[l008com]

I was thinking about setting up a Mac MIni hooked up to an HD TV as a media center type deal. An AppleTV on steriods if you will :-)

I was trying to figure out just how much CPU I need though. If a 1.25 GHz G4 is enough to play a 1080p quicktime movie, that would be great. I'd save a bundle by not having to shell out for an intel mac mini. Or even a core solo intel mac, so i could get the gigabit ethernet. I was looking around seeing what was up, and I found a page on apple's site answering this very question. ONLY, it is just me, or are their requirements a bit STEAP!?!?!!?

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide...endations.html

Thats crazy that according to apple, not even a 1.83GHz core duo can play a full HD movie. Thats the speed of my MacBook and its never had any problems decoding various HD videos, though I don't recall if any were 1080 or not. I really don't want to drop frames.

[Obi Wan's Ghost]

1080p needs at least a 1.8Ghz G5 or 2Ghz G4 for full motion playback. A 1.25Ghz G4 or Core Solo Mac mini will barely be able to play 720p without skipping frames.

Any Core Duo and above will play HD easily so don't worry about Apple's recommendations there.

[pcguy1]

The problem is not with the cpu, but rather Apple use sw Video decoding rather then hw in their computer.

Consider what type of cpu a typical dvd/br-hd dvd use.

[dagamer34]

Toshiba's first-gen HD-DVD player used an off-the-shelf 2.4 Ghz Pentium 4 running on Linux. But you have to account for the fact that you'll be running a full version of OSX and not something slimmed down for one function, so you'll need to get a CPU better than that.

I'd go with a Core Duo Mac Mini. Should work just fine.