Just completed a project I've been working on for a while. Because it was a learning curve I've kept it cheap with a few "hrm" hacks
Basically I inherited a 3 year old "professionally assembled" HTPC. It had been troublesome from day one even though it was sold as a package with MCE (xp) and the mce remote and wireless keyboard for what was a lot of money. It now acts as both video and music storage as well as twin 1080hd TV tuners
1. Case Cooling- pick a good case with good airflow. Not many have it
-This case was an arisetec HT400 rebadged by the seller. The basic layout is flawed as it has a single exhaust fan which simply will not cool the case adequately. The original builder fitted a large Zalman CPU fan but this only kept the CPU cool and was noisy. I fitted a new m/b controlled exhaust fan which was quiet and then could turn down the speed controller on the Zalman fan.
2. Pick your motherboard combo wisely. IMHO get as much on board as possible - so that all you need to add is a tv tuner card. Make sure its a cool running combo and you'll avoid my problems.
- My motherboard is an older PVS945D Intel supporting a Pentium D CPU 2.8ghz. Bad choice- as the cpu is a hot running unit and needs plenty of cooling. I've retained it as my cooling tweaks have addressed the problem- 60c CPU vs 68-70C; 60C GPU versus 75 and case temp 45C vs 55c
3. Passively cooled Graphics cards can suck. Not all though- some of the new ones are better
-This case has a geforce 6600LE (gigabyte) which is passively cooled. Its a bad combo with this motherboard as the heatsink on the graphics card makes contact with the heatsink on the m/b controller chip- result is they both run hot. I retained it by adding another fan next to the graphics card. I could not get a PCI slot fan that had any kind of speed control (too loud) so I hacked an old intel cpu fan into place. hey it works and is unseen so who cares. Next build I will pick a low profile cool running graphics card- but I think I'd avoid passive.
EDIT: I gave up on this card. I kept getting pixelation on the TV and the machine would often hang when selecting a program from the EPG. I've replaced it with a Geforce 210 1gb low profile card and gone to HDMI for the output. It seems to have fixed the problems I was having- and the whole case is cooler as a result. My theory was that seeing the card ran fine on a test monitor and struggled with the plasma that the dvi to component adaptor was stressing the card. It appears to have been the right assumption- and HDMI is a whole lot easier. The new card was $90 aud
4. Pick a good TV tuner card- don't be cheap.
- this had a Haupauge Nova T500 fitted which is a known pig and I ditched. Kept black screening on resume. I put an DVR2210 Hauppauge in and do not regret it. TV cards need to work every time you resume the device. I've tried Compros and Leadteks and they are just too unstable.
5. TV cards can run hot so they need airflow. Make sure your motherboard has plenty of space between the PCI-express slot and the PCI slot(s)
-Trialling my new box and all of a sudden "no signal" Wouldn't recover after a cold boot. Opened up the box and man the tv card was hot. Once it cooled down it recovered- so I added yet another fan- again another old CPU fan so the speed could be controlled. Another hack but it works- pics below. Thats 4 fans now- but its still quiet as most are running well under 700rpm
6. External displays- pick VFD over LCD and as big as you can
- want to see the display from your sofa? It needs to be at least 10cm long and preferably VFD. LCD's are hard to read unless you are on the same viewing level. Mine works well but its too damned small- see pics. Touch control screens are not useful IMHO- remotes should be enough.
7. Remotes - Choose wisely. If you want the WAF factor this is a biggie
-I'm still not totally sold but I used a simple Harmony 515 remote so that one remote powers the HTPC, my amp and TV. One button to watch TV and one button for random music. Most "activities" are one button press. It controls all three devices admirably- and has WAF. Pig to set up but persevere - the results are worth it. The MCE remote was too simple, the haupauge remote that came with the new TV card was not a good layout.
8. Set up Mediaportal on your home PC first and get used to it- you'll save heaps of time later
-I bought a cheap usb compro tuner for $30 bucks and a cheap remote of ebay for $10 (MCE compatible)for testing MP. Worked OK but wouldn't rely on it. I then spent several weeks tailoring and getting to uderstand how MP works so that when it came time to build I knew what I was doing. Once I had EPG working properly I just copied the EPG settings to the new box which worked.
9. Keep your Mediaportal Menu simple - a another biggie for WAF
-I have 5 options- TV, Music, Videos, DVD and Rip CD(Media Slayer). Nice and easy. Remove "My Plugins", "settings" and anything else that can confuse a novice user
10. Power settings - a real PITA
-I still struggle with this. I currently have my HTPC configured with Power Scheduler enabled and allow it to shut down after 10 minutes of inactivity for both client and TV server. It is also enabled to wake up for recording. I then put the machine into S3 suspend with the remote and wake it as needed via remote. My main gripe here is that resume is too slow - even from s3. The solution is to just leave it on- but power here in Australia is getting more expensive by the day- so this is not an option for me. The last "bug" is that because the remote remembers the last power state of the devices - if you hit the power button after a recording session that started from Power scheduler- you'll turn the HTPC off- because the remote thinks its off and sends the power toggle command.. Its such an odd combo that it hasn't happened- yet
So thats it. My HTPC ain't the prettiest- but I've learned heaps- and the HTPC is fully functional- and most importantly functioning reliably without compromise. I boot it once a week and it just works.
Having said that - if you just want a TV server I'd buy a Tivo. Its the added features such as music and videos that ruled out the Tivo for me. Mediaportal is a great full solution- but not for the faint of heart
Basically I inherited a 3 year old "professionally assembled" HTPC. It had been troublesome from day one even though it was sold as a package with MCE (xp) and the mce remote and wireless keyboard for what was a lot of money. It now acts as both video and music storage as well as twin 1080hd TV tuners
1. Case Cooling- pick a good case with good airflow. Not many have it
-This case was an arisetec HT400 rebadged by the seller. The basic layout is flawed as it has a single exhaust fan which simply will not cool the case adequately. The original builder fitted a large Zalman CPU fan but this only kept the CPU cool and was noisy. I fitted a new m/b controlled exhaust fan which was quiet and then could turn down the speed controller on the Zalman fan.
2. Pick your motherboard combo wisely. IMHO get as much on board as possible - so that all you need to add is a tv tuner card. Make sure its a cool running combo and you'll avoid my problems.
- My motherboard is an older PVS945D Intel supporting a Pentium D CPU 2.8ghz. Bad choice- as the cpu is a hot running unit and needs plenty of cooling. I've retained it as my cooling tweaks have addressed the problem- 60c CPU vs 68-70C; 60C GPU versus 75 and case temp 45C vs 55c
3. Passively cooled Graphics cards can suck. Not all though- some of the new ones are better
-This case has a geforce 6600LE (gigabyte) which is passively cooled. Its a bad combo with this motherboard as the heatsink on the graphics card makes contact with the heatsink on the m/b controller chip- result is they both run hot. I retained it by adding another fan next to the graphics card. I could not get a PCI slot fan that had any kind of speed control (too loud) so I hacked an old intel cpu fan into place. hey it works and is unseen so who cares. Next build I will pick a low profile cool running graphics card- but I think I'd avoid passive.
EDIT: I gave up on this card. I kept getting pixelation on the TV and the machine would often hang when selecting a program from the EPG. I've replaced it with a Geforce 210 1gb low profile card and gone to HDMI for the output. It seems to have fixed the problems I was having- and the whole case is cooler as a result. My theory was that seeing the card ran fine on a test monitor and struggled with the plasma that the dvi to component adaptor was stressing the card. It appears to have been the right assumption- and HDMI is a whole lot easier. The new card was $90 aud
4. Pick a good TV tuner card- don't be cheap.
- this had a Haupauge Nova T500 fitted which is a known pig and I ditched. Kept black screening on resume. I put an DVR2210 Hauppauge in and do not regret it. TV cards need to work every time you resume the device. I've tried Compros and Leadteks and they are just too unstable.
5. TV cards can run hot so they need airflow. Make sure your motherboard has plenty of space between the PCI-express slot and the PCI slot(s)
-Trialling my new box and all of a sudden "no signal" Wouldn't recover after a cold boot. Opened up the box and man the tv card was hot. Once it cooled down it recovered- so I added yet another fan- again another old CPU fan so the speed could be controlled. Another hack but it works- pics below. Thats 4 fans now- but its still quiet as most are running well under 700rpm
6. External displays- pick VFD over LCD and as big as you can
- want to see the display from your sofa? It needs to be at least 10cm long and preferably VFD. LCD's are hard to read unless you are on the same viewing level. Mine works well but its too damned small- see pics. Touch control screens are not useful IMHO- remotes should be enough.
7. Remotes - Choose wisely. If you want the WAF factor this is a biggie
-I'm still not totally sold but I used a simple Harmony 515 remote so that one remote powers the HTPC, my amp and TV. One button to watch TV and one button for random music. Most "activities" are one button press. It controls all three devices admirably- and has WAF. Pig to set up but persevere - the results are worth it. The MCE remote was too simple, the haupauge remote that came with the new TV card was not a good layout.
8. Set up Mediaportal on your home PC first and get used to it- you'll save heaps of time later
-I bought a cheap usb compro tuner for $30 bucks and a cheap remote of ebay for $10 (MCE compatible)for testing MP. Worked OK but wouldn't rely on it. I then spent several weeks tailoring and getting to uderstand how MP works so that when it came time to build I knew what I was doing. Once I had EPG working properly I just copied the EPG settings to the new box which worked.
9. Keep your Mediaportal Menu simple - a another biggie for WAF
-I have 5 options- TV, Music, Videos, DVD and Rip CD(Media Slayer). Nice and easy. Remove "My Plugins", "settings" and anything else that can confuse a novice user
10. Power settings - a real PITA
-I still struggle with this. I currently have my HTPC configured with Power Scheduler enabled and allow it to shut down after 10 minutes of inactivity for both client and TV server. It is also enabled to wake up for recording. I then put the machine into S3 suspend with the remote and wake it as needed via remote. My main gripe here is that resume is too slow - even from s3. The solution is to just leave it on- but power here in Australia is getting more expensive by the day- so this is not an option for me. The last "bug" is that because the remote remembers the last power state of the devices - if you hit the power button after a recording session that started from Power scheduler- you'll turn the HTPC off- because the remote thinks its off and sends the power toggle command.. Its such an odd combo that it hasn't happened- yet
So thats it. My HTPC ain't the prettiest- but I've learned heaps- and the HTPC is fully functional- and most importantly functioning reliably without compromise. I boot it once a week and it just works.
Having said that - if you just want a TV server I'd buy a Tivo. Its the added features such as music and videos that ruled out the Tivo for me. Mediaportal is a great full solution- but not for the faint of heart
