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btw, recording and capturing HDTV...
can't believe it being true before I can see it in action.
proper resolution for hdtv should be quite a resource hog.

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Actually it is not all that hard to do. Since a HD broadcast (720p or 1080i) is digital in nature to begin with, so to capture a HD stream is very easy and takes very little CPU cycles to do.

Then again, to capture a NON HD broadcast (480i) can take a LOT of CPU cycles, since the capture stream needs to be converted from a analog broadcast to a digital format mpeg2 through some type of mpeg2 encoder. But, there are now consumer mpeg2 hardware encoders on the market that make capturing an analog broadcast a simple process, and cpu usage will never rise above 5% even when performing multiple 480i capture at the some time. These hardware encoders can be bought for $100 or less.

The majority of CPU cycles are going to be spent on decoding the MPEG2 steam that was captured. And yes the HD mpeg2 streams do contain more information Vs. a SD mpeg2 stream

The 720p and 1080i HD streams do contain a lot more information than a 480i SD stream, but decoding a 720p or 1080i stream using a modern PC is not hard to do, and a good video card really helps in this area, also your choice of what mpeg2 decoder to use can play a HUGE roll in over all picture quality and CPU cycles used..

But even a $50 card like the Nividia fx5200 on a p4 2.4mhz can process and display a 720p or 1080i signal and only use about 50% of the CPU. A bigger video card would lower this CPU usage.

The big thing when dealing with HD streams is hard drive space... you needs LOTS of it!! A 720p or 1080i HD stream can come in at 9gigs an hour. For comparison a 480i SD broadcast uses about 3gigs an hour.

Bryce

PS, i should be getting in the mail today or tomorrow my vga > component transcoder. With this i will be able to output a 1080i picture from my media pc into my 34" HDTV basically a HUGE freaking monitor!! So with my wireless mouse and KB i can surf the web from the couch , but the majority of the media pc’s use will be running Media Center 2005.

• removed the floppy, and put a 80gig HD in its place. (old extra HD)
  
• replaced the CDROM with a DVD-Burner. ($200)
  
• Added 1 Hauppage pvr250, 1 avermedia m150 video tuner cards. (~$250)
  
• replaced the videocard with a Chaintech fx5200 nvidia ($50)
  
• Added a vga to component transcoder to display a 720p resolution on my hdtv. ($120)
  
• i have a ATI HD-Wonder that was in the system, but not at the moment. This is the card that recorded the hidef recordings of LOST used for the last two screencaps above. When I rebuild into a bigger case, this card will be going back in. (gift from boss)
  
• Added the Microsoft Media Center Remote ($40)
  
• Installed Microsoft Media Center 2005 ($130 i think)
  [list]
  
• Nvidia nvdvd codecs ($20)
  
• Powerstrip to get 720p video timing into the hdtv ($30)