- March 18, 2008
- 67
- 0
- Home Country
- Canada
I've been wanting to build a dedicated HTPC for some time and recently finally started to do something about it.
My goal for this build was to have a good looking, quiet, functional, smooth performing & very affordable HTPC which would do everything you would expect such a pc to do & maybe a little more.
I've been experimenting heavily with Mediaportal (using my ATI remote Wonder RF Remote) and have pretty much settled on it being the frontend. It's a very nice piece of work for sure.
To keep the costs down I took a look at some other workstations I have and decided to "Trade" parts from a Linux box that I use for daily computing tasks.
I swapped out it's motherboard, & cpu and will replace them with an Intel E1200 (Celeron c2d based dual core) cpu, and Foxconn motherboard on sale at an online retailer for under $100 retaining the original 1gig Corsair XMS2 (2x512mb) Dimms that were there before. I really don't need all that much power in that box since I only web surf, bank, arrange digital pictures, print and the other mundane PC tasks on that pc anyways.
So here is the parts list for my HTPC as it stands now.
Asus P5L-MX Motherboard (From Linux workstation)
Intel E4300 C2D CPU (@3.05Ghz 100% Stable) (From Linux Workstation)
2gig (2x1gig) PC2-6400 Dimms
Seagate 7200.11 500gig 32mb cache Sata2 Hard Drive
HIS Radeon HD3450 256mb PCIe Video Card
Pioneer SATA Dvd Burner
Inwin Mt. Jade (BK623) Micro Atx case (300W quiet PS)
The addition of the 3450 and it's UVD feature means that I can reduce the speed of the cpu closer to stock even for HD playback which in turn will result in it running cooler and consequently lower the cpu fan noise. Having a C2D cpu such as the E4300 opens up all kinds of overclocking potential if I ever want to upgrade the HTPC to a casual gamer as well by adding a more "game friendly" video card. This would also probably mean that the 300W PS in the Mt. Jade case would have to either be upgraded to a higher spec model or a different case/PSU setup brought in completely. This really isn't in the cards for now since I already have a game ready pc also.
All in all this build is shaping up real nicely & I am just waiting for some of the new parts, which are on order, to arrive.
Any comments or observations will be welcomed.
My goal for this build was to have a good looking, quiet, functional, smooth performing & very affordable HTPC which would do everything you would expect such a pc to do & maybe a little more.
I've been experimenting heavily with Mediaportal (using my ATI remote Wonder RF Remote) and have pretty much settled on it being the frontend. It's a very nice piece of work for sure.
To keep the costs down I took a look at some other workstations I have and decided to "Trade" parts from a Linux box that I use for daily computing tasks.
I swapped out it's motherboard, & cpu and will replace them with an Intel E1200 (Celeron c2d based dual core) cpu, and Foxconn motherboard on sale at an online retailer for under $100 retaining the original 1gig Corsair XMS2 (2x512mb) Dimms that were there before. I really don't need all that much power in that box since I only web surf, bank, arrange digital pictures, print and the other mundane PC tasks on that pc anyways.
So here is the parts list for my HTPC as it stands now.
Asus P5L-MX Motherboard (From Linux workstation)
Intel E4300 C2D CPU (@3.05Ghz 100% Stable) (From Linux Workstation)
2gig (2x1gig) PC2-6400 Dimms
Seagate 7200.11 500gig 32mb cache Sata2 Hard Drive
HIS Radeon HD3450 256mb PCIe Video Card
Pioneer SATA Dvd Burner
Inwin Mt. Jade (BK623) Micro Atx case (300W quiet PS)
The addition of the 3450 and it's UVD feature means that I can reduce the speed of the cpu closer to stock even for HD playback which in turn will result in it running cooler and consequently lower the cpu fan noise. Having a C2D cpu such as the E4300 opens up all kinds of overclocking potential if I ever want to upgrade the HTPC to a casual gamer as well by adding a more "game friendly" video card. This would also probably mean that the 300W PS in the Mt. Jade case would have to either be upgraded to a higher spec model or a different case/PSU setup brought in completely. This really isn't in the cards for now since I already have a game ready pc also.
All in all this build is shaping up real nicely & I am just waiting for some of the new parts, which are on order, to arrive.
Any comments or observations will be welcomed.