P4 stong enough for HTPC?

[TurnX]

Title kind of says it all. Recently found an old system in my basement that had a P4 2.4ghz chip it in. System works but I was curious as to how well it would handle H264 stuff, mainly 720p right now. It has 2gb of ram, probably gonna bump it up 3 or 4 if it will help, and it's running onboard video atm, but would upgrade that to a card again if the base system will work for me. thanks

 

[XMan]

Actually, if you use the right video card, it should be fine.

See here. Blu-ray playback on an Athlon XP-Mobile!

 

[Shawn]

It'll probably work. Just don't expect to multitask.

 

[Blain]

Originally posted by: TurnX
Recently found an old system in my basement that had a P4 2.4ghz chip it in. System works but I was curious as to how well it would handle H264 stuff, mainly 720p right now. It has 2gb of ram, probably gonna bump it up 3 or 4 if it will help, and it's running onboard video atm, but would upgrade that to a card again if the base system will work for me. thanks

If it's using onboard video, it's probably also using OLD crappy onboard audio as well.

I'd buy a nice HD 2600XT AGP card and a good C-Media sound card.
The 2600XT doesn't pull a lot of wattage, so your OLD power supply may hold up ok.
But in the real world, I'd be PS shopping as well. :laugh:

 

[XMan]

Originally posted by: Blain

Originally posted by: TurnX
Recently found an old system in my basement that had a P4 2.4ghz chip it in. System works but I was curious as to how well it would handle H264 stuff, mainly 720p right now. It has 2gb of ram, probably gonna bump it up 3 or 4 if it will help, and it's running onboard video atm, but would upgrade that to a card again if the base system will work for me. thanks

If it's using onboard video, it's probably also using OLD crappy onboard audio as well.

I'd buy a nice HD 2600XT AGP card and a good C-Media sound card.
The 2600XT doesn't pull a lot of wattage, so your OLD power supply may hold up ok.
But in the real world, I'd be PS shopping as well. :laugh:

3650 is cheaper.

 

[Blain]

"Cheaper"...
Yes, it's $2.74 cheaper, but still not the card that the 2600XT is.

 

[XMan]

It might not be the better gaming card, but it's a better HTPC card than the 2600XT. IE, cooler running, better video decode, etc.

I don't count rebates into the price. So I usually disregard rebates unless it's a decent amount.