Contemplating an HTPC build

[Interitus]

First, not sure if this should go here, I figured over the alternatives in the forums, this was the best place.

Anyways, I've been trying to do some research, but I'm not finding much in the way of helpfulness...

I'm thinking about building an HTPC. It's more of a gift for the GF (we live together though, so bonus for me!) as a neat way to compile all her music and pictures and videos she has of friends and make them accessible in the living room where she can show them off to company over the TV. However, I have NO idea what kind of hardware is good or bad for an HTPC, and I REALLY am out of the loop when it comes to different types of DRM on music and movies and hardware problems that may arise from that in an HTPC.

Is there a dummy guide out there somewhere? Or at least a place where I can get some good info as a starting point? I really don't have a ton of money to spend on the project, but I do have a lot of hardware lying around that I'm thinking would work.

If anyone here has suggestions I'd be very appreciative

Some things I'm thinking I would definitely want:

Definitely a SFF attractive looking case - we don't have much "cabinet" space for an HTPC

Something quiet, I'm super anal about noise in my desktop, so a PC in the living room has to be quiet

Something that can play videos, music, show pictures and possibly do a little surfing ( we do own laptops though, so surfing isn't crucial )

And last I'd prefer to mostly use a remote rather than a keyboard ( for surfing it'd be ok, but not for pics/movies/music )


Some other things I don't need:

We have a DVR and cable box, don't really need to replace them, HTPC would be more of a supplement, maybe with a possibility to replace the DVR down the road.

I plan on hooking this up to a sound system, probably a 5.1 but I don't need super high end audio capabilities.. there are no speakers in the room at the moment.


Thanks ahead of time for any help or any directions you could point me If this needs to be moved to a different forum I apologize.

 

[IlllI]

http://www.hardforum.com/forumdisplay.php?f=103

 

[mshan]

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972

 

[armstrda]

Also, just to prepare you... if you are looking to do DVR, with the lack of analog signals now, and everything going to QAM/ATSC, you will only be able to get locals/public access/music choice channels now with a home built PC for the time being (unless your cable company doesn't lock down premiums). If you want to be able to get encrypted QAM channels, you will need to get a cable labs PC.

 

[coolVariable]

Originally posted by: armstrda
Also, just to prepare you... if you are looking to do DVR, with the lack of analog signals now, and everything going to QAM/ATSC, you will only be able to get locals/public access/music choice channels now with a home built PC for the time being (unless your cable company doesn't lock down premiums). If you want to be able to get encrypted QAM channels, you will need to get a cable labs PC.

Unless you go analog via the STB.

If it's for the GF ... reconsider. Not going to work!

Oh - and avoid AMDs depsite what everyone says!

 

[Knavish]

Originally posted by: coolVariable
Oh - and avoid AMDs depsite what everyone says!

Just out of curiosity...why?

 

[Fox5]

Just so you know, even matx cases are obnoxiously large when trying to fit an HTPC in a cabinet. You'll want mini itx. Go on newegg, there's mini-itx cases as well as mini-itx intel (both atom and core 2) and amd based motherboards.
If you want low power, an ion based system with an atom 330 would be a good idea.
If you want high power, either an AMD or nvidia integrated graphics based platform. You could possibly fit a low end quad in, or you could do a higher end dual core (the athlon IIs on the AMD side perform well and are low powerish).

 

[coolVariable]

Originally posted by: Knavish

Originally posted by: coolVariable
Oh - and avoid AMDs depsite what everyone says!

Just out of curiosity...why?

slow
does NOT run much cooler (the intels are so much faster you can underclock/undervolt more/get it to the same if not a lower temp)
buggy mainboard chipsets (SB600 - SB750 still have SATA AHCI issues????)
drivers suck

i got a 5050e.
for $30 more i could have gotten an e6300.
stupid me for listening to people proclaiming the AMDs to be great for HTPCs!


and I repeat:

DO NOT SET IT UP FOR THE GF!

 

[Fox5]

Originally posted by: coolVariable

Originally posted by: Knavish

Originally posted by: coolVariable
Oh - and avoid AMDs depsite what everyone says!

Just out of curiosity...why?

slow
does NOT run much cooler (the intels are so much faster you can underclock/undervolt more/get it to the same if not a lower temp)
buggy mainboard chipsets (SB600 - SB750 still have SATA AHCI issues????)
drivers suck

i got a 5050e.
for $30 more i could have gotten an e6300.
stupid me for listening to people proclaiming the AMDs to be great for HTPCs!


and I repeat:

DO NOT SET IT UP FOR THE GF!

The 45nm AMD chips aren't that slow. Besides, performance isn't an issue for most things on an HTPC. The 45nm chips between AMD and Intel are comparable for heat/power usage as well.
I haven't personally known anyone to have problems with the SB750, but you can get nvidia boards for AMD as well. (except the 8200 is a rather crappy IGP, and you won't find any mini-itx nvidia AMD boards)

I started with a 5050e as well. I ended upgrading to a triple core phenom, huge improvement.

Oh, and you're absolutely right about not setting it up for the girlfriend, she probably wouldn't use it.

 

[Knavish]

Originally posted by: coolVariable

i got a 5050e.
for $30 more i could have gotten an e6300.
stupid me for listening to people proclaiming the AMDs to be great for HTPCs!

On one hand it is only $30 more for a more powerful CPU, but on the other, you would have been spending 50% more on a CPU. I'd expect a significant jump in performance if you spend 50% more for your CPU. The problem is that when you're buying one of the cheapest CPUs out there, the extra 50% doesn't amount to very much.

I still haven't bought an HTPC -- do you find that the 5050e is too slow for some of your applications? I suspect it might be *just* fast enough to play (horribly inefficient) hulu flash video scaled to 1080p.

 

[Fox5]

Originally posted by: Knavish

Originally posted by: coolVariable

i got a 5050e.
for $30 more i could have gotten an e6300.
stupid me for listening to people proclaiming the AMDs to be great for HTPCs!

On one hand it is only $30 more for a more powerful CPU, but on the other, you would have been spending 50% more on a CPU. I'd expect a significant jump in performance if you spend 50% more for your CPU. The problem is that when you're buying one of the cheapest CPUs out there, the extra 50% doesn't amount to very much.

I still haven't bought an HTPC -- do you find that the 5050e is too slow for some of your applications? I suspect it might be *just* fast enough to play (horribly inefficient) hulu flash video scaled to 1080p.

Hulu scaling is very inefficient. I've found it takes a low-end quad (or I suppose a really high end dual or mid range triple) to do 1080p scaled hulu.
A better graphics card also seemed to help.

Most content can be accelerated by IGPs, so that any dual core (except maybe an atom) is sufficient.

BTW, it's hard to recommend an e6300 when a phenom II 710 is just a little bit more. Heck, looking at newegg, AMD has quite a few phenom derived X2s (regor and the older cut down phenoms) for under the cost of the e6300 that should compare favorably, maybe even beat it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16819103648
See what a slippery slope the "but for only $XXX more you can get this!" argument is? It might be a little power hungry for the itx form factor (and trust me, you want ITX if you want a system that'll fit in a standard home theater cabinet), but it can probably be undervolted slightly. Well, if you plan to do gaming on the HTPC, you'd need at least an matx case to fit in a decent video card.

Also, AMD is launching their 880g platform in a month or so, which should best current integrated graphics including nvidia's 9400. The current 780/790G/GX IGP is based on the Radeon 2400, the new one is based on the 3450. Apparently the 880g also has some kind of built-in scaling hardware to scale video to 1080p.
They're also launching the Athlon II X4 series, which should allow for some cheap, low power quads.

 

[coolVariable]

Definitely stay away from AMD chipsets for a HTPC.
They bring ONLY PAIN! (e.g. read up on the AMD chipset AHCI/SATA issues which they have been unable to fix in 3 generations of chipsets)

I just did a custom build HTPC with an AMD and WISH I could go back and do it over again with an intel.

 

[IlllI]

interesting. i've used amd products since 2002 and never had a single issue

 

[mozartrules]

You have left out important information about the TV or more importantly how to connect to it. If we assume that you have a recent HDTV then you want a motherboard that supports audio over HDMI, that will allow simple connection to the TV now and simple connection if/when you upgrade to a receiver for sound (and there are good reasons to do this if music is a significant part of the use, why have the TV on to play music).

My impression is that using small form factor will make it difficult to get a decent compromise between cost, heat and low-noise. mATX is probably the best choice. You don't list the pieces you want to reuse, but I would be looking at something like an Antec Fusion case (sized like a small receiver) with a G45 motherboard and an E6300 processor. Socket 1156 and a low-end i3/i5 may be better, but that isn't available now.

DVR is a nightmare unless you do OTA only (in which case MediaCenter + a decent antenna gives great results). The OCUR CableCard standard is iffy and you need to hack stuff to have a chance to get a $250 tuner to work with DIY.

http://thegreenbutton.com is a pretty good site though it doesn't go that much into hardware.