Decoder cards

[Warthog]

My bombardment of questions:

Does it matter what DVD Decoder card I get?? Should I get one at all? Soon, I'll be buying a 700mhz P3, 128mb RAM and an AWESOME 64mb DDR Geforce graphics card. Should I do software decoding instead? What about in the future? Would a decoder card be required for my system in the futre? How would I get software decoding?

Thank you, thank you, thank you,

Warthog

[Szech]

The Hollywood plus decoders are the best. But from what I hear, with a fast processor, you don't need a decoder card. Anyway, with my system, the DVD player is using software decoding by default. I assume if I had a decoder card, it would know to use it instead.

[Warthog]

Actually the Hollywood decoder was the one I was going to get. But what is so special about it? What sets it apart from another one? If it's about having TV Out capabilities, I don't really care. But if it somehow plays the movie better, then that's something to think about. I saw some dirt cheap prices for a Creative Labs decoder at Price Watch for $25-35. Does a DVD drive come with the software to do "software decoding"??

Warthog

[RobRich]

Try: http://www.7thzone.com/

I beleive you will find this site useful for learning about DVD software and hardware. They have reviews of many different drives, decoder cards, and software players.

Robert Richmond

[Warthog]

Thank you very much, Rob! Looks like a good site for general info. I'll look into it http://sysopt.earthweb.com/forum/smile.gif.

Warthog