Smooth HD Playback with a Sempron 3200+
Thanks to the integrated HD3000-class graphics unit, the 780G and 780V chipsets enjoy complete HD video decoding support in the form of ATI’s UVD (Universal Video Decoder). As a result, CPU load is greatly reduced when playing back HD-video content such as HD-DVDs, Blu-ray discs, HDTV or recorded HD content.
Since the on-board graphics unit comes with hardware decoding support for MPEG-2, H.264 and VC-1, a separate add-in card is no longer required to enjoy hardware video acceleration for these codecs. All that’s left for the CPU to do is to decode the HDCP copy protection and the audio stream. On the previous 690G chipset, even a brawny Athlon 64 X2 6400 CPU was unable to provide smooth HD-video playback. The new 780G chipset, on the other hand, has no trouble with this task even when paired with a comparatively anemic AMD Sempron 63 3200+.
With its 128 KB L2 cache and 1.80 GHz clock speed, the Sempron 64 3200+ is too slow for Windows Vista. A full three minutes pass before the system has completed the start-up process and the CPU load falls below 10%. Still, 1080p Full-HD playback at a resolution of 1920x1080 doesn’t pose any problem whatsoever for the CPU when running PowerDVD 7.3. We played back the James Bond movie Casino Royale form a Blu-Ray disc on an LG GCC-H20L drive. We measured the average CPU load of the Sempron 64 3200+ to be 63.13% during playback, with short peaks reaching up to 90%.
Smooth and stutter-free playback is no longer possible with an even slower processor such as an AMD Sempron 64 3000+ running at 1.60 GHz. Some of the scenes created a CPU load of 100%, causing the system to drop frames. Due to the low performance of the Sempron 3000+, the 200 MHz clock-speed difference has a huge impact. Our conclusion is that the Sempron 3200+ marks the lower limit for smooth Blu-ray playback.
However, if you only want to play back HD content you have previously recorded from sources such as satellite or cable, AMD’s Sempron 64 3000+ is sufficient, since the CPU doesn’t have to deal with any encryption.
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Page 2 - "HD3400 in the northbridge"... "The 780G comes with a Radeon HD3200 chip"
Why were there gaming benchmarks in this review? Surely nobody is going to use this solution for gaming? HTPC is it's forté.
Encryption increases load on the CPU!
Thus it uses more power; some will have to upgrade causing needless waste.
DRM/Encryption is bad for the environment. I say ban it.
I think its a brilliant little GPU, and should increase the competition on the integrated front which will only be good for PC gaming, after all everyone that doesnt like PC gaming says its because its complicated or doesnt want to spend over odds for a GFX card... this way even the little guy will be able to stick in a game and play the recent titles at low-mid settings, unlike current chips which can only play older games at low-mid.
I would like to see the benchmarks done with the dedicated memory slot for the GFX used. I think its a brilliant wee feature, assuming it can actually affect performance in any significant way.
Any chance of that please.
Can you add faster ram than the main system uses? Is it DDR2 or 3 let me know.
Page 2 - "HD3400 in the northbridge"... "The 780G comes with a Radeon HD3200 chip"
What the author meant to say that the 780G incorporates an HD3200 GPU, which is an HD3400-class graphics processor.
Why were there gaming benchmarks in this review? Surely nobody is going to use this solution for gaming? HTPC is it's forté.
The gaming benchmarks serve as a point of reference, letting you compare the performance of the 780G to dedicated graphics cards. Also, casual gamers may use this board in their main system. And let's face it - considering this is an integrated GPU, the performance is really pretty amazing.
Remember Nvidia's first nForce? Yeah, just saying...
I would like to see the benchmarks done with the dedicated memory slot for the GFX used. ...
Trouble is that none of the motherboard companies have actually announced produccts that will take advantage of this feature. Thus, the lab team weren't able to test this feature. Let's hope for such a product in the future, though.
Cheers,
BEN
Everybody sais it supports bluray and VC1, AVC etc...
Does anybody has an idea if it can support HD-audio as well?...
At least as bitstream through hdmi...
Is it HDMI 1.1? 1.2? 1.3a,b?
Its new generation chipset... so, does it FULLY supports the new formats?...
Nobody knows, and the reviewers are too busy to say that it gives 14fps in quake with 320% performance gain (wich is useless) than to fully test it in HD content...
I have been using AMD processors all the way through since Socket-A and although Intel have a performance advantage at the moment, I strongly believe that AMD have got their architecture correct. Having said all that I run Linux (Ubuntu - http://www.ubuntu.com and Mythbuntu - http://www.mythbuntu.org) and have to stick with NVidia cards at the moment due to dire support from AMD/ATI for TV-Out support under the Linux FGLRX driver (AMD Proprietry). Once CrossFire is supported under Linux (http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=NjM3Mw) then I'll switch back.
Will be some form of reviews of the upcoming motherboard that use this new chipset?.
does anyone else think its a shame that you cant match the intergrated HD3200 with something more powerfull such as a HD3870? That way this chipset would have a significant advantage over Intel's intergrated option, as well as increasing the apeal of ATI cards
There is a JW-RS780UVD-AM2+ with 64M dedicated GDDR www.jwele.com/motherboard_detail.php?225
can i put 6 hdd on these sata ports in non-raid config. or some of them are exclusively for raid use?