Playing back HD-DVD files from network share in PDVD

[GreenJelly]

Assuming that you're using the USB for your keyboard and mouse, you should try the Microsoft Wireless Entertainment Desktop 7000. It's Bluetooth and has a range of 30 feet. The keyboard is so light that it almost feels like a remote control. Also, you don't have to use the mouse, if you don't want to, because mouse functions are available on the keyboard.

If you have a DVI or HDMI input on your HDTV you can use them instead of component cables. Newegg.com has a good selection of reasonably priced long cables for this purpose.

Also, if you have a digital coax input on your receiver, you can use a single cable to connect it to your soundblaster card (if needed you can get a mini plug to phono plug adapter at Radio Shack).

I have the Blue Tooth Logitech Keyboard for my HTPC (I beleive its the MX-5000). I would love to know if I could use the logitech for the HTPC and the Microsoft for My Monster (in the same room). I know that you cant use two Logitech Keyboards from two different machines, and that switching the Logitech keyboards from one machine to another is a major pain in the ass.

As for the Digital Sound, the Soundblaster X-Fi does NOT output 5.1 channels from its digital out (SPDIF). The Soundblaster X-Fi will ONLY output 2 channels in its Digital Out! The ONLY way you can output to a digital cable is to buy their add-on box, which converts the 6 channels of annalog audio to a digital (optical or coaxial) output.

Yes thats right

Digital Sound -> soundblaster X-Fi DAC -> Analog RCA's -> Sounblasters $100+ SPDIF output Box -> Digital SPDIF (optical or Coaxial) -> Digital Cable -> A/V Recievier DAC -> Analog!

I know, your thinking... hes nuts... that cant be right! Well unfortunately Soundblaster is the crazy one here

of course I got a great sound card on my motherboard, which supports 7.1 SPDIF outputs. But it lacks EAX, the increadible DAC soundblaster offers, and the processing power. Plus its fun to run 6 High Quality RCA cables 30 feet to my Marantz 7300 Receiver (which simply amplifies it) to my 4xB&W 603's, B&W ASW600, and a B&W sub.

I could of gone with the Long distance HDMI cable, but I had the RCA's! Ohh, and Im running 2 monitors, so I didnt have a free DVI to use.

PS, from this single thread it would not be unreasonable to assume that I am slightly nuts... But Sound Blaster's Digital Out Solutions, is insane.

 

[roog]

I have the Blue Tooth Logitech Keyboard for my HTPC (I beleive its the MX-5000). I would love to know if I could use the logitech for the HTPC and the Microsoft for My Monster (in the same room). I know that you cant use two Logitech Keyboards from two different machines, and that switching the Logitech keyboards from one machine to another is a major pain in the ass.

As for the Digital Sound, the Soundblaster X-Fi does NOT output 5.1 channels from its digital out (SPDIF). The Soundblaster X-Fi will ONLY output 2 channels in its Digital Out! The ONLY way you can output to a digital cable is to buy their add-on box, which converts the 6 channels of annalog audio to a digital (optical or coaxial) output.

Yes thats right

Digital Sound -> soundblaster X-Fi DAC -> Analog RCA's -> Sounblasters $100+ SPDIF output Box -> Digital SPDIF (optical or Coaxial) -> Digital Cable -> A/V Recievier DAC -> Analog!

I know, your thinking... hes nuts... that cant be right! Well unfortunately Soundblaster is the crazy one here
of course I got a great sound card on my motherboard, which supports 7.1 SPDIF outputs. But it lacks EAX, the increadible DAC soundblaster offers, and the processing power. Plus its fun to run 6 High Quality RCA cables 30 feet to my Marantz 7300 Receiver (which simply amplifies it) to my 4xB&W 603's, B&W ASW600, and a B&W sub.

I could of gone with the Long distance HDMI cable, but I had the RCA's! Ohh, and Im running 2 monitors, so I didnt have a free DVI to use.

PS, from this single thread it would not be unreasonable to assume that I am slightly nuts... But Sound Blaster's Digital Out Solutions, is insane.

Hi Mike,

I've had excellent results using multiple Microsoft wireless devices in close proximity. I would hazard to guess that bluetooth should be even better. Bluetooth on one machine should ignore any other bluetooth devices, that haven't been registered with it, so you should be able to use bluetooth on multiple machines. If this wasn't the case, everyone using bluetooth headphones on their cellphones would lose their service when they were near someone else using another cellphone with bluetooth.

I too was once a Sound Blaster nut, but since digital is supposed to be passthru, I'm using motherboard digital now. I know it works, but your analog cables are subject to signal degradation over that long a run. BTW, I have boxes full of cables that I don't use anymore.

You don't sound like someone who's trying to cut corners, with the exception of your video card, your HTPC is adequate for HDTV and gaming. Because of that, I recommend that you get a new video card. You can get a 256 MB 1900 series video card for less than 200 USD now. I have one and it works fine for HDTV. Your gaming should be fine too using your HTPC because you're only running your HDTV at 720p.

Following this path would get rid of all of your cables between Monster and your HDTV.

roog

 

[SamuriHL]

of course I got a great sound card on my motherboard, which supports 7.1 SPDIF outputs. But it lacks EAX, the increadible DAC soundblaster offers, and the processing power.

PS, from this single thread it would not be unreasonable to assume that I am slightly nuts... But Sound Blaster's Digital Out Solutions, is insane.

This is EXACTLY the reason I dropped Creative sound cards from all of my machines. I just picked up a generic 7.1 sound card with s/pdif in and out for like 30 bucks. Flawless sound quality and flawless Vista support. That's all I need. EAX is nice, but, useless if you can't do 5.1 through s/pdif. The fact that you have to convert analog back to digital is beyond ridiculous. No, Creative lost me a LONG time ago and their DREADFUL Vista support did not help to win me back.

 

[GreenJelly]

I too was once a Sound Blaster nut, but since digital is supposed to be passthru, I'm using motherboard digital now. I know it works, but your analog cables are subject to signal degradation over that long a run. BTW, I have boxes full of cables that I don't use anymore.

I love the X-Fi, and 30 feet of RCA cables does not degrade the performance of the system. I was very worried about this myself! As you can tell from my configuration, I would easily be able to tell if any noise occured as a result of this usage. I am extremely picky about sound, and would not tollerate anything but perfection. I ran a water cooled setup on my HTPC because I didn't want the noise of a fan on my entire audio system! Ever try finding a HTPC Case that would support a custom made water cooling kit, and still look like any standard audio component? Hell my PC looks better then my TV (thank you external radiators)!

Comparing the SPDIF from my giga-byte motherboard sound card and the DAC of the 7300 (which is no slouch), with the 30 feet of RCA's and the DAC of the Sound Blaster (which is a monster), the Sound Blaster gives a better sound. This is very easy to compare, and you can easily adjust all params (such as volume levels) so that a quick 1, 2 comparison and blind test can be done, without the psychological problems associated with almost all other comparisons I have done with audio equipment.

In fact, the Sound Blaster DAC is one of the best on the markets. I had directly compared it to pre-amps costing thousands of dollars and have found superior performance against everything I could toss at it. Simply put, the Sound Blaster X-Fi is a elite level DAC, mass produced creating a low costing solution. Its simply amazing.

In this specific situation, I would of preferred to run a SPDIF cable from the Sound Blaster, and lived with the excellent DAC of the 7300, but that wasn't in the cards.

As far as the video card... yep, ordered one... VGA SAPPHIRE 100199L X1950GT 256MB with HDCP for $134.99 plus S/H.... Not fanless like my 7300 GeForce, which means an addition >$50 for a water block and a few MORE hours of work.

This all started with the decision to "Try-out" Ripping and Storage of HD-DVD's to Hard Drive Storage, using a $199 XBox 360 HD-DVD. Add the cost of upgrading my version of anydvd, and the eventual cost of 2 licenses of Power DVD, and you start to understand my reluctance to "try out" a $100 keyboard. The guys at logitech told me that two of their MX-5000 keyboards could not be used in proximity of themselves

Now that Microsoft has a Blue Tooth solution available, I will be looking into this! I had to find a completely adjustable keyboard and mouse "table" for my Sofa (which wasn't easy), so I am ready to get ride of that either net wire and mini hub strung along the ground.

I missed getting my Adaptec RAID controller (23w @ 12v) by 15 minutes. Im hoping the UPS guy is in the area, and can drop it off. The next issue I have to deal with is the power consumption of my main machine. I am worried that 9 Hard Drives (1 for Vista, 1 for XP, 7 for RAID storage), an overclocked Core 2 Duo Extreme (1.425v), Overclocked Corsair Memory (1066 running at suggested 2.1v) , a Pump, a X1900XTX, and 2 CD/DVD Burners will all work under a 550w power supply!. I would not be lying if I said that I wasnt worried.

But remember who in the hell would do all of this but a complete lunatic!

PS; does anyone know where I could get external SATA drive bays that will hold and power Internal SATA CD/DVD Roms?

 

[SamuriHL]

But remember who in the hell would do all of this but a complete lunatic!

PS; does anyone know where I could get external SATA drive bays that will hold and power Internal SATA CD/DVD Roms?

Crazy SOB! LOL! Nice set up you got there. I'm not rebuilding my video machine until the new Sony SXRD tv is paid off. When I rebuild it, though, I'm getting video with HDMI output as I'm not messing around trying to get it all working correctly. I'd LOVE to see something with cablecard support so I can record in HD off my cable system, but, yea, that'll happen in my lifetime. cough cough.

As for your question, check out newegg.com. They'll have what you're looking for. I put my dad's 350 gig sata drive in an external case and it works great.

 

[GreenJelly]

Crazy SOB! LOL! Nice set up you got there. I'm not rebuilding my video machine until the new Sony SXRD tv is paid off. When I rebuild it, though, I'm getting video with HDMI output as I'm not messing around trying to get it all working correctly. I'd LOVE to see something with cablecard support so I can record in HD off my cable system, but, yea, that'll happen in my lifetime. cough cough.

As for your question, check out newegg.com. They'll have what you're looking for. I put my dad's 350 gig sata drive in an external case and it works great.

I love Newegg, service is outstanding, and the prices are almost always the cheapest.

I also want cable card. I have a HD-DVD tunner, with no way to get HD-TV outside of an attena. And my apartment is facing the wrong way!

My plasma is great, though like all plasma's it states 1080i, but only really supports 720p! Thats ok, because one day it will only be my "Day Time TV". I really want a 1080p front projection screen for my movie nights.

Imagine a huge collection of Music, DVD's, TV Programs and DVD/HD-DVD collections on demand and accessible from every room! No more searching through countless disc's. or even getting up to put in a new movie or music CD's. My dreams are so close! I even have a 1500 VA UPS for my "Monster", and a 900VA UPS for my HTPC! The only thing that could rune my day is a fire or direct lightning strike (can you say insurance).

Which brings me to how I got the ability to pay for all of this. I have had DVD's and CD's stolen from me in the past never with insurance. Last time was 4 years ago when 100 DVD's disappeared, no insurance. Shortly after that, I sold 100 DVD's and not thinking I took a check. Well the check bounced harder then a rubber ball on steroids! DOH! I filed charges against the man who "bought" the DVD's only to have the charges dismissed in favor of a Felony Mail Fraud charge. I guess you shouldn't mail bad checks!

When I moved into my new apartment I requested a dead bolt on the first day. They wanted $30 for installation so I said go for it. 3 Months later I came home to find that all 600 DVD titles missing. I had created a index of all my movies with descriptions, so that I could have friends, family, and myself easy access in picking out a movie for the night! Came in real handy for the $10,000 claim, and a free dead bolt installed the next day

Lastly, with all this wonderful entertainment at my finger tips, I needed to make sure I was going to get my exercise on a daily basis. Therefor a new Wii found its home between my HTPC and my AV Receiver. 30 minutes of boxing, Tenis and Baseball gets a sweat going! My air conditioner was dead when I first turned it on for the summer. In came a new AC, and low and behold a REMOTE! 20 Minutes later, Im sitting back with my Logitech 880 controlling the temperature and fan speed of my living room! After all of this, who could sit back and say there is no god! Not I!

 

[roog]

Crazy SOB! LOL! Nice set up you got there. I'm not rebuilding my video machine until the new Sony SXRD tv is paid off. When I rebuild it, though, I'm getting video with HDMI output as I'm not messing around trying to get it all working correctly. I'd LOVE to see something with cablecard support so I can record in HD off my cable system, but, yea, that'll happen in my lifetime. cough cough.

As for your question, check out newegg.com. They'll have what you're looking for. I put my dad's 350 gig sata drive in an external case and it works great.

Fat, so build a cabinet around it. No burn in worries. SXRD rocks!

 

[SamuriHL]

I love Newegg, service is outstanding, and the prices are almost always the cheapest.

I also want cable card. I have a HD-DVD tunner, with no way to get HD-TV outside of an attena. And my apartment is facing the wrong way!

My plasma is great, though like all plasma's it states 1080i, but only really supports 720p! Thats ok, because one day it will only be my "Day Time TV". I really want a 1080p front projection screen for my movie nights.

Imagine a huge collection of Music, DVD's, TV Programs and DVD/HD-DVD collections on demand and accessible from every room! No more searching through countless disc's. or even getting up to put in a new movie or music CD's. My dreams are so close! I even have a 1500 VA UPS for my "Monster", and a 900VA UPS for my HTPC! The only thing that could rune my day is a fire or direct lightning strike (can you say insurance).

Which brings me to how I got the ability to pay for all of this. I have had DVD's and CD's stolen from me in the past never with insurance. Last time was 4 years ago when 100 DVD's disappeared, no insurance. Shortly after that, I sold 100 DVD's and not thinking I took a check. Well the check bounced harder then a rubber ball on steroids! DOH! I filed charges against the man who "bought" the DVD's only to have the charges dismissed in favor of a Felony Mail Fraud charge. I guess you shouldn't mail bad checks!

When I moved into my new apartment I requested a dead bolt on the first day. They wanted $30 for installation so I said go for it. 3 Months later I came home to find that all 600 DVD titles missing. $10,000 claim, and a free dead bolt installed the next day

Snikes! That's no fun. I am lucky to live in a very low crime area thank God. One of these days I plan on building myself a NAS, as well. That's a far off goal. Right now I've got 2 video machines...one out in my living room running Vista and one in my bedroom running MCE2005. The Xbox360 is configured to use the MCE2005 box to stream video. What's really sweet about that is I can record stuff off the cable box in HD using firewire, strip the commercials out via VideoReDo, and then stream it in 1080i through the 360 to the Sony tv. (The tv can do 1080p, but, since my 360 doesn't have HDMI it won't allow it. sigh). But I agree with Roog, SXRD is a KICK ASS technology. It's LCoS which is something I've always been interested in, but, the price vs PQ is what really sold me on it. Truly a wonderful piece of technology.

 

[roog]

Snikes! That's no fun. I am lucky to live in a very low crime area thank God. One of these days I plan on building myself a NAS, as well. That's a far off goal. Right now I've got 2 video machines...one out in my living room running Vista and one in my bedroom running MCE2005. The Xbox360 is configured to use the MCE2005 box to stream video. What's really sweet about that is I can record stuff off the cable box in HD using firewire, strip the commercials out via VideoReDo, and then stream it in 1080i through the 360 to the Sony tv. (The tv can do 1080p, but, since my 360 doesn't have HDMI it won't allow it. sigh). But I agree with Roog, SXRD is a KICK ASS technology. It's LCoS which is something I've always been interested in, but, the price vs PQ is what really sold me on it. Truly a wonderful piece of technology.

What cable box do you have? I have Comcast with Scientific Atlanta 8300HD DVR boxes. I'd love to be able to transfer video from them to my PCs.

 

[SamuriHL]

Motorola DCT3416...the replacement for the DCT6412. The new model features HDMI and an external SATA port. I've yet to try that but supposedly people have been able to get it to work. Nonetheless, as far as I know ALL cable boxes in the US are supposed to have firewire enabled by law. I've got 2 of these things and they're decent little boxes. Can record 2 HD programs at the same time. Firewire is, of course, only enabled on channels that are not encrypted. Typically that's mostly the broadcast networks. I REALLY wish they'd switch from using MPEG2 to something else...say, MPEG4 or VC1. They'd utilize their bandwidth better and give us MUCH higher quality feeds. Maybe someday.

Anyway, here you go:

Magic Stuff

 

[roog]

I love Newegg, service is outstanding, and the prices are almost always the cheapest.

I also want cable card. I have a HD-DVD tunner, with no way to get HD-TV outside of an attena. And my apartment is facing the wrong way!

My plasma is great, though like all plasma's it states 1080i, but only really supports 720p! Thats ok, because one day it will only be my "Day Time TV". I really want a 1080p front projection screen for my movie nights.

Imagine a huge collection of Music, DVD's, TV Programs and DVD/HD-DVD collections on demand and accessible from every room! No more searching through countless disc's. or even getting up to put in a new movie or music CD's. My dreams are so close! I even have a 1500 VA UPS for my "Monster", and a 900VA UPS for my HTPC! The only thing that could rune my day is a fire or direct lightning strike (can you say insurance).

Which brings me to how I got the ability to pay for all of this. I have had DVD's and CD's stolen from me in the past never with insurance. Last time was 4 years ago when 100 DVD's disappeared, no insurance. Shortly after that, I sold 100 DVD's and not thinking I took a check. Well the check bounced harder then a rubber ball on steroids! DOH! I filed charges against the man who "bought" the DVD's only to have the charges dismissed in favor of a Felony Mail Fraud charge. I guess you shouldn't mail bad checks!

When I moved into my new apartment I requested a dead bolt on the first day. They wanted $30 for installation so I said go for it. 3 Months later I came home to find that all 600 DVD titles missing. I had created a index of all my movies with descriptions, so that I could have friends, family, and myself easy access in picking out a movie for the night! Came in real handy for the $10,000 claim, and a free dead bolt installed the next day

Lastly, with all this wonderful entertainment at my finger tips, I needed to make sure I was going to get my exercise on a daily basis. Therefor a new Wii found its home between my HTPC and my AV Receiver. 30 minutes of boxing, Tenis and Baseball gets a sweat going! My air conditioner was dead when I first turned it on for the summer. In came a new AC, and low and behold a REMOTE! 20 Minutes later, Im sitting back with my Logitech 880 controlling the temperature and fan speed of my living room! After all of this, who could sit back and say there is no god! Not I!

With your love of tech you should move to a more secure apartment. Keep the insurance though.

 

[roog]

Snikes! That's no fun. I am lucky to live in a very low crime area thank God. One of these days I plan on building myself a NAS, as well. That's a far off goal. Right now I've got 2 video machines...one out in my living room running Vista and one in my bedroom running MCE2005. The Xbox360 is configured to use the MCE2005 box to stream video. What's really sweet about that is I can record stuff off the cable box in HD using firewire, strip the commercials out via VideoReDo, and then stream it in 1080i through the 360 to the Sony tv. (The tv can do 1080p, but, since my 360 doesn't have HDMI it won't allow it. sigh). But I agree with Roog, SXRD is a KICK ASS technology. It's LCoS which is something I've always been interested in, but, the price vs PQ is what really sold me on it. Truly a wonderful piece of technology.

I don't like commercial NAS because you're at the mercy of the company that supplies the software. I've built my own server using a motherboard with 8 SATA ports. I personally like using Antec 900 cases which run very quiet and cool. Also, by using XP or Vista, network sharing works like it should.

 

[SamuriHL]

I don't like commercial NAS because you're at the mercy of the company that supplies the software. I've built my own server using a motherboard with 8 SATA ports. I personally like using Antec 900 cases which run very quiet and cool. Also, by using XP or Vista, network sharing works like it should.

Oh I wasn't going to buy a commercial NAS by any means. Personally, I will probably just expand my ubuntu server to handle my storage needs. Right now it's a 120 gig SATA server that works really well. However, I'd like to boost that up to a couple terabytes and rebuild my wired network to use giga-ethernet. Then I can store HD on the thing and serve it to the whole house. I've not had a LOT of luck with this next concept, but, I've gotten it to work once...that is to add video stored on that machine to my MCE library and then stream it over the network to the 360. Not ideal, however. Hence why I want to rebuild my video machines first and then worry about storage. Instead of streaming from the NAS to a video machine to the 360, I'd just stream it from NAS to the video machine. Wouldn't that be sweet...Alas my ideas outweigh my wallet. Many other things have to come first. I was lucky enough to get my tv this year, so, I can't complain at all.

 

[GreenJelly]

There are HDMI cards available for cheaper then what I payed and that have HDCP. Their NVidia, and again, they have Overscan enabled and the drivers blow. You read the comments on New Egg about them, and they have the same Overscan/underscan issues, even when using the HDMI port.

If Nvidia had some real drivers for vista, I would quickly choose one of thoose cards. The truth is a Core2Duo should be able to process and feed the HDTV signal to the video card. Power DVD is just to lazy to write the code (and probably figures you would need a HDCP video card none-the less)

 

[SamuriHL]

I have to agree with everything you just wrote. NVidia drivers under Vista SUCK. ATI is marginally better. But HDMI is a requirement for me because my tv limits 1080p to HDMI only. But things will DEFINITELY have to improve before I buy any new hardware. I'm looking at the end of the year at the EARLIEST so I've got time.

As for PowerDVD Ultra, don't get me started. I regret shelling out 100 bucks for this piece of crap. Which depresses me cause I've LOVED PowerDVD until now.