Mailing List Archive: MythTV: Users

nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed

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neil-on-mythtv at restricted

Dec 27, 2004, 11:37 PM

Post #1 of 20 (1211 views)
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nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed

hey guys,

I'm about to buy an Nvidia FX5200 PCI with DVI interface at newegg.com to
build my own mythtv. But found out that there are many models of this. Which
should I buy please? Please respond. I only wanted a PCI version as my board
doesn't have an AGP slot.

Thanks,

Neil
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brandon+myth at linuxis

Dec 28, 2004, 7:13 AM

Post #2 of 20 (1187 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

They are all pretty much the same. The chip is what is important, not
really who makes it. Some cards varry, but by so little it really
doesn't make a difference for a HTPC. If you have an option of buying
one with a fan or without, go for without if noise in the HTPC is
important, otherwise the extra air doesn't hurt. Mine does not have a
fan, but I've made sure the case fan moves air over the heatsink enough
to keep the card and more important the cards around it cooler. I did
have one fx5200 go bad, probably due to overheating in my old case which
I filled to the max and it couldn't handle that.

--Brandon

On Tue, Dec 28, 2004 at 01:37:54AM -0600, Neil wrote:
> hey guys,
>
> I'm about to buy an Nvidia FX5200 PCI with DVI interface at newegg.com to
> build my own mythtv. But found out that there are many models of this.
> Which should I buy please? Please respond. I only wanted a PCI version as
> my board doesn't have an AGP slot.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Neil
> _______________________________________________
> mythtv-users mailing list
> mythtv-users [at] mythtv
> http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users

--

neil-on-mythtv at restricted

Dec 28, 2004, 8:17 AM

Post #3 of 20 (1192 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

Ok. Now, here is another question. I'm a little confused about doing a combo
with FX5200 and the pvr cards. I know that PVR-250 doesn't have any mpeg
decoder feature while as the PVR-350 have this kind of feature. If I buy the
nvidia FX5200 card and PVR-350, will I still be able to use 350's mpeg
decoding feature and have it tv-out on the FX5200 card?

Thanks,

Neil

Brandon Beattie writes:

> They are all pretty much the same. The chip is what is important, not
> really who makes it. Some cards varry, but by so little it really
> doesn't make a difference for a HTPC. If you have an option of buying
> one with a fan or without, go for without if noise in the HTPC is
> important, otherwise the extra air doesn't hurt. Mine does not have a
> fan, but I've made sure the case fan moves air over the heatsink enough
> to keep the card and more important the cards around it cooler. I did
> have one fx5200 go bad, probably due to overheating in my old case which
> I filled to the max and it couldn't handle that.
>
> --Brandon
>
> On Tue, Dec 28, 2004 at 01:37:54AM -0600, Neil wrote:
>> hey guys,
>>
>> I'm about to buy an Nvidia FX5200 PCI with DVI interface at newegg.com to
>> build my own mythtv. But found out that there are many models of this.
>> Which should I buy please? Please respond. I only wanted a PCI version as
>> my board doesn't have an AGP slot.
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Neil
>> _______________________________________________
>> mythtv-users mailing list
>> mythtv-users [at] mythtv
>> http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
>
> --

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mlynch at gcom

Dec 28, 2004, 8:27 AM

Post #4 of 20 (1183 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

Nope.

Neil wrote:

> Ok. Now, here is another question. I'm a little confused about doing a
> combo with FX5200 and the pvr cards. I know that PVR-250 doesn't have
> any mpeg decoder feature while as the PVR-350 have this kind of
> feature. If I buy the nvidia FX5200 card and PVR-350, will I still be
> able to use 350's mpeg decoding feature and have it tv-out on the
> FX5200 card?
> Thanks,
> Neil
> Brandon Beattie writes:
>
>> They are all pretty much the same. The chip is what is important, not
>> really who makes it. Some cards varry, but by so little it really
>> doesn't make a difference for a HTPC. If you have an option of buying
>> one with a fan or without, go for without if noise in the HTPC is
>> important, otherwise the extra air doesn't hurt. Mine does not have a
>> fan, but I've made sure the case fan moves air over the heatsink enough
>> to keep the card and more important the cards around it cooler. I did
>> have one fx5200 go bad, probably due to overheating in my old case which
>> I filled to the max and it couldn't handle that.
>> --Brandon
>> On Tue, Dec 28, 2004 at 01:37:54AM -0600, Neil wrote:
>>
>>> hey guys,
>>> I'm about to buy an Nvidia FX5200 PCI with DVI interface at
>>> newegg.com to build my own mythtv. But found out that there are many
>>> models of this. Which should I buy please? Please respond. I only
>>> wanted a PCI version as my board doesn't have an AGP slot.
>>> Thanks,
>>> Neil _______________________________________________
>>> mythtv-users mailing list
>>> mythtv-users [at] mythtv
>>> http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
>>
>>
>> --
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> mythtv-users mailing list
> mythtv-users [at] mythtv
> http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
>

--
Michael J. Lynch

What if the hokey pokey IS what it's all about -- author unknown

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kuphal at dls

Dec 28, 2004, 8:42 AM

Post #5 of 20 (1175 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

Neil wrote:

> Ok. Now, here is another question. I'm a little confused about doing a
> combo with FX5200 and the pvr cards. I know that PVR-250 doesn't have
> any mpeg decoder feature while as the PVR-350 have this kind of
> feature. If I buy the nvidia FX5200 card and PVR-350, will I still be
> able to use 350's mpeg decoding feature and have it tv-out on the
> FX5200 card?

Short answer, no. The long answer is that you can compile MythTV with
support for XvMC which does MPEG-2 acceleration with the FX5200. It has
it's share of issues working with MythTV and I would consider it
experimental but it promises to do the same thing that the PVR-350 is
doing for you in accelerating the output.

Kevin

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neil-on-mythtv at restricted

Dec 28, 2004, 11:09 AM

Post #6 of 20 (1184 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

> Kevin Kuphal writes:
> Short answer, no. The long answer is that you can compile MythTV with
> support for XvMC which does MPEG-2 acceleration with the FX5200. It has
> it's share of issues working with MythTV and I would consider it
> experimental but it promises to do the same thing that the PVR-350 is
> doing for you in accelerating the output.
>

Thanks Kevin. Ok, so for now, I should not worry about. Then, what I really
need to do is go for the PVR-250 + Nvidia FX5200 card. Are the issues very
annoying?

Thanks.

Neil
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pwilliamson at mandtbank

Dec 28, 2004, 11:57 AM

Post #7 of 20 (1192 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

>>> neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted 12/28/2004 2:09:06 PM >>>
> Thanks Kevin. Ok, so for now, I should not worry about. Then, what
> I really need to do is go for the PVR-250 + Nvidia FX5200 card. Are
> the issues very annoying?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Neil

Neil,

IMHO, it's a winning combo.
Don't forget the 250 does incoming video+sound.
The 5200 only does outgoing video. You'll need to
come up with something to do outbound sound.

Pick a distibution...then you can move on.
Gentoo? Information is out there...
Knoppix? Yep, out there too
Fedora? Yep, same deal
Suse? Dunno, but I'm sure it's not too different from Fedora
Debian? Getting Fuzzier...
Centrix? No idea
QNX? Probably not, but it would be cool to see

Odd are there will be no significant (if any at all problems). IvyTV
will address the PVR-250 drivers, and nVidia will address the
FX 5200 drivers. Both are fairly standard, and there is no overlap
in features/functionality between the two. Other than the
250 will encode the incoming signal in a format that the
5200 can conveniently decode.

Paul

kuphal at dls

Dec 28, 2004, 12:09 PM

Post #8 of 20 (1184 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

Neil wrote:

>> Kevin Kuphal writes:
>> Short answer, no. The long answer is that you can compile MythTV
>> with support for XvMC which does MPEG-2 acceleration with the
>> FX5200. It has it's share of issues working with MythTV and I would
>> consider it experimental but it promises to do the same thing that
>> the PVR-350 is doing for you in accelerating the output.
>
>
> Thanks Kevin. Ok, so for now, I should not worry about. Then, what I
> really need to do is go for the PVR-250 + Nvidia FX5200 card. Are the
> issues very annoying?

Not really sure, from reading the list the obvious ones are a B&W on
screen display and other OSD related issues.

Kevin

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dzerdecki at gmail

Dec 28, 2004, 12:29 PM

Post #9 of 20 (1168 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

Does I really need acceleration on teh Fx5200? Could I play divx and
xvid without it? For that matter does mythv oujtput look ok without
it?

Thanks.

Drew

neil-on-mythtv at restricted

Dec 28, 2004, 12:33 PM

Post #10 of 20 (1184 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

PAUL WILLIAMSON writes:

>>>> neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted 12/28/2004 2:09:06 PM >>>
>> Thanks Kevin. Ok, so for now, I should not worry about. Then, what
>> I really need to do is go for the PVR-250 + Nvidia FX5200 card. Are
>> the issues very annoying?
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> Neil
>
> Neil,
>
> IMHO, it's a winning combo.
> Don't forget the 250 does incoming video+sound.
> The 5200 only does outgoing video. You'll need to
> come up with something to do outbound sound.
>
> Pick a distibution...then you can move on.
> Gentoo? Information is out there...
> Knoppix? Yep, out there too
> Fedora? Yep, same deal
> Suse? Dunno, but I'm sure it's not too different from Fedora
> Debian? Getting Fuzzier...
> Centrix? No idea
> QNX? Probably not, but it would be cool to see
>
> Odd are there will be no significant (if any at all problems). IvyTV
> will address the PVR-250 drivers, and nVidia will address the
> FX 5200 drivers. Both are fairly standard, and there is no overlap
> in features/functionality between the two. Other than the
> 250 will encode the incoming signal in a format that the
> 5200 can conveniently decode.
>
Great to hear that! So what about that grey scale in OSD when using xmvc,
will that get fixed too?

Thanks.

Neil

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neil-on-mythtv at restricted

Dec 28, 2004, 12:35 PM

Post #11 of 20 (1170 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

PAUL WILLIAMSON writes:

>>>> neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted 12/28/2004 2:09:06 PM >>>
>> Thanks Kevin. Ok, so for now, I should not worry about. Then, what
>> I really need to do is go for the PVR-250 + Nvidia FX5200 card. Are
>> the issues very annoying?
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> Neil
>
> Neil,
>
> IMHO, it's a winning combo.
> Don't forget the 250 does incoming video+sound.
> The 5200 only does outgoing video. You'll need to
> come up with something to do outbound sound.
>
> Pick a distibution...then you can move on.
> Gentoo? Information is out there...
> Knoppix? Yep, out there too
> Fedora? Yep, same deal
> Suse? Dunno, but I'm sure it's not too different from Fedora
> Debian? Getting Fuzzier...
> Centrix? No idea
> QNX? Probably not, but it would be cool to see
>
> Odd are there will be no significant (if any at all problems). IvyTV
> will address the PVR-250 drivers, and nVidia will address the
> FX 5200 drivers. Both are fairly standard, and there is no overlap
> in features/functionality between the two. Other than the
> 250 will encode the incoming signal in a format that the
> 5200 can conveniently decode.
>
> Paul
>

Great to hear that! So what about that grey scale in OSD when using xmvc,
will that get fixed too?
Thanks.

Neil

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pwilliamson at mandtbank

Dec 28, 2004, 12:45 PM

Post #12 of 20 (1169 views)
Permalink

Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

>>> Neil <neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted> 12/28/2004 3:33:58 PM
>>>
> Great to hear that! So what about that grey scale in OSD when
> using xmvc, will that get fixed too?
>
> Thanks.
>
>Neil

I have no idea what XvMC does, but I'm pretty sure
I'm not using it. I have my machine set up using Jarod's
guide, and I think it's disaled by default in ATrpms.

Same deal for grey scale OSD. I'm not sure what all the isues
are with it. My On screen display is just fine. I haven't
fiddled with anything that would make the OSD
more or less transparent, so I'm not sure if it's
broken or if that's even what all the OSD hub-bub
is about...

Paul

kuphal at dls

Dec 28, 2004, 1:01 PM

Post #13 of 20 (1179 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

PAUL WILLIAMSON wrote:

>>>>Neil <neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted> 12/28/2004 3:33:58 PM
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>Great to hear that! So what about that grey scale in OSD when
>>using xmvc, will that get fixed too?
>>
>>Thanks.
>>
>>Neil
>>
>>
>
>I have no idea what XvMC does, but I'm pretty sure
>I'm not using it. I have my machine set up using Jarod's
>guide, and I think it's disaled by default in ATrpms.
>
>Same deal for grey scale OSD. I'm not sure what all the isues
>are with it. My On screen display is just fine. I haven't
>fiddled with anything that would make the OSD
>more or less transparent, so I'm not sure if it's
>broken or if that's even what all the OSD hub-bub
>is about...
>
>
>
XvMC in a nutshell is MPEG-2 playback acceleration using the video card
to do things in hardware normally done in software. If you have a
capable processor, XvMC is unnecessary, but if you are using a low-end
machine as a frontend, it could matter. I personally don't use it but
that's what it is for.

Kevin

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brandon+myth at linuxis

Dec 28, 2004, 1:14 PM

Post #14 of 20 (1179 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

On Tue, Dec 28, 2004 at 01:09:06PM -0600, Neil wrote:
> >Kevin Kuphal writes:
> >Short answer, no. The long answer is that you can compile MythTV with
> >support for XvMC which does MPEG-2 acceleration with the FX5200. It has
> >it's share of issues working with MythTV and I would consider it
> >experimental but it promises to do the same thing that the PVR-350 is
> >doing for you in accelerating the output.
> >
>
> Thanks Kevin. Ok, so for now, I should not worry about. Then, what I really
> need to do is go for the PVR-250 + Nvidia FX5200 card. Are the issues very
> annoying?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Neil

For non-HD, there really aren't any issues. Some seeking in HD material
is causing problems, but that's all that I have seen lately.

--Brandon

brandon+myth at linuxis

Dec 28, 2004, 2:18 PM

Post #15 of 20 (1160 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

> Not really sure, from reading the list the obvious ones are a B&W on
> screen display and other OSD related issues.

The OSD is not B&W any longer for XvMC on NVidia cards. OSD can cause
the display to lock when seeking but I've only ever had this happen on
HD files, never SD that a pvr-x50 would encode.

--Brandon

quaff at clippersoft

Dec 28, 2004, 2:20 PM

Post #16 of 20 (1183 views)
Permalink

RE: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

Just to say ditto - Using XvMC with the 5200 you get grayscale - w/o it
everything works perfectly - smooth and non-pixelated. I thought XvMC was
more for VIA anyway...Whatever the case, it is not needed with the
5200/PVR250 combo...

-Matt

-----Original Message-----
From: mythtv-users-bounces [at] mythtv
[mailto:mythtv-users-bounces [at] mythtv] On Behalf Of PAUL WILLIAMSON
Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2004 3:46 PM
To: neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted
Cc: mythtv-users [at] mythtv
Subject: [mythtv-users] Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed

>>> Neil <neil-on-mythtv [at] restricted> 12/28/2004 3:33:58 PM
>>>
> Great to hear that! So what about that grey scale in OSD when using
> xmvc, will that get fixed too?
>
> Thanks.
>
>Neil

I have no idea what XvMC does, but I'm pretty sure I'm not using it. I have
my machine set up using Jarod's guide, and I think it's disaled by default
in ATrpms.

Same deal for grey scale OSD. I'm not sure what all the isues are with it.
My On screen display is just fine. I haven't fiddled with anything that
would make the OSD more or less transparent, so I'm not sure if it's broken
or if that's even what all the OSD hub-bub is about...

Paul

ijr at case

Dec 28, 2004, 2:46 PM

Post #17 of 20 (1169 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

On Tuesday 28 December 2004 05:18 pm, Brandon Beattie wrote:
> > Not really sure, from reading the list the obvious ones are a B&W on
> > screen display and other OSD related issues.
>
> The OSD is not B&W any longer for XvMC on NVidia cards.

Since when?

Isaac

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brandon+myth at linuxis

Dec 29, 2004, 7:40 AM

Post #18 of 20 (1168 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

On Tue, Dec 28, 2004 at 05:46:26PM -0500, Isaac Richards wrote:
> On Tuesday 28 December 2004 05:18 pm, Brandon Beattie wrote:
> > > Not really sure, from reading the list the obvious ones are a B&W on
> > > screen display and other OSD related issues.
> >
> > The OSD is not B&W any longer for XvMC on NVidia cards.
>
> Since when?
>
> Isaac

For the past, oh 4 months. Maybe it's just the blue theme, and yes I'm
100% sure I'm using XvMC. If I remember right, the limitation was two
colors. My OSD is either white and blue or yellow and blue, but I'll
have to check. I've disabled it for the last month to stop the frontend
crashing when I seek in HD streams. (The other option was to hit esc
before the OSD tried to fade out, as that appears to be what causes the
video buffers in the nvidia cards to get filled and not release for more
frames to be drawn.

--Brandon

ijr at case

Dec 29, 2004, 8:15 AM

Post #19 of 20 (1154 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

On Wednesday 29 December 2004 10:40 am, Brandon Beattie wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 28, 2004 at 05:46:26PM -0500, Isaac Richards wrote:
> > On Tuesday 28 December 2004 05:18 pm, Brandon Beattie wrote:
> > > > Not really sure, from reading the list the obvious ones are a B&W on
> > > > screen display and other OSD related issues.
> > >
> > > The OSD is not B&W any longer for XvMC on NVidia cards.
> >
> > Since when?
> >
> > Isaac
>
> For the past, oh 4 months. Maybe it's just the blue theme, and yes I'm
> 100% sure I'm using XvMC. If I remember right, the limitation was two
> colors. My OSD is either white and blue or yellow and blue, but I'll
> have to check. I've disabled it for the last month to stop the frontend
> crashing when I seek in HD streams. (The other option was to hit esc
> before the OSD tried to fade out, as that appears to be what causes the
> video buffers in the nvidia cards to get filled and not release for more
> frames to be drawn.

If you have a color osd, you are _NOT_ using XvMC, unless you've applied Ivor
Hewitt's work in progress patch.

Isaac
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ivor at ivor

Dec 29, 2004, 10:50 AM

Post #20 of 20 (1152 views)
Permalink

Re: Re: nvidia fx5200 help please badly needed [In reply to]

On Wednesday 29 Dec 2004 16:15, Isaac Richards wrote:
> On Wednesday 29 December 2004 10:40 am, Brandon Beattie wrote:
> >
> > For the past, oh 4 months. Maybe it's just the blue theme, and yes I'm
> > 100% sure I'm using XvMC. If I remember right, the limitation was two
> > colors. My OSD is either white and blue or yellow and blue, but I'll
> > have to check. I've disabled it for the last month to stop the frontend
> > crashing when I seek in HD streams. (The other option was to hit esc
> > before the OSD tried to fade out, as that appears to be what causes the
> > video buffers in the nvidia cards to get filled and not release for more
> > frames to be drawn.
>
> If you have a color osd, you are _NOT_ using XvMC, unless you've applied
> Ivor Hewitt's work in progress patch.
>
Indeed, it will give you colour osd on NVidia XvMC but its very much "work in
progress" and only tested on epia xvmc and probably only used by me at the
moment. :-)

--
Ivor Hewitt.
http://www.ivor.it - tech | http://www.ivor.org - hedge
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