question po..pag yung video graphics card nyo pa ba may HDMI na..hindi na kailangan ng soundcard na external para sa audio? makakabit ko na ba yung reciever ko via sa HDMI ng video graphics card?
HDMI video cards can pass S/PDIF signals from a sound card or onboard audio codec over the HDMI connector, so it will only be stereo PCM and 5.1 Dolby Digital/DTS.
The ATI HD 2000&3000 series GPU has a built-in audio controller for 5.1 digital surround sound.
If you want 7.1 PCM audio, you have to wait for the Auzentech HDMI sound card.
Here's an article regarding HTPC playback with standard DVD's. It's quite old though, the video cards used were 2 generations ago (Nvidia G70 & ATI X1000).
Link:
ATI and nVidia crush high-end DVD playersAlso, there seems to be a notion that you will need a very expensive Video card for video playback, ever since the introduction of ATI's Avivo and nVidia's PureVideo, any card from the same chipset family will perform the same with regards to video playback.
For gaming however, the higher end video cards will be able to handle higher resolutions and till be able to support full anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering. Though, more powerful video cards often run hotter and will need bigger & noisier fans as opposed to the entry level cards which feature passive cooling via just a heatsink.
So for HD movie video playback, the Php1,900 ATI HD3450 will offer the same video quality as say the Php20,000 HD3870X2. (both generation 3 ATI Avivo cards)
For games like Call of Duty 4, the HD3450 will get you around 800x600 resolution no AA or AF and around 30 frames per second while the HD3870X2 might give you 1920x1200 res AA&AF 40-60fps.