Mass Storage
Finding the right video source for our High Definition tests was a little more difficult than we anticipated. We thought of several titles that would be perfect for generating stunning video playback sequences, but each title was available in either HD-DVD or Blu-ray formats only. In the end, we chose a couple of titles that offered very good visuals but more importantly were available in SD, HD-DVD, and Blu-ray formats. These two titles are Mission Impossible 3 and Swordfish. While we would love to show Halle Berry's special scene in Swordfish, we will instead focus on one of the colorful action scenes in the beginning of the movie. Mission Impossible 3 affords us a scene where Tom Cruise is scaling the wall at the Vatican, and that will separate the good from bad when it comes to moiré patterns in 1080P.
In order to display those movie sequences we need the latest HD software, so we naturally used
CyberLink's PowerDVD Ultra and
Corel's InterVideo WinDVD 8 Platinum HD/BD . Both programs gave us migraines under Vista up until the latest patches, and we are still a little on edge during scene switching and extended playback. Of course, this is almost standard fare with Vista, but we will cover these issues and others in a separate article. On a side note, we are also utilizing the
HD HQV Benchmark to evaluate the picture quality output of our graphics solutions and Intel's
Digital Home Capabilities Assessment 2.0 Tool to verify our platform's digital video capabilities and expected stability when playing back various video formats.
Having the software available for viewing and playback does little good if we do not have the proper optical drives that are up to the task. As an offshoot of this particular roundup we will start reviewing optical drives again at AnandTech in the near future. In the meantime, our HD capable test drives consisted of the
Plextor PX-B900A , Toshiba
SD-H802A , and Pioneer
BDC-S02BK . Our standard DVD playback drive is the
Lite-On LH-20A1P and we might even throw in a playback comparison between the Toshiba SD-H802A HD-DVD drive and the Microsoft
Xbox 360 HD DVD Player. Unfortunately, we were hoping to receive the
Toshiba SD-H903A HD-DVD writer to compare directly to the new low cost Pioneer BDC-S02BK Blu-ray writer but our sample has been delayed. However, we should receive it in time for the optical drive reviews.
While we are on the subject of storage, it turned out one of the most difficult choices we had to make was choosing what hard drive to utilize. In keeping with our silent and inexpensive theme we settled on the Samsung
SpinPoint T166 500GB for our standard test bed. That said, we wanted to try something a little different for our featured HTPC buildup and selected the
Seagate DB35.3 750GB hard drive that is designed for DVR-specific challenges such as power consumption, video streaming performance, acoustics, and long term reliability. For those that like to throw caution to the wind, we also will be testing two of the Seagate DB35.3 500GB drives in RAID 0 and RAID 1 to see how well they perform against our standard Samsung T166 500GB in video specific testing. As if that's not enough, we also have the
Seagate SV35.2 500GB drive engineered specifically for use in digital video surveillance systems. Not to be left out, Western Digital is trying their hardest to get us production level
GreenPower hard drives for our home office platform buildup and Hitachi has promised a
CinemaStar 7K1000 for our HTPC buildup.
(Ed: Did we mention the Feature Creep yet?)
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sprockkets - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
For focusing on what matters in uATX boards. That and perhaps the vast majority of people are more focused on these items such as S3 standby as opposed to other features.Shame the abit NF-M2 nView is no longer going to be made since it is older tech.
Myrandex - Friday, August 10, 2007 - link
I think its a shame that there aren't any more SLI capable mATX boards coming out. I have the EVGA Nforce4 SLI mATX board and absolutely love it. I didn't want onboard video, as I already had a 7800GT, and I wanted the option of adding a cheap 7800GT to it later as well if I wanted to (as well as I have a dedicated X-fi sound card and a PCie TV Tuner), so that board worked perfectly.Jason
The Boston Dangler - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
I built a micro box just last night. This was for my friend's parents (in their 60's). The box alone hit the $500 target. Everything else will be purchased in person. I hooked them up with XP MCE and remote, they purchased Office Sudent Edition, and all other software will be freebies. The box will be used for the usual suspects: email, internet, music, movies, and office stuff.ASUS M2NPV-VM
(seems very complete, capable, easy to use, I like the MB header for reset, pwr etc.)
3800+ HE
2 GB decent, cheap DDR-800
Seasonic 330W
Coolermaster Centurion 541, forgot to buy fans DOH!
( I didn't like the way the stand-offs didn't support the forward edge of the MB, the tool-less drive bays are kinda PITA, why are the front panel plugs at the bottom?)
Lite-On SATA DVD
Samsung ??? HDD (love them)
5 beans, not too shabby.
Darth Farter - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
heh, same thing here for my dad ordered from ZZF, 3800+, 2gb ddr2 800, Asus 690G, a 250gb WD, liteon sata dvdrw and mini case vostok w. psu from enermax ~$400.mostlyprudent - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
WOW, impressive summary article. That was a lot of information and you conveyed logically and concisely. The sheer scope of material you plan to present over the next month is staggering, but VERY welcome.Do we really have to wait until September/October for the P35 roundup?
CZroe - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
I just hope you guys are aware that Mission Impossible III on Blu-Ray is MPEG2. Most BD movies are VC-1 or AVC video codecs while it's usually the older titles that end up with MPEG2 (due to immaturity of the mastering software). Most BD movies that are also released on HD-DVD are the exact same VC-1 encode on both discs, so this is an unfortunate selection for comparison.Bjoern77 - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
"Oh, we almost forgot: we get to do this all over again with the P35 motherboards when we're done with the µATX segment."The time that review will show up the p35 will be outdated, concerning all that various components included in this review.
But anyway, i'm looking forward to it.
CZroe - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
I just hope you guys are aware that Mission Impossible III on Blu-Ray is MPEG2. Most BD movies are VC-1 or AVC video codecs while it's usually the older titles that end up with MPEG2 (due to immaturity of the mastering software). Most BD movies that are also released on HD-DVD are the exact same VC-1 encode on both discs, so this is an unfortunate selection for comparison.strikeback03 - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
300 was just released on both using VC-1 for each. Though of course that would mean more testing for the Anandtech crew.Kensei - Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - link
Not to be too pendantic, but did you mean "long road"?
Also, while I have your attention Gary, what happened to those literary quotes you used to use at the beginning of article? I like them... not sure about others though.