Required Hardware For Watching DVD's

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

Hi All,

I'd like to watch DVD movies on my PC. What specs do I look for in a
good drive? What other hardware do I need in order to watch DVD
movies?

TIA

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

Pentium III or better, video card with overlays, any DVD drive.

"Robert Nurse" <rnurse@cudbytech.net> wrote in message
news:a967f5b9.0404110938.5a884670@posting.google.com...
> Hi All,
>
> I'd like to watch DVD movies on my PC. What specs do I look for in a
> good drive? What other hardware do I need in order to watch DVD
> movies?
>
> TIA

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

Robert Nurse wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I'd like to watch DVD movies on my PC. What specs do I look for in a
> good drive? What other hardware do I need in order to watch DVD
> movies?

All you really need is a DVD drive, a video board, and a sound board. Fine
points--there are DVD drives that can be flashed "region free" if you plan
on obtaining DVDs from outside of whatever part of the world you live in,
and if your CPU is slow you might want to consider an accelerator board
such as the RealMagic Xcard.

Beyond that, look at the software bundle and read up on the player software
that's provided--if the drive includes a good player then it might be worth
paying a bit more than for one that is going to require you to buy a
different player.

Beyond that, they pretty much all work for playing DVDs.

> TIA

--
--John
Reply to jclarke at ae tee tee global dot net
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

Thanks. I've got all these already. Here's my system spec:

Here's my system:

AMD Thunderbird 850
512MB SDRAM
Windows 2000
GeForce 4 Ti 4200/128Mb
Sound Blaster Live

Acceptable? Do you have any player software recommendations?

"J. Clarke" <jclarke@nospam.invalid> wrote in message news:<c5c4k801kcc@news4.newsguy.com>...
> Robert Nurse wrote:
>
> > Hi All,
> >
> > I'd like to watch DVD movies on my PC. What specs do I look for in a
> > good drive? What other hardware do I need in order to watch DVD
> > movies?
>
> All you really need is a DVD drive, a video board, and a sound board. Fine
> points--there are DVD drives that can be flashed "region free" if you plan
> on obtaining DVDs from outside of whatever part of the world you live in,
> and if your CPU is slow you might want to consider an accelerator board
> such as the RealMagic Xcard.
>
> Beyond that, look at the software bundle and read up on the player software
> that's provided--if the drive includes a good player then it might be worth
> paying a bit more than for one that is going to require you to buy a
> different player.
>
> Beyond that, they pretty much all work for playing DVDs.
>
> > TIA

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

"Robert Nurse" <rnurse@cudbytech.net> wrote in message
news:a967f5b9.0404120633.47a1eda7@posting.google.com...
> Thanks. I've got all these already. Here's my system spec:
>
> Here's my system:
>
> AMD Thunderbird 850
> 512MB SDRAM
> Windows 2000
> GeForce 4 Ti 4200/128Mb
> Sound Blaster Live
>
> Acceptable? Do you have any player software recommendations?


Robert,

Go into Device Manager, and check the Primary or Secondary IDE channel
(whichever your DVD drive is on), and under the Advanced tab, make sure that
your DVD drive is showing "Use DMA if possible" and the setting under that
is "UDMA" and not "PIO". Otherwise, the video playback will be "jittery".

Jim

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

"Ohaya" <Ohaya@NO_SPAM.cox.net> wrote in message
news:Kzyec.2137$55.1077@lakeread02...
>
> "Robert Nurse" <rnurse@cudbytech.net> wrote in message
> news:a967f5b9.0404120633.47a1eda7@posting.google.com...
> > Thanks. I've got all these already. Here's my system spec:
> >
> > Here's my system:
> >
> > AMD Thunderbird 850
> > 512MB SDRAM
> > Windows 2000
> > GeForce 4 Ti 4200/128Mb
> > Sound Blaster Live
> >
> > Acceptable? Do you have any player software recommendations?
>
>
> Robert,
>
> Go into Device Manager, and check the Primary or Secondary IDE channel
> (whichever your DVD drive is on), and under the Advanced tab, make sure
that
> your DVD drive is showing "Use DMA if possible" and the setting under that
> is "UDMA" and not "PIO". Otherwise, the video playback will be "jittery".
>
> Jim
>
>

Hi,

Sorry, I forgot to mention that I'm running a system with an Athlon
under-clocked to 950, with an "old" Creative 2x DVD player, and DMA is
enabled, and it plays back fine.

Also, I don't remember which exactly which video card I have in it , but
it has a video out, which I don't use, and I had a bit of a time with
playing DVDs for awhile because the DVD software I'm using (PowerDVD) kept
thinking that the video out was enabled, and then not allowing me to play
the DVD (because of copyright/protection). I finally found an older driver
that got it working.

Jim

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

Robert Nurse wrote:

> Thanks. I've got all these already. Here's my system spec:
>
> Here's my system:
>
> AMD Thunderbird 850
> 512MB SDRAM
> Windows 2000
> GeForce 4 Ti 4200/128Mb
> Sound Blaster Live
>
> Acceptable? Do you have any player software recommendations?

Should be fine. The only real gotcha is that if the board has S-video or
composite out nvidia has gone a bit overboard on enforcing Macrovision and
you may not be able to use hardware acceleration with the most recent
drivers. As for player software PowerDVD, WinDVD, and the nvidia player
all work fine.

> "J. Clarke" <jclarke@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
> news:<c5c4k801kcc@news4.newsguy.com>...
>> Robert Nurse wrote:
>>
>> > Hi All,
>> >
>> > I'd like to watch DVD movies on my PC. What specs do I look for in a
>> > good drive? What other hardware do I need in order to watch DVD
>> > movies?
>>
>> All you really need is a DVD drive, a video board, and a sound board.
>> Fine points--there are DVD drives that can be flashed "region free" if
>> you plan on obtaining DVDs from outside of whatever part of the world you
>> live in, and if your CPU is slow you might want to consider an
>> accelerator board such as the RealMagic Xcard.
>>
>> Beyond that, look at the software bundle and read up on the player
>> software that's provided--if the drive includes a good player then it
>> might be worth paying a bit more than for one that is going to require
>> you to buy a different player.
>>
>> Beyond that, they pretty much all work for playing DVDs.
>>
>> > TIA

--
--John
Reply to jclarke at ae tee tee global dot net
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

"J. Clarke" <jclarke@nospam.invalid> wrote in message news:<c5eqoa01uel@news3.newsguy.com>...
>
> Should be fine. The only real gotcha is that if the board has S-video or
> composite out nvidia has gone a bit overboard on enforcing Macrovision and
> you may not be able to use hardware acceleration with the most recent
> drivers. As for player software PowerDVD, WinDVD, and the nvidia player
> all work fine.

I just picked up a DVD-ROM (Benq) that came with WinDVD 4.0. I
installed the drive and the software and I was watching DVD's that
night! Thanks for all your input.