Video Card Upgrade HDMI compatability

Hi,

I'm thinking about upgrading my graphics/video card but am wondering whether my system is tough enough to cope with it. I'm keen to fit one that has an HDMI port since my TV which I use as a monitor has an HDMI input which is redundant at the moment.

So, I've been looking at the NVidia GeForce GT220 although I'd take advice as to better or more appropriate cards.

I'm running WinXP pro SP3 on a system with 1Gig RAM (I think I can upgrade to 2GB but I've found conflicting reports about this). My Mobo is the (not overly impressive) AsRock K7VT4A+ with the AMD Athlon XP 3000+ processor of 2.1GHz. I'm currently using an Nvidia GeForce FX 5700LE graphics card.

So is there any point in even trying to fit a more powerful video card with an HDMI port or will I be wasting my time? I'm basically looking for better graphics in general and improved display when watching streaming video and DVD playback.

Many thanks for any advice received.

Cheers :confused

 

Although a beefier video card will improve things, it's not likely your system will deliver hi-def or blu-ray quality video.

Be sure your board is compatible with the video card (a PCI 2.0 video card slot) before purchasing it.

If you are streaming standard-def (Hulu, Netflix, etc.) it should work; however the actual video quality may end up somewhere in between a VCR and a standard-def DVD player. If you're thinking about ripping DVDs or adding a blu-ray drive you will need to upgrade to a faster board, processor and memory.

It is likely you will need to upgrade your power supply as well. Check the video card mfr's specs for the minimum PSU wattage requirement and avoid cheap generic power supplies. Brands such as Antec or Corsair are worth the few extra bucks.

 

Personally I would plug a HD something into the monitor to see the quality difference you would hope to get, and compare that to the quality your VGA or DVI cable offers. So if you have a Bluray player, PS3 etc, then connect it to your monitor via HDMI, and flick back and forth between that input and your computer as it's currently connected. Ideally you would want to show the same images to test it, such as playing a Bluray disc.

I used such a test to determine my TV's resolution wasn't good enough to pay extra for HD TV, and even that my eyes weren't good enough to worry about coaxal versus Svid on another TV!

If this is your motherboard, then you only have AGP and PCI slots to work with. Here is the cheapest/best video card for either slot, with HDMI out:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125281
(And here's the search that took me there)

As you know, video quality is a result of the weakest link. Right now you're probably right about it being the video card when you're watching DVDs. When watching streaming media from web sites (Youtube etc) the original quality of the feed will be the weakest link. With a service link Netflix or a website like http://www.comedycentral.com it may even be your network adapter, because such services adjust the video quality depending on your network connection.

The laziest approach is simply to buy one from a store that offers returns, test it, and drive back later in the day if you didn't get the improvement you wanted.

 

What? That's not true at all. The computer itself has next to nothing to do with hi-def or BR quality. It is 99% up to the graphics solution so if your card supports HD (and the GT220 does) and you have a BR player, you can easily use your system to watch HD and BR content on your monitor. Understand it takes very little CPU horsepower to hand off graphics tasks to a capable graphics card. This is why tiny ITX systems with Atom and Celeron integrated CPUs are frequently used in HTPCs.

Again, totally untrue, for the same reason mentioned above. The graphics quality is determined by the card and the source. If you are streaming video through your home, your system will be the source. You will be able to stream HD resolutions - though it may be jittery depending on your network, and HD capabiliities, and limited amounts of RAM (not a problem if watching BluRay disks with 1Gb of RAM).

And, sadly, once again, this is not correct either. It is important to note that PCI is totally different from PCIe. But that point is moot because as noted by ASRock, that board does not support PCIe. It supports AGP 8x and PCI 2.2. Since PCI is ancient technology, you need to go with AGP and 94dgrif has you on the right track with that.

I do agree with gman863 on one point however and that is you MUST ensure your power supply will support a new card. Graphics cards are often the most power hungry device inside the computer. According to the GT220 link above, a 300 Watt supply is recommended for the mininum.

 

No it's true I picked those two examples specifically, but Hulu is another example that does it. You're right about the quality being determined by the source though. Simply put, these services all use code which adjusts the quality of the video they deliver to you (ie the source) based on your bandwidth. They do this to avoid the choppy/jittery playback that low bandwidth would otherwise cause.

Netflix
"Our first-gen PC streaming player uses 1-4 bars to represent the delivered quality, representing 500, 1000, 1600, and 2200 kbps. The 3400kbps encodes are represented as 4 bars. The player measures bandwidth once at the start of the title, and chooses a bitrate for delivery that has at least 40% headroom from the measured speed."
"The Silverlight player is currently more opaque, since it picks the stream to deliver dynamically. If your connection slows, as the buffer empties, the player starts buffering a lower bitrate stream and switches seamlessly across."

Hulu
"We'll adjust a video's stream to make the most of your Internet connection."

Comedycentral.com
The player for the southpark episodes has changed since I discovered they vary their quality so this example may well not still be true. But this example I knew from experience because last year I made an HTML page to play their stream so my sister could watch the episodes in the UK. One of the variables that you could pass adjusted the video quality to one of three different bit rates - low, medium and high.



Edit: My post above was all about how network bandwidth can be a factor, and I forgot to mention how CPU can be a factor when some services adjust their steam depending on your computer. Here's the Netflix quote on CPU I meant to include:
"Silverlight might be starved of CPU and drop some frames; this may cause the player to conclude that it should switch to a lower bitrate stream that won't overload the CPU. Today, we haven't figured a reliable way to determine that the CPU is again underutilized and permit switching back up again, so my advice is to close Outlook and similar periodically expensive applications prior to playing the movie!)"

 

Check again, 94dgrif - I did not disagree with you - in fact I supported your position about selecting a good AGP card.

 

Yeah I thought you were disagreeing about the network bandwidth effecting stream quality on some services, but you weren't so I'm sorry - much of that last post of mine will then just be reiterating what I said earlier.

 

No problem! And note the OP is talking about watching DVDs and videos. He is not talking about streaming across his network. So again, this is not taxing the computer itself. And DVD's and BRs have nothing to do with the network and when watching videos from the Internet, it is the bandwidth from the ISP that is the limiting factor.

 

The PCI/PCI-e thing was a typo.

The rest of my comments were based on actual experience upgrading older PCs. The reviews on the Atom-based systems are mixed. Although Ok for average viewers, I have seen reviews where the overall picture quality comes up short on larger screen TVs.

One of the best rules in business is to under-promise and over-deliver. If the OP ends up with better video quality than my worst experiences (posted above), it creates happiness. If blu-ray quality is promised and things come up short, it's a recipe for upset clients.

 

I am not going to debate this with you and throw this thread off-topic. But if you have links to these reviews that pinpoint the problem to the Atom and not the integrated graphics solution on these boards, I will be happy to read it.

 

Wow,

The thread has exceeded both my expectations and my technincal knowledge! Thanks to all for their input.

Put simply, I've become mildly frustrated with average quality DVD playback from the pc (not a massive problem since I can hook up a standalone dvd player) but have also been wanting to improve the performance for watching streaming tv from bbc's Iplayer for example. I had hoped that by using a digital port on the tv and an HDMI output on a graphics card I'd have a chance at improving things. I'm not necessarily interested about High Definition although that would have been nice, but thought any improvement would be a good thing. I now understand that there is more to it than that - such as the bandwidth issue and source quality...

Just as a starter though, do you think that using my DVI port on my current FFX5700LE card and connecting to the HDMI port on the TV (using a DVI to HDMI cable) will improve things by very much? I currently use a VGA cable to get to the TV and am presuming that a digital connection must be better?

Failing that then a new card is the next option. I had actually come across the affordable Radeon HD 4650 (as suggested by 94dgrif) since my original post. It seems to fit the requirements. I currently have a 400W PSU although am keen to upgrade and to ensure a quality manufacturer. I've been doing a bit of reading ('til my brain began to seize) and no end of people were stressing about the need to get a good brand and suitable size of PSU! Many were also talking of a need for more case fans to keep a manageable working temperature. I am overloaded with fans so I'm sorted there.

Anyway, thanks for your advice so far and for any further info you may be able to give about the DVI to HDMI issue.

Cheers

Gingerninja

 

Try the cheapest solutions first and see if the video quality is satisfactory. If possible, buy them from someplace that has a decent return policy if the items don't live up to your expectations.

If these ideas don't hit the mark you could always (ahem...) use this as an excuse to treat yourself to something for the Holidays if your budget permits.

I just built a Home Theater PC (HTPC) system for video editing, Netflix, etc. Using a HTPC (horizontal) case, a decent board with blu-ray certified on board video (ASUS or Gigabyte), an AM3 dual-core, 4GB DDR3, a 1TB HDD, Win 7 OEM and a standard DVD+RW drive at Black Friday pricing, you should be able to pull this off for around $500. For around $600, you should be able to upgrade to a blu-ray internal drive and add a TV tuner/recording card.

Good luck on the project. I hope the lower priced options work for you.

 

gman's build complements my most recent one as they are total polar opposites, which provides a good contrast! I recently resuscitated an old fairly dead laptop. It had a smashed screen, the keyboard was beered to death, the touchpad's cable was ripped, the WLAN was AWOL, the case was cracked, and the battery had flat-lined. Well I decided to turn it into a media center for our work room by running a network cable to it and hooking it up to a 32ish" LCD TV with VGA input. Running on the notion that the final picture is a constrained by the weakest link, I've been adjusting my resolution down to the point at which I actually notice a drop in picture quality. It came when I dropped the Slingplayer resolution from 640/480 to 320/240, so the laptops resolution is at a breathtaking 640/480!

I clearly wasn't aiming for DVD quality, but rather the best picture I could get After maintaining 0 choppiness/jittering. The net result is a picture somewhere between the aerial and HDTV days, at a cost of $9 (new AC adapter!) and does it's job well.

The main reason I mention all that is in support for gman's suggestion of finding a store with a decent return policy. Video quality is really, really subjective, and has fuzzy logic. You could upgrade several things that in theory would improve the quality, only to find your video cable isn't insulated enough, or the PSU isn't supporting the graphics card sufficently, or some other unexpected factor was dragging the picture down.

Having said that, a new decent graphics card with HDMI output + HDMI cable really *should* improve the quality!

 

You put together a system that does the job for the same cost as a month of Netflix. Great idea! :cool