Which Nettop to buy for use with Broadcom BCM970012
#1
Hello all

1) I'm considering buying a Broadcom BCM970012 card but don't know which is the best living room nettop box to buy to put it in. I will be using Windows 7 I have around £350 for the nettop.
What do you guys suggest?

2) Would the ASrock Ion 330ht bd do what the broadcom card can do or could I put one of the Broadcom cards into the ASrock?

3) Does the Broadcom Card eliminate the need for an external player to play HD content?

my aim is to stay up to date with XBMC development with the minimum of fuss

sorry about all the questions
Thank you

John.
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#2
The Asrock Ion 330HT-BD comes just with a Blu-ray drive other than that its just a normal Atom/Ion system. The 330HT loses the Blu-ray drive.

XBMC Live/Linux can offload the video to the GPU with the current release, the next major release of XBMC has GPU video decoding for Windows penciled in but thats a few months away.

Broadcom Crystal HD support is already present in nightly builds but still has bugs to contend with.

Both the Asrock 330HT and the Acer Atom/Ion units have a mini pci-express slot occupied by a wireless card which you'd have to remove to install the Crystal HD card.
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#3
hasselhof Wrote:my aim is to stay up to date with XBMC development with the minimum of fuss

get the asrock, forget about the broadcom card, and install the XBMC live build
OpenElec Standalone --> Asus Chromebox 'Panther' --> Onkyo TX-NR709 --> Sony 55" X85C Android TV (also with Kodi!)
Asus Chromebox EZ Script
Kodi on Sony Bravia Android TVs
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#4
Hannes The Hun Wrote:get the asrock, forget about the broadcom card, and install the XBMC live build
Reasonable advice. I've also been looking for an appropriate cheap nettop (or Mini-ITX board) as a useful starting point for trying out a PCI-E-mini Broadcom add-on, but there's no real point if your starting point is a board with an Nvidia Ion.

To me it looks like the only real use-case for the Broadcom is the Apple TV.

Unless anyone can advise a cheap Nettop (or Mini-ITX) which has HDMI but not Ion graphics and could use the additional hardware acceleration on offer from the Broadcom card...?
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#5
Get the Asrock as Starstream pointed out it should be possible to add broadcom if you so wished all be it by losing wifi unless its the pro version where its not occupied

Your have lots of options with the asrock chances are you wont bother with broadcom, bought my parents an asrock 330HT running DSplayer build of xbmc under windows works great

I've been really impressed with the asrock so much so wish I had got one first before pulling the trigger on my own hardware £££££££ Rolleyes
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#6
spicemuseum Wrote:Unless anyone can advise a cheap Nettop (or Mini-ITX) which has HDMI but not Ion graphics and could use the additional hardware acceleration on offer from the Broadcom card...?

this is a very great board that can be very fast:
http://www.gigabyte.de/Products/Networki...uctID=3927

this board i have used in my video on youtube http://www.youtube.com/user/sraue1977
greetings, Stephan

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#7
Hannes The Hun Wrote:get the asrock, forget about the broadcom card, and install the XBMC live build

I'm of after work to get the ASrock and will give XBMC live a shot. Im not going to bother with the Broadcom Card.

Thanks to all for your help and advice

John.
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#8
openelec.tv Wrote:this is a very great board that can be very fast:
http://www.gigabyte.de/Products/Networki...uctID=3927

this board i have used in my video on youtube http://www.youtube.com/user/sraue1977
Had a look at both your links. The video isn't much help except to illustrate the fast boot-up.
The mainboard looks interesting though. Exactly what processor (and heatsink) did you use?
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#9
spicemuseum Wrote:Had a look at both your links. The video isn't much help except to illustrate the fast boot-up.
The mainboard looks interesting though. Exactly what processor (and heatsink) did you use?

the processor is an Intel P8400
http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=355...LGE2,SLGFC

you can also use slower CPUs - with this processor i dont need an crystalhd card for watching HD Videos

this processor is passive cooled with heatpipes and an supported case from http://www.hifiatx.com
greetings, Stephan

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#10
openelec.tv Wrote:the processor is an Intel P8400
http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=355...LGE2,SLGFC

you can also use slower CPUs - with this processor i dont need an crystalhd card for watching HD Videos
Thanks.

The project for me would be about using the slowest (or lowest energy / cheapest) possible processor and the broadcom mini-pci-e card.

I'm such a n00b at processor selection, can you offer any help on what exactly I could try?
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#11
spicemuseum Wrote:Thanks.

The project for me would be about using the slowest (or lowest energy / cheapest) possible processor and the broadcom mini-pci-e card.

I'm such a n00b at processor selection, can you offer any help on what exactly I could try?

i am too a n00p with processor selection - but this board is great, but limited for various processors. i have needed an cpu with < 35W for this case. the P8400 needs 25W and is very fast.

in my Notebook i have an SL9400 that uses 17W and is fast too
but this are all expensive cpus

if you need the cheapest and lowest energy solution you need an atom - maybe with ION chipset see: http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection.a...lyId=29035
greetings, Stephan

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#12
Hannes The Hun Wrote:get the asrock, forget about the broadcom card, and install the XBMC live build


Hi I get my ASrock in a couple of days...

can you help with the following.

What i will be trying to do is as follows

1) When I turn on the ASrock I want XBMC to be the first thing I see without any user promts.

2) Then be able to shutdown XBMC (Not the ASrock) via XBMC's shutdown menu and it then boot into ubuntu to browse the internet ect.

3) And then be able to reselect XBMC again without turning off and on the ASrock.

I have XBMC live on usb stick, and I also have a Ubuntu 9.1 boot cd.

as an XBMC 4 XBOX user up until now, I'm not sure which is the best way to go about doing what I want to achieve.

Any advice would be great

Thanks

John.
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