Re: [gentoo-user] PCI video cards, hardware accel, upported by open-source drivers?

[Michael Mol <mikemol@gmail.com>]

On Sun, Apr 15, 2012 at 10:09 AM, Florian Philipp <lists@binarywings.net> wrote:
> Am 15.04.2012 15:18, schrieb Walter Dnes:
>> On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 06:30:02PM +0200, Volker Armin Hemmann wrote
>>> Am Mittwoch, 11. April 2012, 02:11:35 schrieb Walter Dnes:
>>>>
>>>>   If it's PCIe, so be it.  Actually, a post that prevents me wasting
>>>> money is helpful <G>.  Would PCIe be significantly better on the same
>>>> CPU+GPU, or is it hype?
>>>
>>> a lot, lot lot lot better. No hype.
>>
>>   I've done some looking, and I'm back with more questions.  I've also
>> read the Nouveau-versus-NVIDIA thread.  Questions...
>>
>> 1) Will PCIe 2.0 cards work in a PCIe 1.0 slot?  I'm not expecting 2.0
>> performance, I just want full backwards compatability.  PCIe 1.0 cards
>> seem to be rare, and have to be ordered online, while I can pick up a
>> 2.0 card locally at a store.
>>
>
> PCIe-2.0 is fully downward compatible to 1.1 and 1.0.
>
>> 2) My main "torture test" will be HD fullscreen video.  Will there be
>> major improvement in that?  That's 2D.  Forget 3D.
>>
>
> 2D video is still rendered using OpenGL if your video player supports it.

I'm not aware of any video decoders using CUDA, OpenCL, or pixel
shaders for video decoding; AFAIK, unless you're using VDPAU you're
still using the CPU to render the video to a frame buffer. The most a
video player is going to use OpenGL for is stretching that frame
buffer to fit a window or screen, and possibly as a compositor to
place overlays like subtitles or playback control elements..

>
>> 3) The 2 lowest-priced Nvidia's at the local store are...
>>
>> Asus EN210 SILENT/DI/512MD3/V2(LP) NVIDIA GeForce 210 Chipset (589Mhz)
>> 512MB (1333Mhz) GDDR3 DVI/VGA/HDMI PCI-Express 2.0 Graphics Card
>>
>>
>> and EVGA GeForce 8400GS 1GB (01G-P3-1302-LR) nVidia GeForce 8400GS
>> Chipset (520Mhz) 1GB (520Mhz) DDR3 Dual Display DVI/HDMI/VGA PCI Express
>> 2.0 Graphics Card
>>
>>   Any preferences?
>>
>
> 1GB of GPU RAM looks like overkill if you just want to watch videos. I
> suggest selecting the model which is cheaper, has more connectors or is
> more silent.

Yeah, RAM isn't going to be the issue here.

Honestly, this is the card I'd recommend if you're not doing any heavy gaming.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125402

It's cheap, dead quiet and has full hardware decode of h.264.

-- 
:wq