I need recommendations on building a box that will play Blu-ray discs. My main computer (Q6600, Nvidia 8800 GT, 64-bit Vista, 8GB RAM) plays them fine. My media rig (older AMD, Nvidia 7900, XP Home, 4GB RAM) chokes on Blu-ray discs. When playing Blu-ray, which is more important, videocard or processor? Should I buy a cheaper processor—say, a Core 2 paired with a beefy GTX 850—or a quad-core with a 9500? And should I go Vista, or will XP be fine?

I’m ripping Blu-ray discs to the hard drive and playing them with PowerDVD 8 Ultra.

Dan, when playing back Blu-ray content, we recommend a modern videocard with a dual-core processor. Any modern card that can play back H.264 video will work; a good benchmark is that if a GPU is DirectX 10–capable, it should be able to handle a Blu-ray movie; try an Nvidia GeForce 9500 GT or, if you’re on a budget, an ATI Radeon 4350. Either XP or Vista will work fine. And make sure your GPU and monitor are HDCP-compliant or you won’t be able to play protected content.

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