CPU for HD TV recording with triple tuner card

[Ubtree]

I am planning a PC-based PVR build, with a triple tuner HD TV card. Would there be any benefit in this situation to having a multi-core CPU?

 

[ronintexas]

I am using an AMD A10-5800K with 8GB of RAM on an HTPC that has a SiliconDust HDHomeRun Prime 3-tuner setup. I have 2 XBox360s as extenders to watch live TV and/or recorded programs. Year one of my HTPC, I had a dual-core Pentium....and there were lag issues when 2 or more HD programs were being watched and/or recorded.

 

[Wolfshadw]

I've used an AMD Athlon II X2-240, paired with a Ceton InfiniTV4 PCI-E and 4GB of RAM. No issues recording three HD shows while watching a fourth. I'd probably stick with a low-end dual core processor as previously mentioned.

-Wolf sends

 

[Ubtree]

Thank you for sharing your experiences.

It is 2 to 1 in favour of dual core. However, I want to play safe, and since ronintexas reports issues with 2 cores, I'll go for a 4-core processor. In the Intel range, the i5-4590T looks the best bet (35W and 6MB L3 cache).