[wellylug] Mini-ITX Motherboard

[jumbophut]

On Sat, 12 Mar 2005 09:49:14 +1300 (NZDT), David Antliff > When you're
done, perhaps you might report back to the list please? I did
> the same research a year ago and I forget my exact conclusions but I
> essentially decided that even the 1GHz core EPIA board wasn't going to
> work very well with Linux when used as a 'media box' (DVDs, TV tuner,
> timeshifting, etc), mainly because of the terrible Linux support for the
> hardware MPEG decoder and the extremely poor cost/performance of the CPU.
> For many headless applications (router, firewall, server, mp3 box, etc) it
> would be great tho.
> 
It has one spare PCI slot, so you can whack a Hauppauge PVR-350 in
there and, hey presto, hardware MPEG encoding and playback.  Card can
be had for less than NZ$300 if you buy from Amazon and ship via
someone you know in the US.  Linux (ivtv) drivers are available,
though probably not completely stable.

The Mini-ITX MPEG-decoder is really not a full decoder anyway.  It
just provides some assistance to take a bit of load off the CPU.  And
it doesn't do DVD decryption at all.

If you want a high-powered, but relatively beautiful solution, Google
Hush-ATX.  No compromises on horsepower, but fanless and the case
looks good (to an anti-esthete like me anyway).  Drawback is price. 
You get what you pay for.

-- 
Tony (echo 'spend!,pocket awide' | sed 'y/acdeikospntw!, /l at omcgtjuba.phi/')