HTPC CPU or GPU more important?

[Psykopathik]

so i have a sempron dual core cpu and a geforce 9500gt now. i also have a 2.2ghz quad core and 8800gt lying around.

my psu cant support upgrading both so which is more critical for home theater?

[Jeremy617]

if you're feeding HD TV-in and doing recording/encoding stuff... CPU.

if all you are doing is watching 1080p MKV files, neither.

graphics cards are pretty much only useful for 3D applications. I'd say go with the dual-core and whichever graphics card is quieter. Thats assuming you're OK with slightly longer load times up to the point where you hit the play button, otherwise go QC and 9500gt.

[c_loke]

A good codec will offload much of the processing work to the GPU.

In your case, both video cards will work equally as well, your bottleneck would be your processor. Although a quad is overkill for an htpc, it will do much better than your sempron.

My htpc is a Core 2 Duo 2.14ghz, Radeon HD 4650. It runs smooth as butter.