[mythtv-users] Downscaling HD Content on 480i

[Patrick Wagstrom]

On 7/3/07, David Schmidt <david.schmidt.in.dallas at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Well, of course the 350 can't hardware decode the HD stream, but
> presuming he has sufficient CPU/main memory, shouldn't Myth be able to
> treat the frame buffer as a "dumb" card and do software
> decoding/scaling for 480i display on the framebuffer?
>
> I sure hope so, 'cause that was my plan once I get my HD tuners since
> I still have an SD set.


What do you mean by "dumb" card?  Well, probably, if you disable XV for
video acceleration.  But if you do that, even SD will bog down a computer.
Want to get an idea of how slow and bad it is without acceleration?  Run
mplayer -vo x11 on your favorite file and experience how slow it is.
Scaling is a fairly expensive operation which is why it gets farmed out to
hardware, which can do it much better much faster.  That's what XV does.  So
yes, myth can treat it as a dumb device and probably do the scaling, but
you'll be getting 386 level performance while pegging your CPU.  Heck, the
power consumption differences alone justify purchasing a better card.

Save yourself trouble and buy an nVidia card for your TV out.  The 350 just
doesn't cut it.

--Patrick
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