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[blgentry]

I'm weighing my options for a set top box type thing at home to play my ripped BD and DVD content.  One option is to use MC under Windows on some kind of medium powered PC in a fanless case.  The NUC seems popular, but I'm not sure about how well a platform like that runs MC.  JMOne seems to have had problems with 4k in that setup, but I guess 1080p was fine.

I don't have any ripped 4k content right now, but my display is 4k.  I could feed the display 1080p or I could feed it 4k if that makes sense.  My other set top boxes feed my display 4k and they work (mostly) perfectly.

I'm looking for a recommendation (or ballpark) on hardware that will easily handle MC's video requirements and play H.264, VC-1, and of course 7.1 audio fairly easily.  Really I want to be able to handle any common CODEC, so maybe I need to make sure this system can handle H.265 also.  I don't mind tweaking a few settings, but I really don't want to be chasing performance trying to get an acceptable picture.  I want smooth playback with minimal effort.

I'm guessing this means I need to spend $1k, install windows and MC, and set up ROHQ.  But I don't know, so I'm asking.

Any words of wisdom for me?

Brian.

[wer]

Brian, is this for a desktop situation, where you're sitting right up close to the monitor, or for a living room situation where you're many feet away from a television?

I ask because viewing distance makes all the difference as to whether 4k is necessary.  If you're more than 10 or so feet from the screen, you need an 85-inch screen or larger for your eyes to actually resolve 4k.  I have a 4k 65-in TV, but my viewing distance is 14 feet: 1080 and 4k are indistinguishable.  If you don't need 4k video support in the PC, the hardware requirements are much lower.

A Core-i5 and a fanless video card (Radeon HD5570) will run RO-HQ beautifully for 1080p content, including 3D (if you have any), and all the formats you describe.   HDMI audio out of the card works perfectly with WASAPI.

If you want the PC to do 4k, and of course use RO-HQ, you'll need a higher power system because upscaling the 1080p content to 4k with madVR requires horsepower.

-Will

[blgentry]

This is for a living room system.  I can see the difference between 4k and 1080p content on this display, which is a 65" Sony 900F.  It's mostly in the dynamic range of lighting.  I guess maybe I'm seeing the effects of HDR more than I'm seeing the effects of 4k?  I'm not sure.  I know that watching "Better Call Saul" on Netflix, I was really impressed:  I was thinking to myself "man 1080p looks REALLY good!  This TV is awesome!"  Then I pressed the info button and found out it was a 4k feed.

Since then I've watched a lot of 1080 which looks ok to extremely good.  I've watched more 4k as well.  Some is crazy impressive.  Some is just as good as the best 1080p.  So I can see the difference on streaming 4k sources versus 1080.  But I don't know if upscaling 1080 to 4k via MC will be "better" than feeding 1080p to the Sony and letting it upscale.  Using another product on another platform that upscales to 4k, I don't really see any big difference between feeding the Sony 4k versus feeding it 1080.  This is when playing my personal collection of 1080p bluray rips, so the source is only 1080 to start with.

All that said, maybe an i5 setup will be enough for this box.

I keep thinking Intel NUC, but maybe that's the wrong direction.  I guess I'm trying to get a ballpark price determined before I go too deep into this process.  If it's going to cost $1k, I think this project isn't going to happen.  <shrug>

Thanks,

Brian.

[mattkhan]

the GPU will be a significant chunk of the cost

nvidia is best for madvr these days and a 1660 is probably the "entry level" card for a pretty full 4k experience, you could probably get by with 8G RAM is all it is doing is video playback and some basic zen 2 CPU should be plenty so say £200 for the GPU, £100 for the CPU, £80 for the RAM and a case for say £100 (no idea what US prices are like, possibly replace £ with $) and you'll have a pretty decent machine, add cost of Windows as well I guess. Basically you should be able to do this for way less than $1k.

I think jmone has posted his experience with a NUC before, still not quite 4k capable (and definitely not ROHQ capable).

[jmone]

If you want a "high" quality HTPC acting as a MC Library Server client I'd suggest:
- i5 anything
- 16gb ram (8 is fine but ram is cheap)
- 128 SSD with Win10
- Min ITX mobo, case, 500+w psu
- IR or BT for RC
- 1660ti
= $1K

...or if you can live with some quality compromises and some restrictions on the type of media then the NUC will certainly do and they are easier and much much smaller and cheaper. 

[jmone]

The other option will be to wait a bit to see how MC for Android TV plays out and run that directly on your Sony x900F......

[mattkhan]

I forgot about a PSU and mobo

Add £70 for the OS + £70 for a mobo + £50 for a PSU and you're up to £700

you could easily cut the cost on the GPU though, a 2nd hand 1060 is probably £100 and does the job. I use one for a mix of BD and UHD content with a 4k output and, for me, the more gpu intensive options are into pixel peeping territory to see the benefit.

[blgentry]

The other option will be to wait a bit to see how MC for Android TV plays out and run that directly on your Sony x900F......

At the moment I own an NVidia Shield also.  It's running a couple of other video players, but not perfectly.  I'm not sure if MC would be any better, other than being MC.  The real issue with my Shield is that it won't play VC-1 codec content correctly.  It jerks and stutters badly.  Apparently the current NVidia software (android) release has broken hardware VC-1 support.  I'm considering ditching the Shield even though I just bought it 2 weeks ago.  It can't play 15% of my collection, which is a bit frustrating.  I would guess that MC would not be able to either because this is an OS hook used to do the codec decode.

It sounds like on the PC front I have at least 2 choices:

$1k :  Capable PC that will definitely play 4k stuff and UHD rips (which I don't own right now)
$600ish:  i5 based setup which will play 1080 with all codecs.  No ROHQ. 

I'm not sure if I'm willing to spend even $600 if it will be limited.  One of my set top boxes plays everything streaming I can find including native 4k content.  The box was well under $300 and is easy to use.  Hell I can name it:  AppleTV 4k.

Hmm.  I guess I have some thinking to do.

Thanks to everyone who responded.  I appreciate the help.   

Brian.

[wer]

Regarding the video card, especially if you want something beefier, it's worth mentioning that the current AMD video cards will actually turn their fans OFF when not needed, so it makes for a quiet system.  I don't know if Nvidia cards do that.

The AMD card in my desktop PC is not fanless like the HTPC card is, but the fan is turned off all the time when in general desktop use, playing music, or browsing in theater view.  The fan only turns on when playing a game or when madVR is processing.

I built a full-size machine for my HTPC, with an audio-style case (17in wide, horizontal, black, etc).  If I had to do it over again, I would go for something small like a NUC or a Zotac Zbox.

Good luck...

-Will

[RoderickGI]

I don't know if Nvidia cards do that.

My NVidia MSI GeForce GTX 1060 GAMING X, 6GB in the HTPC does that. I don't think the fan ever comes on, but then I haven't been playing 4K HDR UHD content regularly to check. The HTPC case is well ventilated with large quiet fans, which also only come on as required. Maybe in Summer when the house gets hot the video card would turn on its fan, but I don't notice.

I built a full-size machine for my HTPC, with an audio-style case (17in wide, horizontal, black, etc).  If I had to do it over again, I would go for something small like a NUC or a Zotac Zbox.

I did the same, and would do the same if I built a HTPC again. Mainly because my HTPC houses five disk drives, and I can hear those just a little bit sometimes. Not enough to bother me with my hearing, but still there.

I have been thinking about building a small form factor Windows MC Client to stick behind the TV out of sight. But I wouldn't use a NUC unless I could add a small but powerful nVidia video card. The iGPUs just can't cut it. But now I am waiting to see what happens with JRiver for Android TV, and living with the large HTPC case.


Alas, I will never go back to the dark side, so an AppleTV 4K is not an option for me. 

[JimH]

I have been thinking about building a small form factor Windows MC Client to stick behind the TV out of sight. But I wouldn't use a NUC unless I could add a small but powerful nVidia video card. The iGPUs just can't cut it.

The video capabilities of the latest generation are supposed to be better.

[RoderickGI]

Latest tests, not good enough. The specifications don't tell the full story.

Intel also still have an issue with audio over HDMI. They need to fix that before I would consider an iGPU.

[jmone]

It is a pretty straight forward selection process. 
- If you want to get a great quality setup then you need a dedicated GPU = build your own HTPC. 
- If you are happy with the sort of quality (and the limitations) you get from a Set Top Box (like Shield, Apple TV etc) then a NUC will be fine. 

Personally, I'd wait to test JRiver for Android TV and see how that goes running on the Sony.  I've no idea how much GPU horse power the processors in the TV have but you would expect it to be better than a std Android device.  If it is not good enough then I'd build a real HTPC based around the 1660ti or better. 

[blgentry]

- If you want to get a great quality setup then you need a dedicated GPU = build your own HTPC. 
- If you are happy with the sort of quality (and the limitations) you get from a Set Top Box (like Shield, Apple TV etc) then a NUC will be fine. 

What limitations can I expect?  The video from the AppleTV has no artifacts or dropped frames.  It is exceptionally high quality.  The Shield is similar until I play VC-1 content.

Personally, I'd wait to test JRiver for Android TV and see how that goes running on the Sony.  I've no idea how much GPU horse power the processors in the TV have but you would expect it to be better than a std Android device.  If it is not good enough then I'd build a real HTPC based around the 1660ti or better.

This particular TV is known to be "slow" with the built in Android OS.  I expect that the Shield has more processing power.  It's very snappy.

However, having said all of that, I don't think MC on a PC is in my future.  It looks like lower end solutions will frustrate me, while higher end solutions are expensive at ~$1k.

I will probably end up with a $200 used PC running a different product which does not need a high power GPU.  This is odd to me because both the AppleTV and the Shield produce flawless 4k video.  So do the i5 based systems that my friends have.  (with low end GPUs). 

Am I asking for the wrong thing?  Is MC with RO standard the same as the "pristine 4k video" I get from the AppleTV?  ...and will run on a mid level i5 and built in GPU?  Or does MC have far greater requirements due to it's video components (MadVR, etc)?

Brian.

[mattkhan]

MC doesn't *need* a high powered PC, RO Standard on Windows uses EVR as a renderer which I think works with any old hardware. 4k UHD decoding is still a demanding task though, a modern CPU is required (Kaby Lake or higher I think based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Quick_Sync_Video) if you don't have a GPU decoder to hand.

[BryanC]

You can scale madVR quality using profile select rules based on whichever GPU you can afford.

Example:

Code: [Select]

if (fps == 50) "50fps (PAL)"
else if (srcHeight <= 768) and (fps >= 25) "SD"
else if (srcWidth == 3840) "Native"
else "HD"
I run a combo of NGU high and very high chroma upsampling and low->high image upscaling depending on which content I am watching on my GTX 1060. You can check the render queues to determine the maximum upscaling that your GPU can support.

Personally, I am waiting for the next NUC (next next?) generation with upgraded on-chip AMD graphics to replace my current i5-3570k/1060 mini-ITX HTPC. I should end up saving about $100/yr in electricity.

[Ekpen]

It looks like you are venturing in to 4k.
I have been here since Friday Nov 17 2017, when ripping 4k mkv became possible.
Please invest in a powerful CPU and Nvidia gpus.
I am days away from powering up my new Goliath server.
My old Ubuntu server of 2017 got flooded, it's pump blew up, causing the server not operatable.
I knew I have to build server or servers.
I have an Asus ROG rampage 5,
128 gig of memory, Nvidia rtx 2080ti, with 3 slot Nvidia link.
My advice is put more $ on CPU and GPU to be on a safe side, if thinking of 4k playback.
Take care,.
George

[jmone]

Hi Brian,  One of my HTPC's (A shuttle SFF) is probably 7 years old and is nothing special in the way of CPU and RAM.  With ROHQ, It's all about the GPU which I upgrade every couple of years to get more processing power as 4K comes out, or there are better Algos that can run.  You can have a cheap PC, it's the GPU that you want to be modern and strong.

With the cheap Media STB, I've found several limitations.  The most obvious is trying to get them to change refresh rates to match the content to be played.  Most don't, though I did find that on the Shield when testing MO4Media last year.

After a bit more playing around the Shield is an interesting bit of kit.....  I tested uisng MO 4Media offloading playback to various Players, and the "best" I've found so far is the Kodi Client.  It will play most of my test files including UHD HDR with bitstreaming of the Audio (including Atmos etc), Auto Display Rate changing, and stream selection!  The of the Kodi Client is that unlike other players (Plex, VLC, Video player) it "takes over" and does not auto quit when stopping the video (the Kodi GUI becomes visable and you have to then close it to get back to MO 4Media).

The other limitations is really more subjective to the viewer.  The cheap boxes will be running the most basic scaling algos which is how they can do this on such low end HW.  The question is if that meets or exceeds your requirements then you are onto a winner at a lower price point.

I'm going to be very keen to see how MC's Android Client goes.

VC-1:  I can not remember if I had issues with VC-1 on the shield but would need to pull it out to test.

[RoderickGI]

The Shield is similar until I play VC-1 content.

VC-1:  I can not remember if I had issues with VC-1 on the shield but would need to pull it out to test.

The nVidia Shield doesn't have hardware support for VC-1, as best I can find out on the internets. There was some indication that it was a licencing issue, so that could change in the future.

This particular TV is known to be "slow" with the built in Android OS.  I expect that the Shield has more processing power.  It's very snappy.

I'm going to be very keen to see how MC's Android Client goes.

I was comparing capabilities of my 2016 Sony KD-65X9300D TV with the Shield yesterday. It seems like the shield has better hardware graphics processing and a better CPU than my TV. I am still hopeful that JRiver for Android TV will run well with a 10' interface on my TV, but I am less sure now. The TV may not be powerful enough to run a good App. Some existing Apps are already a bit slow.

Brian if your TV is a Sony XBR-X900F, it has a better SoC (processors) than mine. https://www.displayspecifications.com/en/model/b4b210f1
The closest that site has to my TV is the American equivalent, the XBR-65X930D. https://www.displayspecifications.com/en/model/bbf5400
Comparison: https://www.displayspecifications.com/en/comparison/8faf63197
Of course my TV, being Australian, may have slightly different specs to the XBR, but usually they are close.

If your TV is too slow, mine is approaching geriatric! But mine does support 3D. 

[jmone]

Looks like the Shield & VC-1 is firmware related, it is reported as working in 7.x of the firmware, broken in 8.0 and then fixed in the latest HotFix.  Some others state it uses SW decoding however so may have issues "keeping up".  I'll pull it out of the draw and see how it goes.

[RoderickGI]

The best source I found reported hardware decoding, but on the CPU. I think that is called software decoding.

[jmone]

Correct

[jmone]

Updated my Shield to the latest version (8.0) and used MO Media to play some test files.  VC-1 did work just fine when using "MX Player Pro" as the external video player.  "MX Player Pro" also had no issue with High Frame Rate / High Bit Rate AVC or HEVC 4K Video.  The downside with "MX Player Pro" is that it does not do auto frame rate switching.   Kodi also played the VC-1 just fine (and does Autoframe rate switching) but this acts more as an App than a Player and you end up in their UI so that is not too good.  There are a heap of other players that could be used so I've not tested them all.

The downside for me on using the Shield is still that you have to play a Video File, as MC needs a "remux to file" option if you have all your content stored by Folder Rip.  That said you could have a library where you import the main Video file (M2TS) and you would be good (minus those that use linking), or mux evything to MKV etc (which I'm not at all keen on).

Still thinking that the MC App for Android TV should be the go on this device!  Not long to wait!

Anyway, VC-1 does work on the Shield with at least some Players. 

[blgentry]

Regarding Android apps on my Sony TV:  I'm not interested.  I don't want to fight with it.  Thanks for trying to find other solutions for me; I just don't want to go that direction.

Brian.

[blgentry]

Regarding VC-1 playback on the NVidia Shield:  Most of what's been stated is correct:  It has hardware support for VC-1 decoding.  It works in the 7.X series of OSes for Shield.  The 8 release broke it and now it's only decoded in software, which is on the CPU.

However, if you subscribe to the hotfix channel, it works again.  Great right?  Well... not so much.  The hotfixes are "not supported".  They break other stuff.  I've read threads about them breaking HDMI sync in some cases.  The worst part though, is that once you sign up for hotfixes, by registering your serial number, you can't ever unsubscribe.  So you'll be offered hotfixes until they stop producing them.  I think that's once a week for the next few years.

Jmone:  If VC-1 works "perfectly" for you, one of a few things is going on (I think):

A.  You have an OS that supports VC-1 in hardware.  Maybe you have an 8 series hotfix release installed.
B.  Your testing did not include a long enough section or a difficult enough movie.  I have about 50 VC-1 titles from BluRay that are in MKV containers.  A few of them play seemingly fine for a minute or two.  Then you start to notice jumpy, jerky behavior.  It's kind of subtle on these titles.  On other titles, it's immediately obvious and awful.  It's unwatchable.  As an example, "The Breakfast Club" is really bad.  The audio is even out of sync on that one.
C.  MO Media is magical and does software VC-1 decoding better than anything else. 

I should go try MO Media assuming it's free.

Regarding frame rate matching:  Kodi will frame rate match, no problem, on the Shield.  It's just a setting.  There's no need to use an external player.

Thanks everyone.  Special thanks to jmone who actually did testing on my behalf.  I appreciate it. 

Brian.

[rec head]

I haven't looked into TV performance in a while but from what I remember the Sonys are good at upscaling. If that is the case and you are happy with feeding it 1080 then shouldn't any NUC type box that handles native 4K be OK? My older 4K LG TV is not close to madVR in upscaling so I bought a 1060 to upgrade the PC. But if I didn't get banding and artifacts in dark content with the TV's upscalilng I'd be perfectly happy to let it do the work.

Am I wrong in thinking that upscaling 1080 to 4K is more intense than just playing 4K and that a more low powered box would be fine if he is happy letting the TV do the 1080->4K?

[BryanC]

I haven't looked into TV performance in a while but from what I remember the Sonys are good at upscaling. If that is the case and you are happy with feeding it 1080 then shouldn't any NUC type box that handles native 4K be OK? My older 4K LG TV is not close to madVR in upscaling so I bought a 1060 to upgrade the PC. But if I didn't get banding and artifacts in dark content with the TV's upscalilng I'd be perfectly happy to let it do the work.

Am I wrong in thinking that upscaling 1080 to 4K is more intense than just playing 4K and that a more low powered box would be fine if he is happy letting the TV do the 1080->4K?

Yes that is correct. The worst source material in my experience is 720p PAL 50 fps (UK Antiques Roadshow). The high frame rate and low resolution causes madVR to chug even on NGU low when upscaling to 4K. Most people assume the latest 4K marvel blockbuster is good for stress testing because of the fast graphics, but the renderer is actually doing very little work because it's pixel to pixel (disk i/o and network i/o are a different story).

[blgentry]

I just tried to find "MO Media" and it appears to be some kind of JRiver remote kinda thing.  So then I found MX Media and installed it.

I played a few of my VC-1 videos.  They worked!!  I tried a few more and... they don't work.  2001: A Space Odyssey is the worst offender.  It can't play more than about 5 seconds before it freezes and the audio drops out.  So it's mixed.  It's all rather frustrating.  Much like my Android phones have been.  You chase and fight and read and experiment and chase and fight some more.  Eventually you get something working, but it's so much time and effort.  Oh well.

Hopefully I'll find a platform that has the right compromise for me.  A $200 used PC is sounding better and better to me.

Brian.

[rec head]

That sounds like a good plan and if you get one with a PCI-E 3 you could upgrade the video card later if you wanted.

[jmone]

FWIW, I need to upgrade my old Shuttle as it only has a 300w PSU and I want to put it a beefier GPU.  I've got my eye on a 2nd hand one that is as cheap as getting a new 500w PSU.  I'd image you can get a 2nd hand one with a older but reasonable GPU for $200 (like a 1070) in the US.

On the VC-1, you right - I only made sure they played.  I did not watch all the way through.  I'm guessing the CPU is getting hammered and then starts to throttle. 

[jmone]

FYI - Did a quick remux on 2001 to mkv.  It only gave me a back screen on the Shield.  No idea why it is different to the VC-1 Blade Running that I'd used to test (I checked and it was CPU decoding - and when I tried to force HW decoding it failed).  As you said, it should not be this hard.

[blgentry]

I've been doing some research, talking to friends, and shopping around at some local PC stores.  I was preparing to buy an i5 based system with a 4th generation or higher processor, put in 4 or 8 GB of RAM and a hard drive, then try that "other" player that I've been running on other systems.

But last night, at the end of a long week, I decided to try the Shield again and see if maybe there was any chance NVidia had released an update.  Nah, not gonna happen....

But they did!  ...and it actually fixed the VC-1 problem so VC-1 is decoded in hardware again.  The result is quite smooth video on VC-1 titles.  Everything else that I've tried so far works well also.

So maybe this blasted Android box isn't so bad after all.  As long as another update doesn't break it again.  For the moment, it's actually meeting my needs.

So that PC project I was going to do today and tomorrow just got put on hold.  I think I'm happy about that. 

Brian.

[jmone]

...and with some luck, you may be able to install MC for Android TV soon(ish) on the Shield.

[blgentry]

When MC for Android is able to play video, that will definitely be interesting.

Brian.

[jmone]

.....and being a Library Server Client. 

[rec head]

.....and being a Library Server Client.

It will change everything.

[jmone]

Yup .... it could replace my NUC's if it is a full feature set on my casual viewing TVs.  Can't wait to see what it brings.