Enormous monitor, very low-power PC: bad idea?

colin2 · Post by **colin2** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 3:06 pm

Like a lot of folks here I like small, low-powered PCs and was thinking in terms of a new box using a picoPSU-120.

But with big monitors getting cheap I'm also yearning for 1920 x 1200 pixels, maybe 2560 x 1600. It would be for office-type apps not gaming, but I might try watching a DVD.

I've been following with great interest the thread on the ASUS M2A-VM and the problems of the 690G chipset with high resolutions, since this would seem like the best AMD chipset available.

The problem seems to be not just the board's announced capacities, but what happens to the northbridge if you stress it with all those pixels in an overall lowish-airflow design. (My current plan is roughly to copy Eitheta's build here viewtopic.php?t=38787/)

So the question is: can I manage a 1920 x 1200 or 2560 x 1600 monitor with a picoPSU-120, maybe by using a passive northbridge cooler or a low-power passively-cooled video card? Are there better chipsets or could I do better if I went back to Intel-land?

Or should I accept reality and go for a 300W power supply, bigger case, and a good dedicated video card?

Max Slowik · Post by **Max Slowik** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 4:51 pm

Well, that's the most powerful onboard graphics chipset, so no, Intel is a worse decision.

It's also rated to 25x16, assuming you use the dual-link DVI (I had problems with that board and single-link cables, but eventually, drivers and BIOS fixed it, IIRC).

tibetan mod king · Post by **tibetan mod king** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 5:38 pm

You will thank yourself every day by getting a dedicated graphics card vs. going with chipset graphics. When you starting using a lot of RAM to push a lot of pixels, even for office apps, a dedicated graphics card really helps your system work better. And almost always the video output circuitry is much better on a dedicated card.

A lot of people like building small quiet machines. But unless you put a lot of time into it, the payoff is rarely there. For example, a machine like the HP dc5750 can be ordered with the 35W AMD 3800+ dual core. It is Energy Star, 80+, etc. So you have a small quiet PC and just add your passive graphics card and you are done.

Two cents from a Tibetan Mod Kontrarian. I think I've got to change my user name

Max Slowik · Post by **Max Slowik** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 6:18 pm

Oh, I wholeheartedly agree. I really like what the HD 2400s bring to the table for an extra $50+. They will make big impact just by allaying the system memory bandwidth consumption.

dsjonz · Post by **dsjonz** » Tue Jul 17, 2007 10:18 am

The AMD 690 series is the first of some great MATX-sized HTPC-oriented motherboards to come from AMD/ATI, but I would be leery of expecting acceptable performance from a 25x16 display with the current generation onboard graphics. Like others pointed out here, the ATI X2400 card would be the lower threshold for good 25x16 support, and the X2600 much closer to the ideal.

Also, an HDMI-connected 1080p display will perform well with the AMD 690 series, but you may be unhappy over time with the visual quality of a widescreen "video" display used for everyday text-intensive computing tasks.

I think the best thing about the onboard graphics of 690 series is the embedded Avivo video processing support for HTPC use. I use an older Avivo-enabled ATI X1300 AGP card with an ATI 550 Pro TV tuner in my old-spare-parts-built HTPC, and the Avivo processing is the most significant contributor to quality video output on my 50" plasma. In fact, I will not build a replacement HTPC without ATI Avivo support...it's that good.