Just Ordered Crank for 17$ on amazon and Nightmare Before Christmas for 27$ with prime 2 day shipping. cant wait ! : D
I’m considering upgrading my pc so that I can play blu ray movies on a blu ray rom drive.
The blu ray drive requires a graphics card, which requires pci express, which my motherboard doesn’t have. It only has agp.
Can someone please recommend me a good motherboard so that I can have an idea of how much it would cost. thanks
Also, if there’s certain upcoming future technology such as pci express part deux, and if there’s a need to get a motherboard with pci-e part deux slots, please let me know
Here’s my pc specifications:
Intel Pentium D 940 Dual Core 3.2Ghz Pc
Pc Chips P21G S. LGA775 SATA Board V/A/L
Intel Pentium D 940 Dual Core 3.2Ghz
Regular Cooling Fan With HeatSink
2 X 512Mb DDR400 PC3200 Total Of 1GB
160GB SATA150 7200rpm Hard Drive
UniChrome Pro 3D Graphics 64MB Shared AGP Adapte
HOUSE BRAND DVD & CD DRIVE
3D STEREO SOUND CARD ADAPTER
10/100 NETWORK ADAPTER (LAN)
Broadcom 56K V.90 PCI Modem / Fax & Lan
ATX WINDOW & FRONT LED CASE 400WT BLACK
2x Case Cooling Fan 80mm (Regular Speed)
MS WINDOWS XP HOME EDITION
Keboard & Optical Mouse PS2 Combo Kit
Exempt $709.33
Total $709.33
if it’s obvious that the price indicates I got ripped off, please let me know. I bought the pc around june 2006
thanks
Are you connecting your PC to your HDTV?
Depending on whether you have other purposes for the Blu-Ray drive, I’d be wary about using a PC to watch Blu-Rays on. There’s nothing wrong with it, and you have the bonus of being able to use BD-R’s to store information, but as a movie player you won’t get the same value with a BD drive. Standalone BD players and PS3’s of equal value will blow it away when it comes to picture quality and they’ll decode high-definition audio codecs.
Damn. Really? are you positive? why does these high end graphic cards keep bragging about smooth 1080p blu ray video capability? That’s just fraudulent.
Another question:
What about these dell blu ray laptops with hdmi outputs?
http://www.dell.com/content/products/features.aspx/bluray_lt?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs
You can get em for under a thousand nowadays. I guess I want the option to play 1080p content from my hard drive and output it to an hdtv via hdmi
The Blu-Ray drives for PC aren’t “bad”, but the problem is that it’s so dependent on your motherboard, video card, sound card, all other parts and, most notably, software. With a standalone BD player, the machine is particularly designed to perform the task of playing Blu-Rays but with a PC, you have put together the components to optimize it to perform the same task. Then you have to tweak it to your own preferences and keep in mind that it won’t work with remote control. Just know what you’re getting into because playing Blu-Rays from a Blu-Ray drive isn’t as simple as hooking up the cables and popping in a disc. The process is time consuming and expensive.
If you just have the bare necessities to play Blu-Rays (ie. Blu-Ray drive, HDMI out), the picture quality and sound quality will suffer. Color representation, audio codecs, etc… For your computer to equal a PS3 in Blu-Ray playback, you’re looking to spend at least twice as much on specific parts over and above the cost of a PC. Being able to play Blu-Rays is a nice perk if you’re already looking to buy a computer, but I wouldn’t recommend buying a PC with the purpose of playing Blu-Rays from them, especially when a PS3 is only $400.
i have a computer capable of playing blu-ray hooked up to my tv
i used it more than my PS3 bc i find the ps3 too loud sometimes
Core 2 Quad Q9550 CPU, Intel X48 Chipset, Radeon HD 4870 GPU
Core 2 Quad Q9550 CPU, Intel X48 Chipset, Radeon HD 4870 GPU
thats a little on the expensive side though
you can get by on Core Duo E8400/Intel P45/Radeon 4850 or GeForce 9800 GT
you don’t really need a super fast processor if you get a good video card
even a system like E7300/P45/Radeon HD 3650 or GeForce 8600 GT will work
i have a bigger system because i can capture HD TV frmo 2 sources and play a BD with no lag at all on any of them
and it does work with a remote control no idea what bokchoy is talking about
you can get a IR receiver and buy a Logitech Harmony 880 Advanced Universal Remote
or if you’re using windows media center microsoft makes a remote that goes for $25 or so
you could build a HTPC for $600 that captures HDTV and plays blu-ray flawlessly. can the PS3 act as a tivo too?
ps3 can’t play mkv files without reencoding them, htpc can
Yeah true, you can get the Harmony Remote an an IR receiver. Just another thing on the list to buy, among other things.
The point isn’t that HTPC’s suck or that HTPC’s are incapable. The point is just: know what you’re getting into, because for the cost of HTPC components (over and above the regular PC components), you can buy a better Blu-Ray player for the same price or lower. Especially with PS3 on the market. If you build it, you have to spend time building it, tweaking it, and have no warranty. And you’ve still spent more money for an inferior Blu-Ray player.
Dirt: I’m not trying to diss HTPC’s or anything. I think they’re very cool. I’m just saying that buying/building a PC with the purpose of Blu-Ray playback is not worth it compared to a standalone Blu-Ray player.
Just buy a PS3 and upgrade the hard drive.
but its formatted in fat 32. You have have to chop up the videos into neat little 4 gig pieces. MAJOR HASSLE.
awesome man. do you think I could get by on Intel Pentium D 940 Dual Core 3.2Ghz cpu combined with good chipset/gpu?
What? The Olympics opening ceremony I have in HD on my PS3 is over 5gb. Some of the HD rentals from the PSN are close to 8gb.
really? my external hd that i plug in can’t transfer files over 4 gb. its in fat 32, hm…
I copied it directly from my PC to the PS3, I don’t know if that makes a difference, I don’t have an external.
awful :lol:
ThinkGeek has the best April Fool’s jokes
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/38108
Good news all around, should help boost sales a bit too.
I’m pretty sure Disney also owns a lot of the release rights to Miyazaki’s movies. Would be great to get those on blu-ray eventually. Crosses fingers.
Is Iron Man out on Blu Ray yet? I just got a gift card at work and I want to use it.
ironman isnt even out on regular-ass dvd…dont think it will be on blu ray any time soon…
Supposed to come out September 30th.