Designing my 1st HTPC (1 Viewer)

[AussieGuy]

G'day everyone,
I’m only new to this sort of stuff but i'm wanting to have a crack at making my own HTPC. I haven’t brought any hardware though, but I have been testing Media Portal for my software. So far so good. Anyways I’m thinking about buying the SilverStone LC16M case, but I don’t know what sort of hardware I should buy to put in it. As it is my first attempt at making my first HTPC, I want to make midrange priced HTPC. I wanting to use the HTPC for a dedicated Home theatre system e.g. TV recording mostly, DVD watching, Music, Pictures and Internet.

So for my first set of questions -

** What type of Motherboard should I be looking at (It has to fit in the SilverStone LC16M) ?

** Should I buy a Motherboard with inbuilt graphics card?

** If separate graphics card, how good does it have to be to run everything smoothly?

** What sort of CPU should I get? Dual Core or something newer?

Thanks in advance for any help.



(I have posted this on another forum, but since im going to be using Media Portal, i thought i should post here too.)

 

[elconejito]

1) not familiar with this case, maybe someone else can provide some info

2&3) it depends... If you can get a onboard video that supports DX9 then you should be OK. If you are dealing with HD content or maybe if you just want better performance then go with a seperate card. I would only go with a seperate card if you get maybe a Nvidia 7600GT or better (or ATI equivalent). If you got a low-end video card they won't be much better than an onboard DX9 solution (by Nvidia or ATI) at much more cost. The drawback to seperate card is more cost, and potentially more noise due to active cooling on higher performance card.

4) personally I like the AMD chips for this type of HTPC. Low power = Low heat which means its easier to keep cool quietly. And if the board supports AMD's cool n quiet thats extra bonus. And they are dirt cheap. I got an AMD 64 3200 for $56 USD. But if you really need some horsepower like if you do a lot of coonverting/compressing of videos or multi-task or use it for other purposes, then the Intel Core2Duo line is fabulous but at significantly higher cost.

 

[AussieGuy]

Thanks for the insight.