Jumped into HTPC catigory, NmediaPC 5000B

[mikeford]

Gotta say reading the forums, this and many others, did not lead me to many conclusions, so I looked at what was on sale at Newegg and jumped.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811204035
NmediaPC 5000B for $70 shipped free.
Athena Earthwatt 380w $39 shipped free.

Biostar TA760GM2+
Athlon II X2 250 $54 Fry's combo

Patriot 2x 1G DDR2 PC6400 $50 at Fry's
Seagate 2TB $85 from TigerDirect.

Thinking W7 or XP64, adding a second 2TB drive for mirror, not sure of the rest.

 

[Binky]

Don't go with XP on an HTPC. If you have any intentions of using the (built-in) media center software, you need Win7. Also, I don't think its possible to play blu-ray on XP.

For an HTPC, Win7 is significantly better than XP.

 

[mikeford]

I may still give XP Pro 64 a shot, its a question of utilizing existing licenses. This is also my first swack at HTPC so it may turn out as Htpc LITE. Jumping in the water in many senses.

 

[kalrith]

I upgraded from XP to Win7, and it's a HUGE difference. I used MediaPortal with XP, which was nice, but I had several problems with it, and it took about 20 times longer (literally) than XP to set up.

 

[aigomorla]

changed the title to remove water from it.

So we dont confuse people into thinking ur watercooling a HTPC.

Cases and Cooling Mod.

Aigomorla.

 

[QueBert]

XP + XBMC is a great media center setup, I'd avoid MCE or anything except XBMC for the front end, but that's just me.

 

[Slugbait]

You won't use MCE with XP64...MCE was never even considered for SRV2K3. You will have to use a third-party front end. Besides, MS stopped supporting XP MCE years ago...content either disappeared or is broken, metadata servers were scrapped, and a funny little update broke Windows Messenger integration so that MCE will tell you that it's not even installed every time MCE is launched (need a reghack to get rid of the bogus message).

I am unaware of any third-party front end that supports XP64.

What little driver support that existed for XP64 was terminated two generations ago. Most companies never wrote drivers for XP64. Let's start with your mobo choice: I doubt chipset drivers exist. So even if you have drivers for the other hardware (which is a huge "if"), you'll probably still have a highly unstable system.

My original XP MCE machine ran 24/7 for almost five years. I was quite pleased, but the continued intentional degradation of the experience convinced me to build anew. I tried Vista MCE, which was a little better of a 10-foot experience, but that damn OS suddenly decided it couldn't see disks in my DVD drive anymore. So I flattened it and installed Win7, which is an even better 10-foot experience over Vista. In addition, 7 is the only one that supports cablecard tuners, if that is of any importance to your TV recording.

In short:
You can't go with XP64
You should go with Win7
MCE is actually quite capable

 

[Auric]

Gotta say reading the forums, this and many others, did not lead me to many conclusions, so I looked at what was on sale at Newegg and jumped.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811204035
NmediaPC 5000B for $70 shipped free.
Athena Earthwatt 380w $39 shipped free.

Biostar TA760GM2+
Athlon II X2 250 $54 Fry's combo

Patriot 2x 1G DDR2 PC6400 $50 at Fry's
Seagate 2TB $85 from TigerDirect.

Thinking W7 or XP64, adding a second 2TB drive for mirror, not sure of the rest.

W7 is preferred for audio as HD bitstream is unavailable with XP. The mobo/CPU choice alone precludes that but adding an HD5000 for the capability would not be an option with XP.

Presumably that is an Antec (not Athena) PSU and so does seem good value for a bronze rated unit and while it is overkill, it is difficult to get anything lower power without spending at least as much. Seasonic do make models with both common air flow options though depending upon the ideal for the layout.

The case looks nice but is relatively expensive compared to common micro towers - for example Rosewill can occasionally be had for $20 shipped, and allow more storage expansion. So, spending a lot more is somewhat contradictory to the choice of core components.

Fry's and microcenter have had combo deals such as i3 / Gigabyte for less than $100 -and those include HD audio as well as video, and aren't shabby quality, performance or efficiency-wise either.

 

[Binky]

The case looks nice but is relatively expensive compared to common micro towers - for example Rosewill can occasionally be had for $20 shipped, and allow more storage expansion. So, spending a lot more is somewhat contradictory to the choice of core components.

For many people, the case choice is among the most important considerations when building a "theater PC" that will likely be on display with the other media components. I certainly don't want a tower case standing next to my A/V system. I also want the HTPC box to be virtually silent. Raw computing power is significantly less important (to me) than striking that perfect balance between looks+noise and enough power to get the job done.

 

[Auric]

Yeah, many volks like to display their gear but ideally I would prefer everything to be squirreled away out of sight. So whether it is a pretty box or a plain box is a lower priority than practicality (and I'm more keen on the form following function schtick anyway).

 

[Rifter]

Instead of buying a new OS or running XP which is a bad idea on manly levels as explained above. You can always run linux with XBMC for a front end. There are also media center specific editions of linux you can look into. Since it seems this is an extream low cost build you should look into no cost OS's.

 

[mikeford]

System is "mostly" together, parked on a corner of my desk while I fiddle with it, but somewhat in use. Already clear this is jump in and learn instead of going directly where I wanted.

I like the case, its pretty, fitting in nicely with AV gear, reasonably well made, cheap, and adequately featured. Flip down access to card readers and many ports in front, rubber isolation in 2 HD bays, nice AV looking legs, and a spot in the front for a VFD (+$30), but needs brackets in the rear for spdif and serial/lpt. Glad I didn't buy a non AV case, starting to see the wisdom in spending more for a better one.

Windows 7 64 is installed, and I agree with the comments above, other than linux, its the OS to go with for AV. OTOH I am finding out many games I hoped to play are too old to work right on 7 (I know about the patches and tricks), like Diablo II, so thats fine too, better to make it a very targeted use machine, Media and general network storage.

MB and CPU, mixed, it was cheap, decent performer in general, but looks like I will be buying video etc. cards to make up for the "not ready for HD" 760G chipset. OTOH putting the video on a card may allow lower power consumption for those times the system is only being used for network storage.

Shopping list;

Blu-ray DVD drive, playback only fine.
S/Pdif and Svideo I/O device, not a clue here even what to look for.
One more Seagate 2TB HD