bluray

[jaymar13]

hi peeps, im looking for a cheap but recommended bluray-rom for my desktop which i run off my hdtv. any recommendatons?

i have heard about problems with frame rates...? my computer has a core 2 duo at 2.5ghz with 2gb ram and a cruddy graphics card on the board... is this machine likely to be able to emit a fairly decent picture? the tv is a 4 series samsung (10,000:1, 60Hz, 720p)

 

[little_pob]

The E2200 is the oft quoted minimum needed to get consistent HD playback.

IMHO, you want the retail LG GGC-H20L as it comes with the playback software and does DVD, BD-ROM and HDDVD (which can still be bought on the cheap from the likes of HMV): LG Electronics Blu-Ray & HD-DVD-Rom Combo 16x DVDRW Black SATA - Retail Box With Software - Ebuyer

You do need to make sure that the onboard graphics supports HDCP otherwise you'll need to grab either a graphics card that does or AnyDVD HD. I would strongly suggest going for the graphics card option.

 

[Captin]

Buying the blu-ray rom is only half the battle to get the films to play.

You have to have a decent CPU (my dual core 2.4 couldnt handle it so I went Intel quad core).

Also you need a pretty good graphics card as the data throughput is vast compared to dvd.

As a test download a 1080p MKV file and if it doesnt play smoothley the you have no chance with blu-ray as they have about 8 times more data to be handled.

A 1080p MKV files would be arounf 4-8Gb, and a blu-ray film is typically 30-50Gb.

Also blu-ray is 1080p so if your TV isnt full HD then dont waste your money.

I have the LG Blu-Ray writer, a quad Q6600 2.4 cpu, 8Gb ram and an Nvidia 9600 GT with 1gb ram and I still get problems with stuttering if there is anything else running.

 

[little_pob]

Buying the blu-ray rom is only half the battle to get the films to play.

You have to have a decent CPU (my dual core 2.4 couldnt handle it so I went Intel quad core).

Also you need a pretty good graphics card as the data throughput is vast compared to dvd.

As a test download a 1080p MKV file and if it doesnt play smoothley the you have no chance with blu-ray as they have about 8 times more data to be handled.

A 1080p MKV files would be arounf 4-8Gb, and a blu-ray film is typically 30-50Gb.

Also blu-ray is 1080p so if your TV isnt full HD then dont waste your money.

I have the LG Blu-Ray writer, a quad Q6600 2.4 cpu, 8Gb ram and an Nvidia 9600 GT with 1gb ram and I still get problems with stuttering if there is anything else running.

Seems a little over kill. What OS and antivirus are you using?

I only ask as I've had a blu-ray running stutter free on an AMD X2 4000+, 3GB RAM, BD-ROM and 6800GS under XP SP2, Nero 8 with Blu-Ray plugin and AnyDVD HD (as the graphics card didn't support HDCP).

However, an Intel Pentium D 940 with 4GB RAM, BD/HDDVD-ROM and 8400GT running Vista Home Premium x64 struggled with even .mkv playback (CPU load would hit 90%+) and had an unwatchable stutter on blu-ray and HDDVD playback.

 

[jaymar13]

thanks for your time to reply guys.
funnily enough i was looking at that lg drive! it seems excellent value considering everything it does and i am looking at this graphics card- XFX GeForce 9400GT 550MHz 512MB DDR2 PCIE DVI Low Profile (PV-T94G-YAJG) - BT Shop

its hdcp and its description seems to say its ideal for video?

im not to worried about my tv being only 720p because i have sky hd(720p) which looks great to me and i want to be able to read blu-ray discs too. i'll probably upgrade the tv at the end of the year anyway with a 1080p set. and rather than just buy a player for the tv, id rather do it the hard way lol because i like to have everything in the computer

its just everything seems a little confusing about what spec i need to run blu-ray succesful?! my OS is sadly vista basic... but i think what i'll do is get a new graphics card and then download a 1080p mkv file and see how it likes it!

cheers guys, let me know what you think on the graphics card i have linked to if you have the time

 

[Captin]

You can run a lower end machine if you are using a PC monitor as it takes a lot less power to play a Blu-ray film on a monitor as it doesnt get the full res. Also most blu-ray disks has the film in a few different formats on the same disk, when it detects a lower res it uses different films files with less data in them, unlike dvd.

HD-DVD has less data throughput requirement than Blu-Ray so needs a lesser machine.

I use the HDMI port on my graphics card to output to a full 1080p HDTV.

I use 8Gb ram cos I like to run windows without a swap file, it makes it a lot quicker. I've updates to Windows 7 RC now and have a lot less problems with playback as Windows 7 uses less processes and overheads than Vista.

I have also been told that a BD-Rom plays back films better than a BD-Writer, dont know why that should be though.

I have also just changed the format of my SATA on the motherboard to AHCI (most motherboards have the SATA configured as standard IDE emulation by default) this allows better data throughput and is used in raid configurations. Windows XP doesnt support AHCI, Vista and Windows 7 do. If you turn on AHCI in the bios you have to manually edit your Windows registry first if you didnt install windows with it turned on.

It has made my drives data access quicker, as my BD drive is also SATA it seems to play a lot smoother.

But I also find my PS3 play's blu-rays way better than my PC, with a lot less fuss.

 

[little_pob]

This was to a 1080p sammy panel. Annoyingly the D 940 system worked fine playing BD and .mkv with half the RAM under XP. (There was a reason that I went to Vista but I forget what it was.)

I've since replaced with a standalone player and Popcorn Hour as they where cheaper than the upgrades that I wanted to do to perform the same functions as I don't need PVR.

 

[Captin]

I use the PS3 for streaming everything (photo's, music, TV, films etc from an old dual core pc i have. It plays everything I throw at it regardless of res (right upto 1080p) stereo, surroundsound, DTS. The server program even transcodes anything the ps3 cant play natively like MKV files. I can even stream 50Gb Blu-ray films downloaded from the internet. I have around 6.5Tb of stuff that available from the PS3 menu for me to enjoy.

Plus I can play games on it.

 

[jaymar13]

I use the PS3 for streaming everything (photo's, music, TV, films etc from an old dual core pc i have. It plays everything I throw at it regardless of res (right upto 1080p) stereo, surroundsound, DTS. The server program even transcodes anything the ps3 cant play natively like MKV files. I can even stream 50Gb Blu-ray films downloaded from the internet. I have around 6.5Tb of stuff that available from the PS3 menu for me to enjoy.

Plus I can play games on it.

nice bit of kit the ps3 nice to see it being used to its full potential!

yeh i'll try and see if i can change AHCI when i get the components in