Completed First Antec HTPC build (1 Viewer)

[Fastsonic]

ps. Ihr English ist eigentlich ganz gut!

thx , your German ist also very good!

Point1. Very nice!

Point2. That means, i need to buy an 3rd Party Remote Controller with Receiver (USB or else)? Where to put the Receiver Part of this? It would be good, if its Inside the Case.

thx 4 help

PS: The Antec is now my favourite, but the missing Remote Controller sucks

 

[eetaylog]

Point2. That means, i need to buy an 3rd Party Remote Controller with Receiver (USB or else)? Where to put the Receiver Part of this? It would be good, if its Inside the Case.

thx 4 help

PS: The Antec is now my favourite, but the missing Remote Controller sucks

i dont think too many cases come with remote controls, but you could just buy an IR receiever on its own, and just use that?

are you going to buy a new tv card? the nova-t 500 comes with its own remote control and receiver if you wanted to do that. the receiver plugs into the tv card itself, which is how ive got mine set up, and it works great.

 

[Fastsonic]

I like it more if i can get a "all in one" System. Sure, i can buy an Remote Controller . . . but where i place the Receiver Part? I think its an external Component with a Cable (like an USB Light or something) . . yes?

Yes i want to buy a Sat Card. This is the reason i need a new case. Maybe then, i look out for a Card with Remote Controller . .. thank You!

 

[eetaylog]

try this card, it supports satellite, terrestrial and analogue broadcasting. should be pretty futureproof, and it comes with a remote control and receiver.

 

[bigflause]

The new fusion remote comes with a remote. hence the new name. They got rid of the PSU though so you will have to buy one.

They are very hard to get now. not many places have them in stock.

http://www.antec.com/uk/productDetails.php?ProdID=08770

 

[Lotsofjazz]

Hey, just surfing the mediaportal forum I saw this topic.

I am from The Netherlands too, and my system is quite similar to yours, except that I have the silver Fusion II 430, with the VFD display, the black has the LCD display.. As far as the case goes, all fusions are similar, also the new fusion remote have still the same case, including the same crappy VFD or LCD display with the integrated IR receiver. for the rest of my system, see the link on the left

About the Digital TV tuner card, we have Ziggo Cable here, so I went for the floppyDTV C-CI with Alphacrypt classic CAM. I have searched the internet for hours for alternatives, but this seems to be the best and cheapest solution to receive digital scrambled Cable TV. The Alphacrypt is expensive but that is because you also pay for the expensive Irdeto licence.. None the less it remains much cheaper then when you buy the HD capable digital receiver(samsung something) that Ziggo supports. Note that when you have the FloppyDTV you CAN record HD TV and you CAN transfer it to DVD if you want.

When you buy the FloppyDTV together with the Alphacrypt classic from Digitaleverywhere, you get a huge discount:

digital everywhere online shop

One more thing I want to tell here is that upgrading with a seperate graphics card is very well worth the money, as the X1250 has turned out to be the culprit of the jerky playback of the HD TV channels I have here (discovery, NGC, History channel), I have installed a cheap Gainward ATI HD 4650 1Gb DDR2 , a low power consuming GFX with HDMI, VGA and DVI on board and an integrated 8.1 soundcard (over HDMI). I must say this was the best E70,- I have spend the past year, what a huge improvement over the onboard X1250!. HD plays now smooth also with fast movements, SD has improved as well, SD TV channels appear to be sharper crispier, more DVD like quality, finally Hardware accelleration also for HD content, so my CPU stays cool. Note that this card has a noisy cooler, BUT because I only use it for TV and movie playback, it doesnt run its full capacity at all, so it stays very cool, and the fan allmost never runs, sometimes for just a minute or so, but most of the time it is turned off. The card has such low power requirements it doesnt need a seperate power connector, all power it needs comes from the PCI express 16x slot.

About the Antec Fusion, I never got the VFD display working properly as the remote controller of my Marantz Home cinema set interferres with the Imon VFD, so when using the volume buttons, the display goes garbled, and sometimes also the computer responds erraticly.

So I bought a seperate MCE USB receiver on ebay, and disconnected the VFD display, so mine is now permanently black.

But reading this topic, I am going to try it again, I have downloaded the latest driver from the Soundgraph website, lets see what happens. Will let you know here.

One more thing.. If your Home cinema set has a digital sound input.. USE IT!, and use the SPDIF out of your on board soundcard, this way there is absolutely no need for a fancy soundcard, note that a Home cinema set wil ALLWAYS be better then the amps on a soundcard... Just look at the power supply of your home cinemaset, and you know what I mean.. Most motherboards used for HTPC do have a SPDIF OUT these days, if not, and you find the on board soundcard crappy, just look for the cheapest soundcard you can find which has a SPDIF out.

All in all I am very satisfied with the home theatre system I have now, It works very well with Mediaportal, and best of all the quality of movie playback and HDTV is fenomenal. I dont think I need an upgrade for many years to come.

Lots

 

[ShoopNL]

Hey, just surfing the mediaportal forum I saw this topic.

I am from The Netherlands too, and my system is quite similar to yours, except that I have the silver Fusion II 430, with the VFD display, the black has the LCD display.. As far as the case goes, all fusions are similar, also the new fusion remote have still the same case, including the same crappy VFD or LCD display with the integrated IR receiver. for the rest of my system, see the link on the left

About the Digital TV tuner card, we have Ziggo Cable here, so I went for the floppyDTV C-CI with Alphacrypt classic CAM. I have searched the internet for hours for alternatives, but this seems to be the best and cheapest solution to receive digital scrambled Cable TV. The Alphacrypt is expensive but that is because you also pay for the expensive Irdeto licence.. None the less it remains much cheaper then when you buy the HD capable digital receiver(samsung something) that Ziggo supports. Note that when you have the FloppyDTV you CAN record HD TV and you CAN transfer it to DVD if you want.

When you buy the FloppyDTV together with the Alphacrypt classic from Digitaleverywhere, you get a huge discount:

digital everywhere online shop

One more thing I want to tell here is that upgrading with a seperate graphics card is very well worth the money, as the X1250 has turned out to be the culprit of the jerky playback of the HD TV channels I have here (discovery, NGC, History channel), I have installed a cheap Gainward ATI HD 4650 1Gb DDR2 , a low power consuming GFX with HDMI, VGA and DVI on board and an integrated 8.1 soundcard (over HDMI). I must say this was the best E70,- I have spend the past year, what a huge improvement over the onboard X1250!. HD plays now smooth also with fast movements, SD has improved as well, SD TV channels appear to be sharper crispier, more DVD like quality, finally Hardware accelleration also for HD content, so my CPU stays cool. Note that this card has a noisy cooler, BUT because I only use it for TV and movie playback, it doesnt run its full capacity at all, so it stays very cool, and the fan allmost never runs, sometimes for just a minute or so, but most of the time it is turned off. The card has such low power requirements it doesnt need a seperate power connector, all power it needs comes from the PCI express 16x slot.

About the Antec Fusion, I never got the VFD display working properly as the remote controller of my Marantz Home cinema set interferres with the Imon VFD, so when using the volume buttons, the display goes garbled, and sometimes also the computer responds erraticly.

So I bought a seperate MCE USB receiver on ebay, and disconnected the VFD display, so mine is now permanently black.

But reading this topic, I am going to try it again, I have downloaded the latest driver from the Soundgraph website, lets see what happens. Will let you know here.

One more thing.. If your Home cinema set has a digital sound input.. USE IT!, and use the SPDIF out of your on board soundcard, this way there is absolutely no need for a fancy soundcard, note that a Home cinema set wil ALLWAYS be better then the amps on a soundcard... Just look at the power supply of your home cinemaset, and you know what I mean.. Most motherboards used for HTPC do have a SPDIF OUT these days, if not, and you find the on board soundcard crappy, just look for the cheapest soundcard you can find which has a SPDIF out.

All in all I am very satisfied with the home theatre system I have now, It works very well with Mediaportal, and best of all the quality of movie playback and HDTV is fenomenal. I dont think I need an upgrade for many years to come.

Lots

Hi,

Nice, but why don't you make a topic of your finished system, or do you have it already
Whit some nice picture's

 

[Lotsofjazz]

hmm, mine is not really new anymore, my reply was to get you all some ideas on improving a similar sytem built around the Antec Fusion.

I just tried the VFD again with the latest IMON driver, but still the same issue, interferrence with my marantz remote.. , so back to the MCE IR remote and disconnect the VFD.

Lots

 

[kszabo]

Can i use my Silverstone(Imon) Remote Control with the Antec Fusion? Is a Receiver Build in and only the Remote Controll is missing at delivery?

In Europe (Germany) there is no Antec Fusion 430 any more, it is replaced by the Antec Fusion Remote. This has no power supply unit inside, but comes with an Ir Remote unit (Imon Pad). An infrared receiver from Soundgraph is always inside but this is not a MS MCE one! You need the iMon software to get it work (this is a little bit tricky) either with a MCE Remote or the iMon Pad.

 

[Lotsofjazz]

Can i use my Silverstone(Imon) Remote Control with the Antec Fusion? Is a Receiver Build in and only the Remote Controll is missing at delivery?

In Europe (Germany) there is no Antec Fusion 430 any more, it is replaced by the Antec Fusion Remote. This has no power supply unit inside, but comes with an Ir Remote unit (Imon Pad). An infrared receiver from Soundgraph is always inside but this is not a MS MCE one! You need the iMon software to get it work (this is a little bit tricky) either with a MCE Remote or the iMon Pad.

Hmmm.. , Antec must have a really tight contract with Soundgraph, otherwise I cant imagine why they are keeping this crappy piece of hardware inside their cases. In stead of installing a decent working display and MCE IR receiver, they do now supply the Imon remote with it in the hope they get less complaints or send back cases as the Imon VFD is not really working very well with the MCE remote, and has serious interference problems with other remotes that are accidently pointed to the VFD.

But with supplying the Imon remote with the case, it does not take away the interference problem. It just remains crap.. I tried today again, with new drivers, but it is still the same..

lots