PCI-E x1 card for H264 decodeing? (high quality 1080p files)

[quizzelbuck]

Will a Radeon x1550 help my computer decode 1080p movie files? the really high quality, HD ones? will it successfully take the load off the CPU? I am trying to get an ITX board to do HD movies, and i want the LOWEST end card to do the job. For power consumption reasons, actually.

If that isnt a viable option, does any one know a way to make the CPU and video card share the load and make it work any way?

 

[lopri]

Well, the PCIe x1 should provide enough bandwidth for H.264/VC-1 @1080p/24 or 1080p/30, at least in theory. PCIe x1 lane has a theoretical max of 250MB/s. But I don't know if X1550 has enough processing power to decode HD movies. (Does it have UVD?) In any case, modern CPU can take care of clips up to 720p without issues. For 1080p, you need a fast CPU or a GPU with off-loading.. Don't know if they make a capable video card with PCIe x1 interface..

 

[Seggybop]

The cheapest card with UVD is the 2400pro, but I don't know if you can find it in pci-e 1x. Though, if you filed/cut out the end of your pci-e 1x slot so that a 16x card could fit, it should actually work fine.

 

[coinz]

Originally posted by: Seggybop
The cheapest card with UVD is the 2400pro, but I don't know if you can find it in pci-e 1x. Though, if you filed/cut out the end of your pci-e 1x slot so that a 16x card could fit, it should actually work fine.

damn really..you can do that?

 

[Seggybop]

PCI-E cards will work at whatever bandwidth they're given-- http://www.tomshardware.com/20...ng_analysis/page3.html kind of explains how it works. Though in that case, they taped off sections of the card's contacts and then set the bios to treat a 16x slot as a lesser bandwidth one. In this case, the motherboard's 1x slot is already permanently 1x, so if you fit a 16x card into it it should work no problem. Some motherboards come with open-ended slots by default for this purpose. My own motherboard has 4x slot with an open end that I have a 16x video card running in.

 

[quizzelbuck]

Would a safer option be to attach a soft cable riser for pci-e x1 and just attach it to the PCI-e x1 pins of a PCI-e x16 card?

 

[bigsnyder]

This was doable back in the ISA/early PCI days. Not sure the tolerances needed by PCI-e would allow it.
It technically should work, but who knows how stable until you try it.

 

[palladium]

wow haven't heard of that before...