Is HTPC as good as the best BD players?

[jsteinhauer]

If I were to invest in a top notch motherboard, video card and sound card, can I expect a HTPC to match the AV quality of a premium BD player?

It's been about 4 years since I built a PC. I'm not inclined to fashion a new "desktop", if it can't do what I want it to do.

[dadkins]

Definitely.
Plus, you will have a killer computer as well.

[Blu-Dog]

Originally Posted by jsteinhauer

If I were to invest in a top notch motherboard, video card and sound card, can I expect a HTPC to match the AV quality of a premium BD player?

It's been about 4 years since I built a PC. I'm not inclined to fashion a new "desktop", if it can't do what I want it to do.

You can get an outrageously good picture, but you still can't get the very best sound.

I built a quad-core system, with a Blu drive, and nVidia graphics. Terrific picture, but it's still stuck with an SPDIF fiber optic line out - no DTS HD MA for me.

It's also goofy handling the menus on the disks, you'll have to cursor around instead of using the mouse sometimes.

But it works for me.

[dadkins]

Originally Posted by Blu-Dog

You can get an outrageously good picture, but you still can't get the very best sound.

I built a quad-core system, with a Blu drive, and nVidia graphics. Terrific picture, but it's still stuck with an SPDIF fiber optic line out - no DTS HD MA for me.

It's also goofy handling the menus on the disks, you'll have to cursor around instead of using the mouse sometimes.

But it works for me.

Media Center and ArcSoft TMT.
Remote works fine - XP MCE or Windows Media Center(Vista).



DTS-MA is also doable now, depending on sound card.
Many semi-decent video cards have HDMI(my laptops do)... and they work quite well.



Yes, audio is carried out the HDMI on these laptops.

[SupaSweet]

its true that you can get a beautiful picture...sound on the other hand is a bit of a task...i had a killer rig..HTPC..you can see it in the community section under "my old set up" click my name =D

Anyhow..it was great but at the same time finnicky..you could probably resolve issues around the sound if you installed a higher end sound card.."turtle beach" but then you are looking at a couple hundred dollars..

I also was a tad bit annoyed that my remote control would not function very smoothly with the BD software i was using..needless to say i sold the HTPC and bought myself an SLR camera and a PS3...i just didnt have the patience...

I am now kind of missing the ultra high res/ultra high max settings i used to game on, on my HTPC...the PS3 are not too bad though...consoles are pretty impressive nowadays for gaming..

[prerich]

Originally Posted by Blu-Dog

You can get an outrageously good picture, but you still can't get the very best sound.

I built a quad-core system, with a Blu drive, and nVidia graphics. Terrific picture, but it's still stuck with an SPDIF fiber optic line out - no DTS HD MA for me.

It's also goofy handling the menus on the disks, you'll have to cursor around instead of using the mouse sometimes.

But it works for me.

Yes you can, You can go 7.1 analog out or you can buy the Xonar Card. If you don't buy the xonar - software downsamples TrueHD and DTS HD MA to 16bits/48khz, but Vista can resample at 24bit/192khz - that's what I'm doing now and its fabulous!!!!

P.S. I have 7.1 via HDMI.

[Schizzlefuzz]

Menus are more responsive and the player itself is faster than a standalone. No problems with PAL extras or menus that some imports have that most standalones won't play.
If you have AnyDVD HD you can use it to remove forced subtitles on the few foreign discs that have them and it removes region coding and annoying trailers on some discs.

[jmg]

you don't even have to spend a lot of money-- with a few hiccups, umy htpc is up and running find-- with a pentium m chip, integrated sound (haven't noticed any problems yet, but have a feeling that a new sound board is in my future), and an ati 3850 video card-- video output is stellar.

And I'm using windows medai center, which integrates flawlessly with a remote control, so I don't even have a keyboard/mouse conntected to the computer (If I need to make any changes, I just remote in from another pc in the house).