Best Graphic Card for PCI-e x16 to watch blu-ray with hdmi

as far as i know, all PCIE x16 2.0 are backward compatible to a PCIE x16 slot

and you want to go with an ATI card for bluray,
i would recommend anything between a 3850 and a 4850,
ATI cards decode the high def movies on the card (i believe) with no extra software,
i have an nvidia card and they want to make me buy PureVideo to allow me to decode on the card,
lame way to pick up a few extra dollars nvidia.

Yeah ATI cards are the way to go when it comes to doing things with HDTVs and HTPCs. All ATI cards from the HD 3xxx and 4xxx series will give you excellent performance with Blu-ray and they include Native HDMI.

Do you plan on playing any games with it? If so, the 4850 would probably be the best choice. It also has more sound features than the 3xxx series, so if you have an awesome sound system, you may want to go that route for 7.1 DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD.

I am not sure what you mean about backward compatible, can you explain how it works? I am guessing it still plugs in the slot, even it says "2.0."

It looks like that will be my choice of the VGA:


http://shop2.frys.com/product/5647371?site=sr:SEARCH:MA...

Thanks for reminding me a bout the sound system.

like backward compatible in the sense that right now i have a PCIE 2.0 graphics card in a PCIE x16 slot and it works just fine

If not gaming you don't need to grab an HD4850. It's a nice choice if you are gaming. But you can get them cheaper than that fry's link. $150ish shipped AR at newegg for example.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

is it really goin to work with pci-e x16 slot?,i have a ep35-ds3l mb,q6600,320gb wd caviar blue,im building a new rig,and need a lot of help now to all you good guys out there to complete my rig,tnx!!!!!

im more on watchin movies too...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Definately ATI.

I have an ATI Diamond 4870 512MB, got it at Fry's for $279 and just bought a nice $150 LG Blu Ray Drive at frys too. I get perfect clarity on my 24" 1900x1200 resolution LCD. I MEAN PERFECT! No artifacts, no choppy stuff...its perfectly clear. 100%. Could not get better than what i've seen with this card. LG Blu ray drives come with Power DVD software. Just make sure you download the right update and it plays everything. At first I could not view the previews before getting to the menu screen. So i went to the Power DVD site and downloaded some update and now its flawless. Power DVD software actually advertises ATI GPU's to run it so don't even try Nvidia. I'm betting the 4850 is a better deal if you have smaller resolution such as 1600x1200 and probably runs just as great as the 4870 on that lower resolution . But if you have 1080p lcd, definately get the 4870!

Here's the tradeoff...with ATI cards there is a delay in texture loading when gaming. It happens a lot when I play warhammer online. I doubt you'll have this problem with Nvidia Cards, But it has not happened once when watching a blu ray movie. Its like ATI cards are made for High Def movies!

Hey Nette, i have a GA-P35-DS3L too, same mobo as you, but got an E8400 CPU and 4 gigs of ram on windows XP. Going vista soon but still debating on windows 7.

A hd 4850 is a over kill just to watch movies not mentioned the 4870. Just get a cheap 4830 that has all the features as his bigger brothers including the 7.1 decoder. I mean come on guys 1 teraflop to decode one high def movie give a q9770 bluray heck he'll decode four at a time.

Dang, I'm glad I didn't buy HD 3XXX yet. I have to keep looking around because my mobo and cpu are still 3 years old (P4 3.00 GHZ). I am assuming most of you guys are talking about $150 range for a top tier HD graphic card to watch blue ray.