HTPC Advice

[Barakka]

Thinking about building a HTPC for in the lounge, but not sure what setup to get, shopping list so far:

Antec Microfusion Remote Case w 350W PSU
OR
Antec NSK2480-UK V2 Desktop Media Centre Case for uATX with 380W Earthwatts 80%+ Eff PSU

2GB Corsair RAM
750GB Samsung Drive
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4580e AM2

Things i'm not sure about :
What Motherboard, heard that some of the ASUS boards have issues with sync, and audio
What TV Card to get - want dual Freeview
What OS to run - Vista ? Ultimate ? XP MCE ?

I want it to be able to work as my freeview PVR, view photos, surf the net, play DVDs, stream audio poss. video.

The setup in the lounge it needs to connect to for now is Sony Wega 32" CRT 100Hz Television for video, and Home cinema amp with Composite video and SPDIF audio.

But I do want HDMI for when I get a flat screen, and to be able to upgrade to a BD drive then.

Grateful for any advice you can give.

[crazyfool]

I have only recently built my first htpc similar to your specs...the micro fusion is a very nice case but if you are looking to install a wide cpu cooler then it is a tight squeeze and will result in bloody fingers, however i managed to do it and it is a good case... i have 2gb corsair, 4850e and a 750gb samsung as well... for the motherboard 780g is the best option pricewise however there are some issues with it... i have the abit and after a bios update i solved most problems except hdmi audio cutting out in vista which i think is a driver issue... there are plenty of decent dual cards around, i have the nova t500 which is great and works flawlessly... the OS depends on what you want from it really... vista media center is great but i switched to mediaportal because vista was giving me stupid issues such as saying there is no audio and refusing to play a video when i could clearly hear sound... however mediaportal is definately not easy to setup so as far as OS's go i cant really say... but for the rest the cpu with either the onboard or a 3450 will easily handle blu ray and hd content... hope that helps

[Barakka]

Cheers for the reply, i've had a mess with MediaPortal in the past and it looks like a good application, seems to be quite a few people ditching Vista to go back to XP MCE or MediaPortal.

Anyone know the best way to go about connecting up to a CRT television, would you take it from the VGA or DVI somehow ?

[Webby]

All depends what inputs your TV has a lot of the media graphics cards come with an S-Video connection which allows them to output to svideo or composite video, not sure if the motherboards like the 780G would allow this, I guess you can get an adapter from VGA to S-Video or composite as well.