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DVD question

Hamburgerpimp

Hamburgerpimp

Diamond Member
Well, I know very little about DVD and playback. With a 1Ghz+ CPU do you need a Hardware decoder card? And if not, what is the best decoding software to play DVDs, thanks.
 
No, you won't need a hardware decoder card for DVD playback with that CPU...

As for software player, I recommend PowerDVD...
 
Power DVD 2.55 is the best in my view.

Cinemaster 2000 has the best picture quality though, and now supports Sb Live pass-thru, by using DVD Genie
 
If I already have WinDVD 2000 pre-installed on my Dell Dimension 4100 (Pentium III 866 MHz, 256MB PC133 CAS2 RAM, 12x DVD) would installing PowerDVD screw anything up?

What does PowerDVD do so well?
 
I just prefer the layout of Power DVD, I had both installed a while back, and everything worked OK
 
AMB - Thanks, I might give PowerDVD a try if I can read some reviews, and perhaps a few screen snapshots.

Watching a DVD on a PC sucks when you can watch it on a TV with a regular DVD Player which is the best but "The Matrix" kicks a** on a 19" Dell P991 monitor.
 
Umm..software DVD will run fine on a freaking Celeron 400. I don't know why people waste their money on a decoder card. Image quality is worse too.
 
image quality *worse* ?? Hrmm.. i didn't find that to be the case.

Also, hardware DVD allows for TV out, in the event you didn't have it on your vid card in the first place. And depending on who you are, you may need it.

I prefer WinDVD 2k 2.2 myself. Seems to work better for me in win2k than PowerDVD 2.55
 
Yeah, well it is pass-through, isn't it? Not just DVD quality, but the quality of everything should suffer...at least if you run a high resolution. TV-out is a reason yes, but other than that I think they are a waste of money.

I like PowerDVD 2.55 best, but I haven't tried WinDVD 2k 2.2 yet...I'll give that a whirl tomorrow.
 
Kami, you are correct, the pass through does reduce video quality (a typical geforce coupled with this would be horrible!), however TV out quality is unsurpassed with the H+ (for some reason, video card manufacturers don't seem to be able to do this properly).
 
I'll have to second the H+

I sure as heck don't need a decoder card to play on my crappy PC as PowerDVD does very well itself on the CRT.

The only reason I bought the Hollywood+ is because of the excellent TV output it has.
 
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