New PC for Ripping and Transcoding

[digifiend]

I've done a fair bit of searching, so I apologize in advance if this topic has been covered or overcovered.

I'm fairly new to the entire home theater thing, and I'm just starting to look into how to convert my sizable DVD and BD collection (approx. 300 titles) to digital. I'm a Windoze guy, and I am planning on using AnyDVD HD + Handbrake to get files into .mp4/m4v format for steaming onto my Apple TV3 (pretty slick unit for $99 USD imo).

I have plenty of storage space, devices are all good to go except for one key bottleneck. I dont have a PC faster than an Intel Core(TM)2 Duo running at 2.4GHz. A test 1080p file I am transcoding using Handbrake is going to take 15+ hours (Average FPS = 002.9) using high profile setting @ RF18.

The solution is of course a new PC for ripping/transcoding. Given the fact that I have a limited budget, is CPU the chief bottleneck I am likely to encounter in terms of ripping and coding speed?

[TedJ]

Yes. HDD speed and RAM play very little part in transcoding speed... GPU plays no part at all. Spend the majority of your money on CPU, Intel over AMD where available, with 4-6 cores.

[digifiend]

Yes. HDD speed and RAM play very little part in transcoding speed... GPU plays no part at all. Spend the majority of your money on CPU, Intel over AMD where available, with 4-6 cores.

Thanks for confirming, I'll make sure I spend my money wisely. First file is done and runs like a** in iTunes, I am hoping the streaming to ATV will be better.

[Deleted User 11865]

iTunes/QuickTime are very bad at H.264 decoding, especially under Windows.

[digifiend]

iTunes/QuickTime are very bad at H.264 decoding, especially under Windows.

Here is where I get to expose some of my ignorance of how the entire process works. Since ATV uses iTunes to pick up the files available for streaming from a local environment, wouldn't the fact that iTunes/QT blows as an H.264 client impede it's ability to stream the content as well?

[Deleted User 11865]

No - streaming doesn't involve decoding the video. Streaming decoded, uncompressed video over a wireless connection would be impossible.

[digifiend]

No - streaming doesn't involve decoding the video. Streaming decoded, uncompressed video over a wireless connection would be impossible.

The more I look at this stuff, the more I realize that I have a lot of reading to do. Thanks for the info, I'm looking forward to getting back and seeing how my first try at this went.