Is my P3 1.5Ghz Fast enough for PVR?

[shlap]

I've had an old Dell Dimension 8100 P3 1.5Ghz w/512RDRAM 80GB HD sitting around collecting dust for awhile now that I'd like to use as a PVR. I found a couple of cheap vid cards that are compatible with Windows Media Center.

Video Card: nVidia GeForce FX5200 128MB 8x
Capture Card: Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150MCE

With this hardware, do you guys think my PC would be fast enough to encode desent quality video? Thanks in advance!

[greymalkin]

based on my lookup of that card it's a hardware mpeg encoder, so you should have no problems unless MCE has some outlandish requirements. For recording tv programs straight to mpeg i'd say this would do it comfortably. If you want to edit and re-encode then you might want a beefier system.

[gll99]

Don't know how much difference there is with the p4 1.6. I run it OC'd at 2.2 though but capturing to mpeg2 DVD full spec 720x480 averages around 50% of the cpu using a bt878 card with software only encode. The only other difference might be that I have a 200 gig 7200 8mb buffer dedicated drive my old drive was an 80 gig 5400 . When I capture to divx full res avi the new hdd makes a lot of difference. It shows up as at least 20% less on the cpu usage. If you have a hardware assisted card there should be no problem.

[edDV]

I've had an old Dell Dimension 8100 P3 1.5Ghz w/512RDRAM 80GB HD sitting around

Video Card: nVidia GeForce FX5200 128MB 8x
Capture Card: Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150MCE

With this hardware, do you guys think my PC would be fast enough to encode desent quality video? Thanks in advance!

The MPeg2 encoding load is all done internally in the PVR-150MCE so CPU usage should be mimimal if you close video monitoring.. For playback the FX5200 has MPeg2 decode support if you use the right player. Again not much load is put to the CPU.

Don't know how much difference there is with the p4 1.6. I run it OC'd at 2.2 though but capturing to mpeg2 DVD full spec 720x480 averages around 50% of the cpu using a bt878 card with software only encode.

Interesting. Which MPeg2 encoder are you using?

[Zen of Encoding]

I've had an old Dell Dimension 8100 P3 1.5Ghz w/512RDRAM 80GB HD sitting around collecting dust for awhile now that I'd like to use as a PVR. I found a couple of cheap vid cards that are compatible with Windows Media Center.

Video Card: nVidia GeForce FX5200 128MB 8x
Capture Card: Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150MCE

With this hardware, do you guys think my PC would be fast enough to encode desent quality video? Thanks in advance!

An old PC with the above specs will work perfectly as a PVR. But
forget the "nVidia GeForce FX5200 128MB 8x", that's a gaming
card, it has little to do with TV video performance.

The only purchase I'd make to add to your old system would be
*giant* hard drive, perhaps 400 or 500 Gig. You'll probably also
need a cheap little IDE interface PCI card so that the older P3
mother-board will be able to recognize the 400-500 Gig drive.

[wwjd]

By using a capture card that has on board hardware mpeg encoding you should be ok especially if you turn off video viewing during cap.

I think the more important question is; what are you going to do with the video once you cap it? Are you just going to watch it on your pc? Burn it to DVD? Your system is fine for capture but is under powered for encoding or converting to something like wmv or divx. You can do it but it will take a long time.

I do think you need more HDD no matter what your goals are. If you use this like a PVR it will take no time at all to fill an 80Gb drive. I use my PC as a PVR and have been down this road.

[shlap]

But forget the "nVidia GeForce FX5200 128MB 8x", that's a gaming
card, it has little to do with TV video performance.

Well, the current video card is an old nvidia gforce2 mx/mx400 and Windows Media Center says the video card is incompatible and won't even let me access the PVR functionality. Is there any way around this?

[edDV]

So you are running Widows Media Center or are considering installing it? What do you own now?

In other words are you in planning mode or trying to dig out of a problem?

Windows Media Center is intended for new computers purchased from an OEM manufacturer that will support it.

An "old Dell Dimension 8100 P3 1.5Ghz" is not a good starting point for a Windows Media PC. Your post should have been titled "Is my computer adequate to run Windows MCE" Microsoft would say "No way". Some MCE forums may be able to guide you.

Other PVR options exist depending on what you have already purchased.

[reboot]

The FX5200 is the bottom end of the GeForce line that works with DX9 and has TV out, so it's a good choice. There are cards that will do what you want, that don't work directly with DX9, but for less than $50, it's a good choice.
Your MX2 may just be too slow to give you consistent playback. Try it first.

The PVR-150 does all the encoding in hardware, so your P3 is plenty fast enough. Some people are running PVR-150's on P3 800's and 1ghz. Slow, but they work.

Stay away from MCE though. Your computer is just slow enough, that it will bog down completely with MCE. You don't need MCE. There are plenty of full featured PVR apps that do much more than MCE, and some are free (gbpvr, gotall media, mediaportal).

Definitely grab another hard drive, and install it specifically to hold your recordings, leaving the OS on a drive by itself. You'll get much better results, smoother playback, and more storage.
Once you start recording stuff, an 80 gig (minus the OS size) will fill up in a couple of days.

[greymalkin]

I agree with reboot..i've used gbpvr for quite some time and it's incredibly easy to use and set up. media portal i found to be way too complicated setting up the xml tv guide..i got it working but it was way more of a hassle than it should have been..the gbpvr setup is very straightforward and the channel guides update automatically.