Requirements for playing AVCHD

[Erik Bennett]

I have a Mack Truck desktop which has no trouble playing or editing AVCHD, but my netbook struggles playing 1080i .mts files and usually gives in.

I considered a laptop for editing on the move and was advised to get one with a non-integrated video card, as I was told the video card is the most important item in AVCHD playback.

Is the video card the most important item in AVCHD playback? I thought it was the amount of memory and the grunt of the processor - to do the decode.

What is the opinion of the Forum?

Thanks

[Mark Rosenzweig]

"... was advised to get one with a non-integrated video card, as I was told the video card is the most important item in AVCHD playback."

This advice is half right. The graphics (video) card matters, but with the new Intel processors and *integrated* graphics playing AVCHD video is duck soup - they are hard-wired to play it. This includes the latest Atom processors as well as the iX series. You can go into any BestBuy store, bring your AVCHD video on a usb stick and play the video using Windows Media player completely smoothly. In the "old days", the integrated graphics was not good enough. No longer true. AS $349 laptop will play AVCHD movies with no problem.

[Erik Bennett]

Good reply.
Thanks Mark