New Atom platform in Mini-ITX vs BTV Link?

[DonK]

http://www.digitimes.com/mobos/a20080305PD223.html

Intel Atom mini-ITX dual core and single core boards coming soon... I wonder how well they'll run Link

[Maximo]

Looks interesting. I really think that BTV would do well to offer a link box, much like what sage has. That would sell link licenses a whole lot easier.

[Rich A]

There is no problem at present finding a really small form factor box that will work well as a link-machine. However, the problem that does exist is the cost. Really small form factor PCs are just not mainstream products and don't command anywhere near the market share as normal desktop, or even laptop PCs. And so the "deal killer" is usually price. To build a ultra small form factor PC, capable of running BTV-Link would generally end up costing 400 bucks or more. I've been searching myself for a "DVD Drive" sized PC for a couple years now ... But the cost is always the killer for me.

Unless of course you are willing to trade up to something like a bookcase sized computer bought used.

[DonK]

I'm more concerned about the video decoding capability for HD.

I've got a couple of mini-ITX systems, an m10000 based board and a cl6000 based one, the cl6000 is more of a "router" board because it has 2 onboard ethernet ports, which makes it ideal for creating a small linux based home router using things like ClarkConnect. I have a very small case that I'm hoping will house a new Atom mini-itx board, that's not much larger than a DVD-Rom drive.

http://www.mini-itx.com/ - Check out the new boards....

They both sport graphics capable of displaying HD, and with plenty of USB ports, 4 SATA ports, a PCI-E 1x slot (can you say put in the new "quad tuner" dual SD/Dual HD hauppauge tuner announced at CeBit? I knew you could...) and also an external SATA port, this could concievably be a very *small* and *quiet* BTV/WHS server with some decent expandability if the right case is used.

This is the good quote: "Also on display was a DG45FC board (codename "Fly Creek"). The G45 chipset has rather nice X4500HD integrated graphics, supporting High Def H264 and VC-1 decoding in hardware. This one has an Intel G45 + ICH10-R chipset; LGA-755 socket supporting 65W FMB Intel Core 2 CPUs (Wolfdale and Conroe); Dual output through 1x DVI-I and 1x HDMI ports; 2x Dual Channel DDR2 800/667 DIMM slots; 4x SATA 2.0; 1x 82567LM Gigabit LAN; 5x Audio & S/PDIF out (10 channel audio with Dolby HT); 6x USB 2.0 + 4x USB 2.0 headers on the board; a PCIe x1 Slot and 1x eSATA port."

Now *that* is sexy...

[purduee]

Here's the rule on these systems:

Small, quiet, or high performance - pick any 2.

Regarding the atom platform, here's a key sentence from mini-itx.com highlighting a problem with atom and the previous little valley motherboards:

"the CPU heatsink is taller than the backplate - severely limiting the choice of low-profile Mini-ITX cases available to it."

Those other boards from mini-itx are great, but the heatsink required for a 755 CPU will likely be substantial in relation to the size of the board (quiet and high performance), either that or it will require one of those 7k RPM delta fans to cool it (small and high performance).

I used to have a m10000 ITX board and a casetronic case about the size of an external CD-ROM. Size was great, noise was a bit high, and performance was god awful. Couldn't do anything useful with it.

As cheap as notebooks are getting, it seems like a decent laptop might result in a better link machine than cobbling together an ITX system. I run link off a Dell 600m with an ATI 9000 and Cyberlink's decoder - works pretty well for everything up to 1080i. I imagine these laptops are pretty cheap these days.

[Zaap]

Originally Posted by purduee

Here's the rule on these systems:
Small, quiet, or high performance - pick any 2.

Soooooo true!

I think you can get all three, but only if you add a fourth component: expensive.

[purduee]

Anyone ever try one of these out?

[DonK]

The new Ion platform is probably even better suited than the mini-itx atoms are. I'm waiting for them to show up on the market.

[mattman]

NVIDIA ION Barebone Kit - Zotac IONITX-B-E MOBO W/ Intel ATOM 1.6GHz CPU, 2GB DDR2, 750GB HDD, 22x DVDRW, Mini ITX Case w/ 250 Watt PSU at TigerDirect.com

Comments on how the above would work as link box?

[RenegadeELEN]

I use the ASrock ION 330 as a Link box right now.

Newegg.com - ASRock ION 330 NVIDIA ION 2 x 240Pin NVIDIA ION graphics Black Barebone - Barebone Systems

I have it using wireless right now but that will change in the next week or so. Performance has been great. It has enough power for HD and SD tv so far. I do notice that it is not as quick as some of my other HTPCs but the difference isn't enough for me to dislike the experience with the machine.

[poobah]

Originally Posted by RenegadeELEN

I use the ASrock ION 330 as a Link box right now.

Newegg.com - ASRock ION 330 NVIDIA ION 2 x 240Pin NVIDIA ION graphics Black Barebone - Barebone Systems

I have it using wireless right now but that will change in the next week or so. Performance has been great. It has enough power for HD and SD tv so far. I do notice that it is not as quick as some of my other HTPCs but the difference isn't enough for me to dislike the experience with the machine.

I tried a Zotac ION, and while it was fine for ClearQAM HD, it did not have sufficient oomph to play HD-PVR HD, no matter what I tried.

Just a warning.

[Wolfie99]

same problem with the ASRock Ion 330. HD PVR stutters. Upgraded RAM and installed solid state hard drive with no success.

[RenegadeELEN]

Well I don't have an HD-PVR so I can't do my own testing but I know I can playback BluRay discs with it without any issues. I can also playback mkv files that have AC3 and h264 encoded files inside.

I know that the h264 decoder BTV uses doesn't do Hardware Acceleration well or at all since I see 30-40% CPU usage on an E8400 Proc. MPC-HD, PowerDVD and ArcSofts decoders are always around 5%.

[poobah]

Originally Posted by RenegadeELEN

Well I don't have an HD-PVR so I can't do my own testing but I know I can playback BluRay discs with it without any issues. I can also playback mkv files that have AC3 and h264 encoded files inside.

I know that the h264 decoder BTV uses doesn't do Hardware Acceleration well or at all since I see 30-40% CPU usage on an E8400 Proc. MPC-HD, PowerDVD and ArcSofts decoders are always around 5%.

This was with the ArcSoft decoder.

I assumed that since all of the reviews of the ION said that it did hardware acceleration of h264 and that it played blue-rays just fine that it wouldn't have a problem with HD-PVR output.

That assumption did not pan out however.

B.

[RenegadeELEN]

Originally Posted by poobah

This was with the ArcSoft decoder.

I assumed that since all of the reviews of the ION said that it did hardware acceleration of h264 and that it played blue-rays just fine that it wouldn't have a problem with HD-PVR output.

That assumption did not pan out however.

B.

Oh. Well that's too bad. That makes me wish I could get my hands on some HDPVR HD Recordings to try on my unit for my own curiosity.