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Intel Atom Computer Media Player

cornemuse

cornemuse

Joined
May 19, 2016
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Recently I got a very small computer (minus the hdd) from an independent computer shop. They toss (recycle) them, & let me go through the 'pile'. I wanted the case for a (micro?) mobo I want to setup as exclusivly for watching dvds, (*.iso images), that have only CC's, not subtitles. I have 'WinDVD' which shows CC's.
Anyways, this small comp is way too small for my (gigabyte a1m1) mobo. Before tossing it I put a "Mint Mate" disk in & plugged in an old hdd. Got the "press any key to boot from cd:" Pressed any key(!) & Win XP started up, all the way! I dont know which of my comps it came from. Got the "new hardware need drivers etc." This lil comp happens to be an Intel Atom mobo computer. Found the very detailed pdf file from intel, & drivers DL page. Amazon sells this mobo for ± $180.00! The comp has heat resistant 2 gig ram, no cpu cooling fan, (passive cooling), a 250 W psu. Comp has one PCI slot (full size). The original hdd was a WD 3.5" 0.55a @ 5v & 0.5a # 12 v.
Mine is a 2.5" 0.55a @ 5v. Movies would be on a WD 2.5" USB connection. Comp has a vga plug for monitor.
Is there a relativly cheap PCI -> hdmi card with XP drivers out there, I could use? VGA would be ok, (my tv is 42"), but hdmi would easily connect to my AVR (with 6 hdmi inputs). All I want it for is to watch movies with CC only. "My hearing is bad bad bad!"

-corne-
 
cornemuse said:
Recently I got a very small computer (minus the hdd) from an independent computer shop. They toss (recycle) them, & let me go through the 'pile'. I wanted the case for a (micro?) mobo I want to setup as exclusivly for watching dvds, (*.iso images), that have only CC's, not subtitles. I have 'WinDVD' which shows CC's.
Anyways, this small comp is way too small for my (gigabyte a1m1) mobo. Before tossing it I put a "Mint Mate" disk in & plugged in an old hdd. Got the "press any key to boot from cd:" Pressed any key(!) & Win XP started up, all the way! I dont know which of my comps it came from. Got the "new hardware need drivers etc." This lil comp happens to be an Intel Atom mobo computer. Found the very detailed pdf file from intel, & drivers DL page. Amazon sells this mobo for ± $180.00! The comp has heat resistant 2 gig ram, no cpu cooling fan, (passive cooling), a 250 W psu. Comp has one PCI slot (full size). The original hdd was a WD 3.5" 0.55a @ 5v & 0.5a # 12 v.
Mine is a 2.5" 0.55a @ 5v. Movies would be on a WD 2.5" USB connection. Comp has a vga plug for monitor.
Is there a relativly cheap PCI -> hdmi card with XP drivers out there, I could use? VGA would be ok, (my tv is 42"), but hdmi would easily connect to my AVR (with 6 hdmi inputs). All I want it for is to watch movies with CC only. "My hearing is bad bad bad!"

-corne-
Click to expand...
So you want a PCI graphics card with XP drivers supporting HDMI or VGA, that's it?
Does the motherboard support anything else? AGP, maybe?
 
What exactly model computer is this. And why not wipe it and put something more modern than XP on it?
 
I wouldnt have that much of faith in an atom. But still need more details to be sure.

What kind of resolution do you want to play videos and movies at?
 
Unless its one of the last Atoms made, it won't be worth it. Yeah they barely take any power but they're slow to all hell.
 
At least tell us what's the model of your mini-PC.
 
Theres no brand name anywhere on it. A label inside the case says intel D510MO, the label shows what all plugs/connections/jumpers are, even assignments for an internal parallel plug. The vga plug works fine, hdmi would just simplify connecting to my AVR system. It only needs to be fast enough to read/process data from iso image, say 5-6 gigs in 1 1/2 - 2 hours movie duration.
720 resolution is fine.
Has one pci slot (not express), no agp slot, already has vga.
 
What model Atom processor does it have? It seems that platform is about 10 years old, so it should handle Win10.

I'd throw a cheap SSD in it and toss Win10 on it and see how it runs.

As for a PCI card that hard HDMI, they didn't really exist AFAIK, or at least they weren't common at all. However, you can probably find a card with DVI and just use a cheap DVI -> HDMI adapter.
 
Windows 10 will shit itself with a Atom. Try Elementary OS or some other distro of Linux, or Windows 7.
 
From the model I'm guessing an atom d510...

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...el-atom-processor-d510-1m-cache-1-66-ghz.html

It's actually got 4 threads! And 64bit. Not bad... Can handle 4gb of ddr 2 so I'd max that out. Throw in a cheap ssd 240gb for the sake of the OS loading decent, and win 10 might just work OK. As for a video the gma3150 should do ok if your just watching dvds off iso, of you can't get win10 drivers, just download the win7 drivers... They'll work fine... A trick I've done many times... It's how I got a 6800gt working with 10. But if you really want a different video card...

You can try setting up a mini pcie to x16 adapter... Should be plenty after the mining craze, and use a low power gpu... Or just set the filter on Newegg or a similar site to only PCI and hope you can find something affordable

There's also this,... https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MCX7NHQ/ref=cm_sw_r_apa_i_AtQIEb3NCM9PY
 
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Mint xfce runs nice on a dual core "vista business " Dell latitude from 2007. I'd try that. Also linux has decent media software choices.
 
king of swag187 said:
I wouldn't count barely rendering the login window as running fine but each to their own
Click to expand...

I'm guessing you've never actually done it. It amazes me how much poeple over-estimate how much computer power is actually needed to do basic tasks on a computer running Windows 10.
 
cornemuse said:
Theres no brand name anywhere on it. A label inside the case says intel D510MO, the label shows what all plugs/connections/jumpers are, even assignments for an internal parallel plug. The vga plug works fine, hdmi would just simplify connecting to my AVR system. It only needs to be fast enough to read/process data from iso image, say 5-6 gigs in 1 1/2 - 2 hours movie duration.
720 resolution is fine.
Has one pci slot (not express), no agp slot, already has vga.
Click to expand...
Well, if you say it's just gonna play DVD ISOs, then it's not too bad. I used to have ZBox ID41 many years ago, and it was powerful enough to run earlier editions of Windows 10, but newer revisions might be too heavy for it. Win10 Enterprise LTSC will run perfectly on this thing, but I'd stick with Win7 or any lightweight Linux distro. The guy that bought it from me later had similar idea - hook it up to his old TV to run Kodi/XBMC.

If you want HDMI, it's gonna be a bit more expensive than the other way around. You'll need an active converter from VGA to HDMI like this one:
104098284_images_12949324560.jpg

VGA to HDMI adapter cable, 0.15 m, black (A-VGA-HDMI-01)

cablexpert.com cablexpert.com
It'll set you back around $10-15.

Instead of SSD I'd get a decent modern HDD. At SATA2 speeds you won't get any benefits except faster boot times and no spin-up delay (neither is critical for cheap-ass media player). For file copy and sequential reads(e.g. playback) most modern drives can give you upwards of 120Mbit/s sequential. My 4TB Seagate does stable 180Mbit/s, but it's loud AF at spinup.
Other than that, it should be good. The only thing you need to be weary about, is that integrated GMA3150 does not have any modern codec support, so even H264 at 720p will tax the CPU and may cause playback hiccups. H265 will put it to its knees.

king of swag187 said:
I wouldn't count barely rendering the login window as running fine but each to their own
Click to expand...
Ran Win10 1511 just fine back in a day (no tweaks, just stock OOB experience). Enterprise (aka IOT) version will be even smoother.
D2700 is also fine for this purpose. One of my customers uses an old intel enterprise board w/ this CPU as a cartoon/youtube machine when he takes grandkids to his dacha. Dirt-cheap, but still adequate.
 
It is an "Intel Atom D510MO" It starts up and runs with WinXP, the program I want is already installed, the hdd I installed is 80 gig WD, there is like 65 gigs free, so far I am into it for a bios battery. Is win 10 free now? Why an ssd? I just want to watch the occaisional movie with only close captions. I can connect to tv via vga & send audio to AVR via (stereo) RCA plugs, maybe CD inputs. This AVR if hdmi connected to tv, will ignore any other (eg: vga) inputs.

{I bought a 3-pak of the bios battery at 99¢ store for $1. This particular hdd has been in a box for a few years. The lil computer was free}

Just wanna keep things simple, , , , ,
 
If it's playing your media fine as is, then just get the vga to hdmi adapter if you want to simplify connection to a newer TV. You should be able to plug the vga, sterio plug, and a USB cable into one side and get hdmi out to the TV. Some adapters use USB for a little power for the analog to digital conversion needed for hdmi. The USB should be power only... Meaning no driver needed.

Said adapter will be much more affordable than a PCI graphics card unfortunately. In a little bit of irony... Newer pci express cards (basic ones at least) are far cheaper than what you can get for pci. Of course you may be able to find a used pci card somewhere, who knows.
 
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