I'm running a ati type hd4850 right now. Previously I was using a hd3650 with a passive cooler and I discovered it had issues passing audio trough the HDMI port so I had to swap it out. I'm into that one for about $150, a little more than I needed to spend on a video card but it also plays games quite well.
I do need to check out the GOM player, it sounds like it may be the way to go. I'm running PowerDVD right now. At the time it was one of the few programs that supported all the HD audio formats and did BD Live as well.
I have started down the whole house thing myself but as it turns out I'll likely just end up with it in the Master BR and the living room. I figure if I need anything else I'll just stream it to a laptop and move that whereever I am at the time. I only have one flat panel in the master right now and I'm leaning towards a projector for the living room. I also added a HDHomerun box to the network so I have HD broadcast TV anywhere I have access to my wireless network.
Yep, Netflix was one of the reasons I went with HTPC's also. I currenlty have all my music ripped in lossless along with the TV tuner, Blu Ray/DVD and netflix it pretty well takes care of everything. As a extra, email, surfing, and games.
We are in a minority right now but when everyone sees what can be done with HTPC's there will more of them out there. Blu-Ray on PC's was lagging a bit behind but it's there now. High def audio and high quality DACs & decoders are still more difficult to come by but they are on the way and a person can always stream to an audio receiver or processor for now.
The Asus Xonar HDAV will be 1.3a compliant, do all the HD decoding and have top of the line Burr-Browns. An optional card will allow the user to play with different op-amps by simply plug in sockets. That woukd be fun.
I do need to check out the GOM player, it sounds like it may be the way to go. I'm running PowerDVD right now. At the time it was one of the few programs that supported all the HD audio formats and did BD Live as well.
I have started down the whole house thing myself but as it turns out I'll likely just end up with it in the Master BR and the living room. I figure if I need anything else I'll just stream it to a laptop and move that whereever I am at the time. I only have one flat panel in the master right now and I'm leaning towards a projector for the living room. I also added a HDHomerun box to the network so I have HD broadcast TV anywhere I have access to my wireless network.
Yep, Netflix was one of the reasons I went with HTPC's also. I currenlty have all my music ripped in lossless along with the TV tuner, Blu Ray/DVD and netflix it pretty well takes care of everything. As a extra, email, surfing, and games.
We are in a minority right now but when everyone sees what can be done with HTPC's there will more of them out there. Blu-Ray on PC's was lagging a bit behind but it's there now. High def audio and high quality DACs & decoders are still more difficult to come by but they are on the way and a person can always stream to an audio receiver or processor for now.
The Asus Xonar HDAV will be 1.3a compliant, do all the HD decoding and have top of the line Burr-Browns. An optional card will allow the user to play with different op-amps by simply plug in sockets. That woukd be fun.