I figured I'd been beating around the bush for too long with this HTPC and with my birthday coming up on September 7th, I figured I'd go ahead and just treat myself so I ordered a bunch of parts today, here's what I ordered:
- Case
Antec NSK2480 MATX Desktop Case Black & Silver - With 380W EarthWatts PSU - £57.99- Power Supply
520W Corsair HX Series Modular PSU, ATX, EPS12V, whisper quiet, 5 year warranty - £63.32- Processor
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750, S775, 2.66 GHz, 1333MHz FSB, Conroe Core, 4MB Cache, Retail - £120.07- CPU Cooler
Scythe Mini Ninja Heatpipe CPU Cooler - £28.19- Motherboard
Gigabyte GA-G33M-DS2R iG33 Express, S775, PCI-Ex16, DDR2 1066/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, uATX, VGA - £64.61- Memory
2GB (2x1GB) CorsairTwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 4-4-4-12, EPP - £66.55
2GB (2x1GB) CorsairTwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 4-4-4-12, EPP - £66.55- Hard Drive
Samsung SpinPoint HD501LJ 500GB SATAII Hard Drive 16MB Cache OEM - £59.79- DVD Drive
Samsung SH S183 SATA 18x DVD±RW RAM Black Bare Drive OEM - £17.62- Operating System
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64Bit 1Pk OEM (DVD) - £64.50
The only bits I got stumped on were Graphics Card and TV Tuner. For the graphics card I was thinking of getting a Radeon 2600XT as they're fairly cheap but I'm not sure which one would fit in the NSK2480 case? I've found from reading up on graphics cards that the new mid-range cards are all pretty much crap, doh! So I'm looking for a mid-range card that might be able to play a game or two whilst staying cool and super quiet, which one should I go for?
As for the TV Tuner, I'm totally stumped. I need a card that works with Windows Vista 64bit and allows me to watch one freeview channel (inc BBC HD) whilst recording another. It needs to work with Media Centre too.