Another HTPC topic..

[mrCide]

I currently have a 1080i Sony TV, an xbox360, a nice HK receiver with some nice Klipsch speakers. Currently I watch DVDs on the 360 and do DD5.1 to the audio system. All is well there.

I have standard cable (through association) so instead of paying extra I decided to put together old parts for a little media center PC. It's basically a p4-3.0 with a gig of RAM running MCE2005. I installed a HP Digital/Analog (Hauppauge WinTV-HVR 1600) dual tuner card so I can have my OTA (for HD) tuner and regular cable hooked up. Also the MCE DVR and streaming network media/movies/whatever is nice.

I'm running into some issues with it though now. 1.) Too loud (crappy fans, GPU fan dying). 2.) System reboots itself when playing/recording HD content from OTA like it can't handle processing it. 3.) Slow. Old ATA drive, won't handle Vista or higher media center. 4.) Won't support any special DVD/audio playback, only will do 2ch audio. 5.) MCE2005 doesn't seem to like certain playbacks, sometimes freezes, sometimes won't play (h.264 stuff for example).

Soo, what I WANT to do is get something solid now and that will be ready for when I get a 1080p TV at some point, including DVD and BR playback. I want the same functionality I have now OTA/cable wise but with the latest/greatest software and no AVI/video playback/speed issues. Also maybe storing the media instead of streaming it. Here's what I got based on some quick forum research (seems like other HTPC sites are dead or something).

1.) GIGABYTE GA-E7AUM-DS2H
2.) SILVERSTONE Black Aluminum / Steel LC13B-E
3.) Intel Pentium E5200 Wolfdale 2.5GHz LGA 775
4.) G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800
5.) CORSAIR CMPSU-400CX 400W
6.) Western Digital Caviar Green WD10EADS 1TB SATA 3.0Gb/s
7.) LG Black Blu-ray/HD DVD-ROM & 16X DVD±R DVD Burner SATA Model GGC-H20L
8.) Vista x64 or higher OS

Assuming this, am I missing anything? In terms of audio/video/playback of what I want. I seem to make a mistake every time I order parts these days so I thought I'd run it by you guys. Any advice/comments/recommendations are appreciated.

 

[QueBert]

Originally posted by: mrCide
I currently have a 1080i Sony TV, an xbox360, a nice HK receiver with some nice Klipsch speakers. Currently I watch DVDs on the 360 and do DD5.1 to the audio system. All is well there.

I have standard cable (through association) so instead of paying extra I decided to put together old parts for a little media center PC. It's basically a p4-3.0 with a gig of RAM running MCE2005. I installed a HP Digital/Analog (Hauppauge WinTV-HVR 1600) dual tuner card so I can have my OTA (for HD) tuner and regular cable hooked up. Also the MCE DVR and streaming network media/movies/whatever is nice.

I'm running into some issues with it though now. 1.) Too loud (crappy fans, GPU fan dying). 2.) System reboots itself when playing/recording HD content from OTA like it can't handle processing it. 3.) Slow. Old ATA drive, won't handle Vista or higher media center. 4.) Won't support any special DVD/audio playback, only will do 2ch audio. 5.) MCE2005 doesn't seem to like certain playbacks, sometimes freezes, sometimes won't play (h.264 stuff for example).

Soo, what I WANT to do is get something solid now and that will be ready for when I get a 1080p TV at some point, including DVD and BR playback. I want the same functionality I have now OTA/cable wise but with the latest/greatest software and no AVI/video playback/speed issues. Also maybe storing the media instead of streaming it. Here's what I got based on some quick forum research (seems like other HTPC sites are dead or something).

1.) GIGABYTE GA-E7AUM-DS2H
2.) SILVERSTONE Black Aluminum / Steel LC13B-E
3.) Intel Pentium E5200 Wolfdale 2.5GHz LGA 775
4.) G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800
5.) CORSAIR CMPSU-400CX 400W
6.) Western Digital Caviar Green WD10EADS 1TB SATA 3.0Gb/s
7.) LG Black Blu-ray/HD DVD-ROM & 16X DVD±R DVD Burner SATA Model GGC-H20L
8.) Vista x64 or higher OS

Assuming this, am I missing anything? In terms of audio/video/playback of what I want. I seem to make a mistake every time I order parts these days so I thought I'd run it by you guys. Any advice/comments/recommendations are appreciated.

looks pretty good, HD's not going to change so you shouldn't ever haev to upgrade unless you plan to game on it. This is just my personal preference here, that Silverstone case is kind of large. It's not huge, but depending on your budget you can get a smaller HTPC case, I understand if you like the looks of it. But if you're buget can go a bit higher you might like this case. I almost passed out when I saw it.

linky - it's the 312b. Not out yet, but will be coming any day now. Kinda pricey at $220 but I've never seen a HTPC case that actually made me drool before this one

I also recommend you look into XBMC for your frontend, I've tried all the "media center" programs and nothing comes close. the new Aeon Stark skin was just released this week and it's SWEEEEET!

linky this is a video of the offical trailer for it. I installed it this afternoon and MAN it's sweet. On a 1080p TV you'd be in Heaven.

 

[mrCide]

Hey, thanks for the response. The problem with the small cases it seems is that they all require half height PCI cards, and this TV tuner I wanted to pop into it is a standard full height card. Otherwise I'd be all over some of these slick cases, but alas. I currently have a full open spot on my shelf so the full size one should fit OK, but if I could find a sleek one that supported full size cards I'd opt for that.

 

[mrCide]

Looking a bit more it seems if I want to spend the extra money I can opt for this case replacement and a new TV tuner card that will do OTA HD antenna and SD from comcast coax cable.

1.) LIAN LI Black Aluminum PC-C37B Micro ATX
2.) AVerMedia AVerTV Combo PCIe MCE ATSC/NTSC/QAM Tuner Card

Plus I'm looking to buy now =P

 

[Tegeril]

:: Points you in the direction of my signature ::

If not, your system sounds good to buy new.

 

[XMan]

Originally posted by: mrCide
Looking a bit more it seems if I want to spend the extra money I can opt for this case replacement and a new TV tuner card that will do OTA HD antenna and SD from comcast coax cable.

1.) LIAN LI Black Aluminum PC-C37B Micro ATX
2.) AVerMedia AVerTV Combo PCIe MCE ATSC/NTSC/QAM Tuner Card

Plus I'm looking to buy now =P

If want to get a smaller case, looking into the Hauppauge HVR-2250. It's a low-profile dual tuner card that can do 2 SD, 1 SD / 1 HD, or 2 HD.

 

[erwos]

If you're having codec problems, try out ffdshow-tryouts.

 

[mrCide]

Originally posted by: XMan

Originally posted by: mrCide
Looking a bit more it seems if I want to spend the extra money I can opt for this case replacement and a new TV tuner card that will do OTA HD antenna and SD from comcast coax cable.

1.) LIAN LI Black Aluminum PC-C37B Micro ATX
2.) AVerMedia AVerTV Combo PCIe MCE ATSC/NTSC/QAM Tuner Card

Plus I'm looking to buy now =P

If want to get a smaller case, looking into the Hauppauge HVR-2250. It's a low-profile dual tuner card that can do 2 SD, 1 SD / 1 HD, or 2 HD.

Thanks for the response. I'm looking at the Haup card and I'm not sure I get this. I see that it has one coax for 2 tuners, and the other coax is for FM. How would i plug in my SD cable and my OTA antenna into this?

 

[Pardus]

1.) GIGABYTE GA-E7AUM-DS2H
9400 onboard sounds good, but its the northbridge, untested, it could be good, dunno

2.) SILVERSTONE Black Aluminum / Steel LC13B-E
other cases to consider: this one and this one. both will need a power supply.

3.) Intel Pentium E5200 Wolfdale 2.5GHz LGA 775
consider this cpu instead, overclocks easily to 3hz. it says dual, core, but it's really core2duo.

4.) G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 - great ram

5.) CORSAIR CMPSU-400CX 400W - good ps, very quiet

6.) Western Digital Caviar Green WD10EADS 1TB SATA 3.0Gb/s - great drive, 5yr warranty

7.) LG Black Blu-ray/HD DVD-ROM & 16X DVD±R DVD Burner SATA Model GGC-H20L

8.) Vista x64 or higher OS

 

[BornStar]

Originally posted by: mrCide

Originally posted by: XMan

Originally posted by: mrCide
Looking a bit more it seems if I want to spend the extra money I can opt for this case replacement and a new TV tuner card that will do OTA HD antenna and SD from comcast coax cable.

1.) LIAN LI Black Aluminum PC-C37B Micro ATX
2.) AVerMedia AVerTV Combo PCIe MCE ATSC/NTSC/QAM Tuner Card

Plus I'm looking to buy now =P

If want to get a smaller case, looking into the Hauppauge HVR-2250. It's a low-profile dual tuner card that can do 2 SD, 1 SD / 1 HD, or 2 HD.

Thanks for the response. I'm looking at the Haup card and I'm not sure I get this. I see that it has one coax for 2 tuners, and the other coax is for FM. How would i plug in my SD cable and my OTA antenna into this?

You can't, there's only one TV input on the card and it uses an internal splitter to handle two channels at a time. If you need to have one cable input and one antenna input then you've got the right card already.