Building HTPC for friend, need advice (prelim build inside)

[imported_Fletcher]

Hey all...going to build my friend a new HTPC. Budget is $800 give or take. Use will include connecting to his current 42" plasma...and shortly after that a new 1080p 65"

He's having a baby so what he really wants is a machine for viewing photos and videos with probably some simple editing. Smooth full screen Hulu is important. Also he liked the idea of ripping his BD's and DVD's to the hard drive for easy watching. Getting his music organized and playable through his audio setup is important.

No gaming
No tuner needed for watching/recording TV

I don't really know where to start. Would like to stick with Intel. Want smooth BD/1080p video playback.

This may be a stupid beginning...dunno. Let me know what you think.

E5200 wolfdale
GIGABYTE GA-G41M-ES2H HDMI Micro ATX
Radeon HD 4350 512MB
LG Black 8X BD-ROM
Audigy SE 7.1
G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR2 800
Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB
hec Black 0.7mm Thickness SECC 7K09 Micro ATX Media Center HTPC case
Logitech diNovo Mini bluetooth keyboard

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819116072
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128396
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125251
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16829102003
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231122
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827136174
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136284
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811121027
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16823126039

 

[elconejito]

that setup should work just fine. You probably don't need the Audigy card as the 4350 has HDMI which should pass through the audio.

If this is the only place the photos videos are stored, make sure there is a good backup. Even an external USB will be great. Unless he's already got the content elsewhere.

 

[Blazer]

get a 4670 card, and the blu ray drive is missing.

 

[engiNURD]

What's his audio setup like?

I'd swap that board for a GeForce 9300 and ditch the discrete vidcard.
$110 - ZOTAC GF9300-A-E LGA 775 NVIDIA GeForce 9300 HDMI Micro ATX

... or you could get a faster CPU with AMD, and go with DDR3 instead, since DDR2 is way overpriced (and again, ditch the discrete vidcard):

$85 - ASUS M4A785T-M/CSM AM3 AMD 785G HDMI Micro ATX
$61 - AMD Athlon II X2 240 Regor 2.8GHz Socket AM3
$94 - Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3-1600 CMX4GX3M2A1600C9

 

[Fox5]

How about this?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-077-_-Product

 

[imported_Fletcher]

cool guys...let me look into those few suggestions

the shuttle seems to be a good one stop thing if my friend is OK with the case form factor

 

[ecom]

The G45 chipset does h.264 decoding for Blueray so if you get something with that, you won't need a discrete graphics card. The G41 and G43 do not include h.264 decoding from what I understand.

Using the IGP, I've been playing 1080p h.264 all day long full screen on a 52" LCD TV no issue. I have a E7500 in mine and CPU utilization is something like 2-7%. Built in HDMI too.

This is what my Dell Studio 540 has inside for $400:

Intel C2D E7500 (no VT)
4GB (4x 1GB) DDR2
Unknown motherboard with G45 chipset
500GB Seagate 7200.12 HDD
DVD-RW 16x
Intel X4500HD IGP
Windows 7 Professional <-- don't forget the cost of the OS since you didn't mention one
Expansion slots include 1x PCIE 16X, 2x PCIE 1X, 1x PCI

Aside from this, I bought a wireless keyboard and mouse combo.