Andrew Van Til

[Andrew Van Til]

[quote=”erikt”]
I want the better VT25 2D PQ without the VT25 cost.  I don’t think it’s the 3D technology per-se which makes the 2D PQ better, maybe I’m wrong…
[/quote]

Improvements made to the displays to enable 3D (faster pixels, better contrast, etc) also benefit 2D.  3D isn’t going anywhere; I’d be really surprised if it wasn’t just another checkbox feature (like Vieracast) on most of the mid-range next year.

All that said, if you look at what a VT25 costs now it is less than what the V10 went for at the same time last year – and that’s even ignoring the free BD deck offer currently going on right now. 

[Andrew Van Til]

[quote=”Mikinho”]
I was honestly hoping for mediocre  reviews since I can’t afford either TV  >:(
[/quote]

Next years model will be much better (just keep saying that over, and over ;)).

[quote=”erikt”]
Now, if they’d only create a model with the high-end features/PQ of the VT25 without the 3-D…
[/quote]

The 3D bits are almost free (look at V10 vs. VT25 pricing) and make the 2D PQ better.  Why would you want to loose that?

[Andrew Van Til]

Sandy Bridge should be out in early Jan (~CES), AMD/nVidia will have had their mid-range GPUs out long enough to get a decent selection of cards and there will have been enough time for everyone to get the worst of the early adopter kinks worked out of the software (PDVD/TMT) and drivers.

There’s also a really good chance that non-exclusive content that doesn’t suck will finally be there.

[Andrew Van Til]

[quote=”Skirge01″]

This is probably why magazines don’t do these types of builds very often.  There’s never a “perfect” time.  I won’t begin to understand how long it takes for a magazine article to go from “idea” to “newstand”
[/quote]

Timing is part of what distinguishes that know what they’re doing from those that don’t 🙂

FWIW – I have a feeling that Jan/Feb 2011 will be the perfect time to build a low power, quiet, 3D, HDMI 1.4, bit streaming HTPC.

[Andrew Van Til]

[quote=”Mikinho”]
One one of the pre-reqs was 3D HDTV and HD Audio bitstreaming so a discrete sound card was needed since the NVIDIA 4xx series weren’t available at the time of the article.
[/quote]

While that’s true – the problem is that the stated goals are bizarre given product timing that they should have known about.  I don’t think it’s possible for them to have picked a worse time to build that box; had they waited a month (or two) significantly cheaper/better hardware would have been available as well as nVidia’s HDMI 1.4 driver.  Anyone who follows their guidance to achieve similar objectives and doesn’t do some homework will be completely screwed.

[Andrew Van Til]

1) They should have known in June (I did) that the 460/450 were coming soon, so that was a bad time to do a feature on building a 3D HTPC
2) We all know that lossless multi-channel LCPM is the same thing as bit streamed HD audio
3) $200 for a PSU?
4) Green drive for a quad HD tuner?

[Andrew Van Til]

It should.

[Andrew Van Til]

There’s an audience for any product.  Just have to wonder if there are enough impatient agoraphobs to make it worth their while.

[Andrew Van Til]

In PPV quality, sometime after they were in theaters but before they make it to disk? 

Why not wait a couple more weeks and pick up the BD w/ extras and better PQ/AQ for less $?

[Andrew Van Til]

Unless you’ve got a serious HT install it would be really hard to match the theater. 

[Andrew Van Til]

Where do I pre-order?

[Andrew Van Til]

Sorry, saw that you’d recorded in Sage but missed the part about watching it in Media Center (which uses the MS decoder and EVR renderer).

Do you have the MEI driver installed?  Do the files play decently on other PCs (isolating a recording error)?

[Andrew Van Til]

There’s a newer driver revision, you could try that but it should work perfectly w/ 2182.  What MPEG2 decoder + renderer are you using?

[Andrew Van Til]

[quote=”dugiehowsa”]
The EVGA 210 arrived today.  I was very excited to install it, and then I ran into a small road bump.  The EVGA requires a 300 W power supply and 18 A on the +12 rail.  My power supply was only 250 W and 17 A on the +12 rail.
[/quote]

FWIW – I’ve used a 210 in my 150W pico PSU powered HTPC w/o issues.

[Andrew Van Til]

That probably explains the decision.  Everyone wants one, but no one could afford it 🙂

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