ATI HD 2600 (ddr2,gdr3,gdr4,256-512MB) which one to buy?

[digidigi]

Hi, I'm gona buy a new ATI HD 2600 video card.

It will be used only for Multimedia PC (HD Encoding) and no 3D gaming.

It should be able to decode h.264, vc1 and other HD content with ease.

 

which Memory speed ddr2, gdr3 or gdr4?

which Memory size? 256mb or 512MB?

 

Any sugestions?

 

/Digi

[Moses]

I have this one: http://www.giga-byte.com/Products/VGA/Prod...?ProductID=2586

I didn't test it with VC1 content, yet, but I am very happy with it, watching H.264 Live-TV, recordings and samples mostly in 1080i but also in 720p/1080p. It does a very good job, CPU load is mostly below 10%, no problems of any kind... as I said: very happy. And no noise (it's built into my HTPC), because of it's big passive cooler. There are two very slow spinning and low noise case fans in the case producing a steady air flow. CPU has a passive cooler, also. The cooler of the graphicsboard is quite big. It occupies the next slot and is a bit higher than normal PCI cards... for some cases this might become a problem.

[zaxon]

Hi, I'm gona buy a new ATI HD 2600 video card.

It will be used only for Multimedia PC (HD Encoding) and no 3D gaming.

It should be able to decode h.264, vc1 and other HD content with ease.

 

which Memory speed ddr2, gdr3 or gdr4?

which Memory size? 256mb or 512MB?

 

Any sugestions?

 

/Digi

 

if paying games is no issue for you then for HDTV viewing there is no noticeable difference. you can take cheapest HD 2600 available (even HD 2400 will do great for that matter) but when you like quiet environment pick one with passive cooling because cheap videocards have usually pretty noisy standard coolers. if you plan to use your multimedia pc with 2 monitors (monitor and TV for example) and both have DVI/HDMI inputs then better check that videocard has same outputs too.

Edited October 9, 2007 by zaxon

[topcaser]

Take the cheapest one: Palit 2600XT. Its fan is very noisy @50% (default). Nevertheless, you can slow it down with ATITool to run @30%. This is the rotation speed where other fans are louder (like the power supply, and i have got really a silent power supply with my S12 Seasonic, or the case fan (also very silent (12 cm Scythe))). Temps are reasonable good at 67-69degrees, regardless playing back HD or SD content.

 

@Moses: which temps do you get with your Gigabyte @400 and @800 MHz?

[Moses]

at 800 Mhz I have 55-60°C. At 400 Mhz it's just a little bit less. Not much, just 2-3°C. Both measurements where while decoding H.264 Live-TV in hardware.