ... he uses the ... Yellow - Composite Video .... and the normal ... White and Red audio.

My Pioneer VSX 1015 processes the composite video input to ... Component Video for the Sony HDTV in the living room.

I also have a decent system in the bedroom but it is only a 5.1 sound system. My wife wont let me mount speakers on the back wall ... he he he

[yoda313]

@lacywest - just get the component cable for the xbox 360 at target or walmart or bestbuy or whatever and you'll be fine. It still has composite cables on it but you can use component too (just move the little slider to "hdtv"). Then you'll have the output port for the fiber optic jack on the back of the connector block that goes into the xbox.

It shouldn't be more than 30.00 or so give or take. Check out gamestop and they may have some used. Either that or try ebay.