DL.TV

episode 230 (1x230)

: 01, 2008

Finally, we have Loyd Case, Editor of ExtemeTech.com, back on the set to answer your questions. • Today's Tech Pic of the Week is from Ramon of Marina Del Ray, CA. Linux on a PS3. Want to try it on your PS3? Go to psubuntu.com. • Question 1: Leo of 'Downeast', Maine wants to know about he upgrade ability or Blu-Ray drives for HTPCs...Loyd says to check out PowerDVD 8, which adds Profile 1.1 support. • Question 2: Chris of Adelaide, South Australia wants to know what the minimum specs are of a MCPC that will record 2 HD channels at the same time...You'll need a faster CPU -- preferably a dual core processor. It wouldn't hurt to have a faster hard drive and more memory, either. I don't think the issue lies with your HD capture cards. • Question 3: Virgilio of Vancouver, BC, Canada would like to know how to go about choosing a LCD monitor...You should be good with a 22-inch monitor at 1680x1050 and should comfortably drive a 24-inch at 1920x1200. Another great resource is the Theater Computers section of the AVS Forums. • Question 4: Alex of Brooklyn, NY is wondering if there were micro ATX motherboards that support PCI-e 2.0...If you want to use an AMD processor. The AMD 780G chipset is built into boards made by Asus, Gigabyte and others. But then you have to think: what do you want PCIe Gen2 for? If you're talking home theater PC, you'll never approach the bandwidth of PCIe 1.1, much less Gen2. • Question 5: Ryan of Anchorage, Alaska has an old rig and is wondering if he should wait for Nehalem to upgrade or upgrade now...If you're still running an old single core CPU, upgrade now, for pity's sake! Nehalem is likely to be very expensive at launch. You can get an E8400, 3GHz dual core for under $200. • Question 6: Julian of Phoenix, AZ needs to set up a rig to support up to 8 displays...The Nvidia Quadro NVS 440 allows you to connect up to four displays, as does the AMD FireMV. You can also use the Matrox DualHead2Go Digital, an external box