HTPC build - opinions, derrision or recommendations :)

[dangel]

A friend of mine loves my HTPC setup so i've spent a few mins putting together a spec - it's fairly rough and i'm very open to suggestions - any thoughts?

Keysonic KB-ACK-540RF v2 Notebook Cordless Keyboard, Touch Pad Mouse Included, Silver/Black 27.50

SilverStone LC03B (BLACK) aluminium Front & SECC Body Desktop case (w/o PSU) 88.11

Asus P5KC, iP35, S 775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2/DDR3 1066/1333/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX 76.70

Intel Core 2 Duo E4500, S775, 2.2 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Allendale Core, 2MB Cache, Retail 73.07

2GB (2x1GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-12 41.88

400 GB Samsung HD403LJ Spinpoint T166, SATA II, 7200 rpm, 16MB Cache, 8.9 ms 54.27

512MB HIS HD 2600Pro iSilenceIII (ZALMAN) (HDMI) Dual DL-DVI & TV (HDCP) (128bit) DDR2 PCIe 68.58

500W Zalman ZM500-HP Heatpipe Cooled Modular PSU + 80% Eff 62.85

Hauppauge Win TV Nova-TD 500 MCE/*Vista Ready* Dual Digital DVBT Tuner 51.70

Microsoft Windows Media Center Hardware Kit V2 (Remote/Receiver) OEM 17.03

EDIT: forgot the bloody DVDRW - so 20quid odd on top.

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561.69 inc VAT

[staffsMike]

I like the antec fusion
fusion black

Comes with a quiet (if not silent) 400w PSU which will be more than enough and costs around £110.

2x120mm fans for cooling which is a nice touch.

It looks fine though thats just preference.

I'd probably get the Abit IP-35 instead of the asus though

[SiM]

Looks good...

The ram is on scan today only now, you can save £3 if you add that to your basket before noon...

I reckon its worth the extra £8 or so to get 500gb samsung instead...

Graphics might be a bit over kill... A 256mb 2600 pro will cost you half of that and do the job just as well...

[staffsMike]

The 2400's are great if its just video. Games..not so much

[SiM]

The 2400's are great if its just video. Games..not so much

But i thought the 2400's cannot do 1080p properly...
Its safer getting this imo...

[dangel]

I like the antec fusion
fusion black

Comes with a quiet (if not silent) 400w PSU which will be more than enough and costs around £110.

2x120mm fans for cooling which is a nice touch.

It looks fine though thats just preference.

I'd probably get the Abit IP-35 instead of the asus though

Thanks - the fusion is a nice case but it's uATX which might be a limitation. Is the Abit board better then? I'm a bit ASUS centric thesedays (for probably no good reason).

Looks good...

The ram is on scan today only now, you can save £3 if you add that to your basket before noon...

I reckon its worth the extra £8 or so to get 500gb samsung instead...

Graphics might be a bit over kill... A 256mb 2600 pro will cost you half of that and do the job just as well...

I couldn't see the 500gb drive but yeah, i take your point and i'd probably do that. The cheapest 2600 pro was £53.61 on scan. I choose that one because it's passive tbh.

The 2400's are great if its just video. Games..not so much

It's a 2600 but yes, it'll suck at games - but it's there for it's low power consumption and hardware video decoding. This won't be a games machine, just a media centre.

Thanks folks

[staffsMike]

But i thought the 2400's cannot do 1080p properly...
Its safer getting this imo...

Deffinatly safer to do that. some people say the 2400xt's are fine with 1080p.. other say it struggles.

I've just built something similar for my GF she doesn't need 1080p though.

Its got,

Asus M2A-VM uATX (dvi + vga also a version with HDMI but its a PCIe add on)
AMD X2 5000+ Black edition (overclocked at 3.0ghz ) temps are still so low lol
2gb of Geil Ultra PC6400
320gb Western digital AAKS

etc..

I will try some 1080p playblack on it later if you're interested?

[SiM]

Passive is not worht the extra 80% price increase over this!

I have that card and although it has a fan it quiet quite...

[dangel]

I've got a 2600 (pro or xt can't remember) sitting in a box at home. I bought it to do some testing versus the 8600GTS (because nVidia's drivers are terrible for media PCs) but couldn't easily get 1:1 mapping on the sammy with the drivers at the time. I might well do that again over the weekend to see where things are at now.

I deliberately didn't spec the 2400 because of the reported 1080P issues.

[dangel]

Passive is not worht the extra 80% price increase over this!

I have that card and although it has a fan it quiet quite...

Aha! Nice one many thanks - now that's a good deal and with free delivery too!

[smallstool]

I went with Linux (MYTHTV) have a look at:

MythTV on an Asus Pundit-P1 AH2

I have a AMD Athlon 64 X2, 6000 and 2 Nova-T cards.

Works a treat (and much cheaper)

[SiM]

Deffinatly safer to do that. some people say the 2400xt's are fine with 1080p.. other say it struggles.

I've just built something similar for my GF she doesn't need 1080p though.

Its got,

Asus M2A-VM uATX (dvi + vga also a version with HDMI but its a PCIe add on)
AMD X2 5000+ Black edition (overclocked at 3.0ghz ) temps are still so low lol
2gb of Geil Ultra PC6400
320gb Western digital AAKS

etc..

I will try some 1080p playblack on it later if you're interested?

Would be nice to see how that copes... Try 1080p playback with multi-threaded ffdshow... I reckon you will get flawless playback, but high CPU usage...

[dangel]

I went with Linux (MYTHTV) have a look at:

MythTV on an Asus Pundit-P1 AH2

I have a AMD Athlon 64 X2, 6000 and 2 Nova-T cards.

Works a treat (and much cheaper)

Very interesting - I wouldn't go the linux route myself because he likes VMC (and i'll be the one looking after it since he's not in the computer way of thinking) but the PC there looks neat!

[s3ds]

I use media portal on xp with a nova-t + remote

has any one used a mobo with onboard HDCP + VGA? was thinking about that route next time

Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK

[jabski]

new zalman hd160 plus case should be out soon.

[kungpo]

I've just rebuild my HTPC:

E4300
ASUS P5KPL-VM
2GB Kingston Value RAM 667
Gigabyte 2600 Pro (Passive)
WIN TV NovaT-PCI
WD Caviar 250GB
MS MCE Remote and Receiver
Old IDE CD/DVD drive
Antec NSK1300
Vista Home Premium 32bit

Works beautifully and plays everything. It's not silent (the CPU and PSU fan is audiable, but not too far from it. The PS3 is noisier.

Connected to my Sharp XD-1E via DVI-HDMI convertor, so no issues with HDCP and getting 1080p either.