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Which is better, GeForce 5200 or 6200?
http://forums.linhes.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=19558		 Page 1 of 2
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 12:31 am ]
Post subject:  Which is better, GeForce 5200 or 6200?
...or neither?

6200 is newer and presumably faster, but is it better, as cool, and problem free with Knoppmyth livecd auto install as the 5200? I can get either one right now for about 50 bucks -- decisions, decisions! See my system specs in sig for my HDTV (ATSC) system I'm building. Thx!

ZOTAC nVidia GeForce FX 5200 256MB DVI PCI Video Card

or...

NVIDIA GEFORCE 6200 256MB PCI VIDEO CARD

Both seem to have sinks instead of fans. (Good for less noise hopefully.)

My PCI GeForce 5200 stutters a bit. HDTV CPU = 70%. Transcoded mpg4 = 99% unless 320x240.
Author:  marc.aronson [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 1:28 am ]
Post subject: 
I've used both -- they are both good. I had better luck using XVMC with the 6200 than I did with the 5200. My 6200 was a "6200 LE", in case that makes a difference.

Heads up -- if that 2.4ghz CPU is a P4, it is board-line for hidef playback and you will probably need xvmc. If its a
Author:  graysky [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 3:32 am ]
Post subject: 
Is this PCI or PCI-E? Anyway, given that choice, I'd go w/ the 6200... but if $50 if your planned spend, Why not get a 8400GS (512 meg) for $54? This card will give you the ability to use VDPAU. There are other options as well, but the price goes up to around 70-80 if you want a 9400GT w/ 512 or around 100 for 1 gig. It's unclear to me if the 9400GT is that much better than the 8400GS though.
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 4:47 am ]
Post subject: 
Thanks, guys!!
graysky wrote:
Is this PCI or PCI-E?

PCI
Quote:
Why not get a 8400GS (512 meg) for $54? This card will give you the ability to use VDPAU.

What's VDPAU? (And will Knoppmyth autoinstall it? I'm a lightweight here :)
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 4:59 am ]
Post subject: 
Yikes, I just read about VDPAU. That's a bit new and scary for me. The one and only time I tried to update my NVDIA driver for my MX4000 -- which, yes, I did correctly, as per the updateNvidia drivers wiki -- X windows stopped outputting to either the MX400 or internal graphics out. Just blinked then when black. I had no idea what to do (I'm not a linux person), didn't know how to undo, and was forced to reinstall Knoppmyth from scratch. Was a real, real drag. :oops:
Author:  graysky [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 5:04 am ]
Post subject: 
Currently, VDPAU probably isn't ready for prime time use... but it will be in the not-to-distant future. My point is that you're planning to spend $50 on a 5- or 6-series, why not spend $4 more on an 8-series that will have this ability. Plus, you said your machine plays HD content, right? As to your breaking the machine concerns, I'm pretty sure that once cesman feels that VDPAU is ready, installation will be a snap under R6. As to your issues updating drivers, I dunno what to tell you. Did you ask in the forums/post logs? Many folks in here are both friendly and knowledgeable.

P.S. When you did the reinstall, you did take advantage of the backup/restore scripts, right?
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 5:11 am ]
Post subject: 
graysky wrote:
P.S. When you did the reinstall, you did take advantage of the backup/restore scripts, right?

Weeeelllll - I said yes when it asked me if I wanted to save backups. But then, where/what/how these backups... didn't know where to look or what to do when I found them.
graysky wrote:
why not spend $5 more on an 8-series that will have this ability.

Will XVMC in the meantime work on this series 8? I figured out how to do that much. It helped bring ATSC down to about 70% CPU.
Quote:
Did you ask in the forums/post logs? Many folks in here are both friendly and knowledgeable.

Yes, you all are indeed, that's true, it is cool. Yeah, I did mention it in a lengthy thread about my initial stuttering issues. Didn't get answered, but a lot was going on. I didn't push in a new post.
Author:  graysky [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 5:19 am ]
Post subject: 
worldpoop wrote:
Weeeelllll - I said yes when it asked me if I wanted to save backups. But then, where/what/how these backups... didn't know where to look or what to do when I found them.


Hmm... you run 'mythbackup' as root, it makes your backup files in /myth/backup. You boot off the R5.5 CD and select the upgrade installation option and it should be automatic from there. Did you do an upgrade after running the backup script?

worldpoop wrote:
Will XVMC in the meantime work on this series 8? I figured out how to do that much. It helped bring ATSC down to about 70% CPU.


I haven't used XvMC in a long time so I can't answer your question. I don't see why it wouldn't work. FYI- the current incarnations of VDPAU for mplayer at least drop the CPU usage by approx 3 fold. I really think this is something you WANT to use once it get a little more hardened... <nudge><nudge> ...consider the 8400GS!
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 5:26 am ]
Post subject: 
graysky wrote:
Did you do an upgrade after running the backup script?

Actually, I did do an upgrade, didn't fix it.... but I didn't know until now about being able to run mythbackup first at CLI! The backup inquiry I encountered was during the driver installer script, a different backup moment of zen. I assume that one made copies of a bunch of conf type files somewhere.
Quote:
...consider the 8400GS!

I will!
Author:  marc.aronson [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 12:07 pm ]
Post subject: 
worldpoop wrote:
Thanks, guys!!
graysky wrote:
Is this PCI or PCI-E?

PCI

The Dell Dimension is an older machine, but with a 2.4ghz processor I would guess the motherboard supports AGP. Is there any reason you're using a PCI slot for the video card instead of AGP? I seem to recall reading some other posts where people have problems trying to do hidef output with PCI video cards, but perhaps that is a resolved issue.

To complicate things for you a bit more, here's a linkto an FX5200 AGP 8X card for under $30. This puppy has both VGA and DVI output.
Author:  tjc [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 1:29 pm ]
Post subject: 
According to something jams discovered/noted last week Nvidia recently relegated the 5200 series GPUs to the legacy (96xx) drivers. So a 6xxx series GPU is probably a better choice now.

On the other hand the 6200 based cards tend to steal their memory from the CPUs main RAM. A 6600 might be a better choice and almost as cheap.

Oh, and avoid PCI for video cards if at all possible. Since the bus throughput becomes a serious limiting factor. Both AGP (on legacy motherboards) and PCI-e (especially 16x) are much better on this count.
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 3:30 pm ]
Post subject: 
marc.aronson wrote:
but with a 2.4ghz processor I would guess the motherboard supports AGP. Is there any reason you're using a PCI slot for the video card instead of AGP?

Thanks, marc!!! But indeed, there is no AGP slot on this machine. I wish there were. There's an integrated VGA out, but can't do TV-out with that unless I buy a 300-something buck converter. (And I don't know what kind of graphics power the integrated has anyway.)
Quote:
I seem to recall reading some other posts where people have problems trying to do hidef output with PCI video cards, but perhaps that is a resolved issue.

Yeah, that discussion is here. For me, the MX4000 can play ATSC HD okay enough now (CPU 70%) when there's no OSD or other interference (like a second stream being recorded). It cannot do mp4 except at very small sizes. I'm assuming that I will get only an improvement on HD as well as transcoded with a bigger card? I just don't want to go overkill, both to avoid noise and heat, and also if PCI bottlenecks it anyway.
Author:  worldpoop [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 3:40 pm ]
Post subject: 
Thanks tjc!!!
tjc wrote:
Nvidia recently relegated the 5200 series GPUs to the legacy (96xx) drivers. So a 6xxx series GPU is probably a better choice now.

What happens when driver goes legacy? Is the problem that there will be no more updates, or is it something else?
Quote:
On the other hand the 6200 based cards tend to steal their memory from the CPUs main RAM.

Yeah, that's the kind of thing I was wondering, if maybe the 5200 was easier on the system.
Quote:
A 6600 might be a better choice and almost as cheap.

Oh - interesting. Are people using that with success? The reason I've zeroed in on 5200 is because it is mentioned in the Knoppmyth Pamphlet for HDTV; and 6200 because that's one people in these forums seem to be using too. Oh, and just (re-)found this in the wiki.
Quote:
Oh, and avoid PCI for video cards if at all possible.... Both AGP (on legacy motherboards) and PCI-e (especially 16x) are much better on this count.

Sigh - I would if I could. PCI slots whats I gots!
Author:  tjc [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 10:52 pm ]
Post subject: 
worldpoop wrote:
What happens when driver goes legacy? Is the problem that there will be no more updates, or is it something else?

Mostly lack of new feature support like the vdpau stuff.
worldpoop wrote:
Quote:
A 6600 might be a better choice and almost as cheap.

Oh - interesting. Are people using that with success? The reason I've zeroed in on 5200 is because it is mentioned in the Knoppmyth Pamphlet for HDTV

The recommendation at the time was for a low cost commodity card which could be passively cooled and still get the job done, but times change. With the 5200 not getting vdpau support, which BTW is looking like the next big thing at the moment, it's a bit less attractive for this application.

Oh and FWIW, I'm using a PCIe 16x 6600 based card in my Fedora workstation box. It uses the most recent Nvidia driver, and plays back all kinds of video content quite well (to a DFP but that the future of TV anyway).
Author:  mjl [ Sat Feb 21, 2009 11:15 pm ]
Post subject: 
I just read somewhere that the vodu doesn't work with agp.. I have the 7300GS and was going to try it until checking the "list" of known useable cards. AGP was out.

Mike
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