I am trying to build a "budget" shuttle XPC HTPC and am trying to figure out which shuttle to pick. I game very very little, probably because my PCs are outdated and this shuttle would be the fast one of all of them. It's kind of ironic that the PC that would probably be the least used would wind up being the fastest. 🙁 I will watch divx/xvids and DVDs probably with post processing (ffdshow). In the background I will run F@H all of the time.
I will connect the shuttle to my receiver with a optical toslink cable. This would be the SPDIF connection right? It's wierd because sometimes a svideo link pin connector would be labeled as a SDPIF as well. 😕 Well, what I have noticed is that almost all of the shuttles have a toslink out and I was just wondering is there any particular reason to consider an AMD based shuttle that has nVidia's Soundstorm over an Intel based shuttle that also has a toslink out? Wouldn't both pass the same digital signal to my Denon receiver over the optical? I usually do not use Dolby Digital even though I have a 5.1 setup. This is due to the way my living room, furniture, and subsequently my home theatre is setup. Most of the time (though not always) 2 speaker stereo sounds more coherent with dolby digital material. I know, sacrilege 🙁.
The reason for this is because I was leaning towards an AXP-m setup until this morning. I have been recently advised that an Intel 2.4C (then o/c) setup may be more favorable for my needs and uses than an AMD Athlon XP mobile 2500+ setup. Or I may consider an Athlon 64 s754 setup (no Soundstorm) but with a nForce3 150 board. I know that the overclock I achieve will likely be limited by the SSF's cooling and motherboard options. But I'd like a setup that gives me a bit more for the money, so it's not as if I'm going after a OC monster. The looks of P4 and A64 Shuttles look superior, that is my preference would be G5 >= G4 > G2 > G1. And the prices are all over the place too. Arg, it is hard to pinpoint which Shuttle is for me.
Now to complete my digression...
How is the overclocking with a nForce3 150 chipset?
How is the overclocking with a ATI RS300 chipset?
I just need to clear these things up before I can best select a Shuttle. I have already figured out what hard drive (seagate 200GB ATA), RAM (Corsair Value Select), video card (some fanless DVI out solution... 9600xt I think perhaps even lower).
I will connect the shuttle to my receiver with a optical toslink cable. This would be the SPDIF connection right? It's wierd because sometimes a svideo link pin connector would be labeled as a SDPIF as well. 😕 Well, what I have noticed is that almost all of the shuttles have a toslink out and I was just wondering is there any particular reason to consider an AMD based shuttle that has nVidia's Soundstorm over an Intel based shuttle that also has a toslink out? Wouldn't both pass the same digital signal to my Denon receiver over the optical? I usually do not use Dolby Digital even though I have a 5.1 setup. This is due to the way my living room, furniture, and subsequently my home theatre is setup. Most of the time (though not always) 2 speaker stereo sounds more coherent with dolby digital material. I know, sacrilege 🙁.
The reason for this is because I was leaning towards an AXP-m setup until this morning. I have been recently advised that an Intel 2.4C (then o/c) setup may be more favorable for my needs and uses than an AMD Athlon XP mobile 2500+ setup. Or I may consider an Athlon 64 s754 setup (no Soundstorm) but with a nForce3 150 board. I know that the overclock I achieve will likely be limited by the SSF's cooling and motherboard options. But I'd like a setup that gives me a bit more for the money, so it's not as if I'm going after a OC monster. The looks of P4 and A64 Shuttles look superior, that is my preference would be G5 >= G4 > G2 > G1. And the prices are all over the place too. Arg, it is hard to pinpoint which Shuttle is for me.
Now to complete my digression...
How is the overclocking with a nForce3 150 chipset?
How is the overclocking with a ATI RS300 chipset?
I just need to clear these things up before I can best select a Shuttle. I have already figured out what hard drive (seagate 200GB ATA), RAM (Corsair Value Select), video card (some fanless DVI out solution... 9600xt I think perhaps even lower).
