Completed My HTPC project, parts and config (1 Viewer)

[petsa]

Hi Johan,

I can not quite remember how much I've spend, and I probably shouldn't try to recount either

I'd say, besides spending the money you should be prepared to spend time to get it to work. Not that it is too difficult but there is for sure a reason why the HTPC concept has not taken over every livingroom in the world. I've spent quite a lot of time tuning, fixing, upgrading, downgrading, adding new plugins, etc, to get it to a state where it works quite well. For me this is a hobby, others may see it as a pain...

/Peter

 

[Lotsofjazz]

Whooo.. I would defenitely keep the Marantz receiver/amplifier (I suppose you have a SR7002), if you try to lift it, you know why!!.. Sound from High End receiver is ALLWAYS better then from a flimsy sound card in a PC.. I would make sure your HTPC has SPDIF Out, and via fddshow or AC3 codec on the HTPC send all digital audio signals directly to the Marantz.. The D/A converters (DTS, Dolby Digital, PCM decoders) in the Marantz are superior to those on a sound card. I have my HTPC connected to my Marantz SR7000 (older brother of yours!) via Optical SPDIF out.. and it is AWSOME! Since I have also a Magnat subwoofer added to it.. sound is way better then in a movietheatre.. I never listen to the TV speakers ever since, I have allways sound via the Marantz.. My JVC TV is also known for its good speakers, but compared to the marantz sound system its just crap.. A good sound system and well placed speakers are so much of an enhancement , you will defenitely enjoy movies much more.

So, important is to look for a soundcard with Optical SPDIF Out, some motherboards have it on board.. and that is really enough because you will never use the Soundcard D/A converters anyway, so spend money on an expensive soundcard is not necessay.. you have a Marantz and that is all you need.

I allso would keep the stand alone DVD player, because a stand alone DVD player is the only device that can send the DVD video signal directly to the TV (with component cable, 576P signal is possible, which is the best DVD quality possible). When playing DVD format via HTPC using PowerDVD or something allways results is a little fuzzier image, because the software converts it to the resolotion you use at that moment.. I have tried to configure my video card to send out 576P when playing a DVD image from Harddisk, but till now I have not been successful with that. Image quality via the DVD is better because the source format fits the resolution of the DVD SIgnal exactly (576P) and is therefore sharper then playing via HTPC on a higher resolotion. Of course the electronic cirquits in a DVD player are all taylored to decode DVD movies the best way possible, so no surprize DVD looks better when played in a stand alone DVD player.

If you have a HDMI Video output on your HTPC and HDMI input on your TV, I would use that, for HD video it is perfect! (720P HD movies can be played in the correct resolution, 720P so that looks awsome!) Sometimes a digital DVI is present in stead of HDMI, most of the time the videocard supports HDMI format output via DVI, or vise versa, so eather way you can connect your TV via digital Video.

In the future a DVB TV tuner will be included in my HTPC, and watch digital TV from then on.. This tuner allso will function as a radio tuner (comes via the same cable)

So in short:

Keep the Marantz and surround speaker system
Keep the DVD player for DVD movies
Make sure HTPC has Optical SPDIF audio out to the Marantz, go for on board audio, no need for expensive soundcard
Make sure the HTPC has HD digital Video out, eather via DVI or HDMI

If your TV is a full HD 40"or bigger, make sure you have Full HD capability on the HTPC video out,

I am quite happy with my configuration:
Abit Micro ATX motherboard: fatal1ty i90HD, Has the following features:
ATI Radeon Xpress 1250 On Board video card with VGA output and HDMI video output (dual display config possible!, do computer stuff on a normal monitor and play a HD movie on the HDMI at the same time!)
On Board realtec HD audio soundcard with SPDIF optical audio out, (or 7.1 analogue out, which I never used)
4 SATA2 connectors
1 IDE connector (for that old HDD or DVD burner)
1 3.5"Floppy drive connector
total of 10 USB busses (4 on the back panel)
2 PCI-E X1 slot
1 PCI-E X16 (for additional seperate video card
1 PCI slot
4x DDR2 SDRAM slots, capable for 16Gb DDR2 (max 800Mhz clockspeed)
On Board NIC 100/1000 Mb/sec with stndard RJ45 network connector in the backpanel

CPU: Intel Core Duo E6600, 2.4 Ghz

4x 1Gb Transcend DDR2 SDRAM memory, 800Mhz clockspeed, of which 256Mb allocated to the on board videocard (can be set in the BIOS)

Samsung Spinpoint 500Gb hard disk

Samsung DVD player/burner

Case: Antec Fusion V2 (nowadays known as Fusion 430) Silver with build in IR receiver for the Microsoft MCE remote.

Stand alone Pioneer DV575A DVD player, which I also can use as CD player and super audio player

Marantz SR7000 High end Surround receiver with Mission front center and rear speakers and active magnat 30 Litre downfiring Subwoofer with 15 inch magnat driver and reflex port (goes lower then 20Hz), DVD and HTPC connected via optical SPDIF, TV via normal stereo red and white CINCH (JVC TV has no digital audio out) Speakers connected via red copper speaker wire, Subwoofer pre amp signal goes to the Magnat via coaxial shielded CINCH cable

JVC LD32S60 32 Inch HD ready LCD TV (upto 1080i resolution) with HDMI and VGA input, Both connected to my HTPC. DVD player connected via Component cable (3x ccoaxial shielded CINCH, red blue and green) For the small livingroom I have this is Big enough I have it allready 3 years now, but when I would know what is available today i would have waited for a 42 Inch Full HD Plasma for the same price (3 years ago Plasma TV's were still way more expensive then LCD's.. but today above 40" comparable LCD's are more expensive then a Plasma)

I enjoy my set everyday! The HTPC is the best investment in years (I have it now about 6 months)

Oh yeah, I have still windows XP Professional, which runs fine, but this set would also be perfect for Windows Vista.

Ok this eather has helped you, or has bring more dilemma's!

BTW, the ATI x1250 has an issue with some skins of mediaportal that use reflections in the graphics, could be easily overcome by using another skin. it is expected this issue will be solved with a new ATI driver release in the near future or maybe solved with the release of MPII. Watching HD content with this setups runs smooth.

Take care,

Lots

 

[Baltic Johan]

Hi Petsa & Lotsfojazz,

Thanks for your comments - it both increased my dilemma, and solved it. Which is god, and bad...

It´s bad because one of the really god things about new projects is the investigation part when all details needs to be looked into, every stoned turned - and so on. It´s pleasant and painful!

It´s good for now I can move into implementation! Which I can enjoy for quite a while if I work slowly enough.

Just to clarify, I don´t have any equipment at all to day - except for my very old Grundig TV and a low budget combo Samsung DVD/VHS player - so I´m free to use my budget as I please!

Petsa put the finger on a very important aspect - time. And since (even though I would love to spend hrs making out with a HTPC project) there are some other issues to take care of like; wife, house, children, work... , following will happen.

Petsas comment made me take the decision to:

- buy a new Marantz SR7002 receiver
- buy a new BenQ W9000
- buy a new, decent DVD player (and wait for a while to see if Blu-Ray or HD-DVD wins the standardisation battle)
- buy a good surround system

This decision will give me the better of two worlds. I can get into implementation phase now - today! And I still have a HTPC project to look forward to! I can already now play with a server solution and my network - the step to HTPC can be made gradually but will probably speed up when it starts to get dark in Sweden next time (November 2008). I will for sure have lots of use of Lotsofjazz comments and will come back to the Forum when it´s time for technical details

So - again - thanks guys for your input. It solved my dilemma at the same time as I still have a project to look forward to.

/Johan

 

[Darre]

Blu-Ray is winning.. Even tho Toshiba is cutting the prizes in half they can't compete with getting ps3 and blu-ray in one package. HD-DVD only got one major movie studio left backing them, so its just a matter of time. I was cheering for HD-DVD for a long time, but its over now.


Oh and good luck with the HTPC/mulitmedia setup!

 

[Lotsofjazz]

Hi Petsa & Lotsfojazz,

Thanks for your comments - it both increased my dilemma, and solved it. Which is god, and bad...

It´s bad because one of the really god things about new projects is the investigation part when all details needs to be looked into, every stoned turned - and so on. It´s pleasant and painful!

It´s good for now I can move into implementation! Which I can enjoy for quite a while if I work slowly enough.

Just to clarify, I don´t have any equipment at all to day - except for my very old Grundig TV and a low budget combo Samsung DVD/VHS player - so I´m free to use my budget as I please!

Petsa put the finger on a very important aspect - time. And since (even though I would love to spend hrs making out with a HTPC project) there are some other issues to take care of like; wife, house, children, work... , following will happen.

Petsas comment made me take the decision to:

- buy a new Marantz SR7002 receiver
- buy a new BenQ W9000
- buy a new, decent DVD player (and wait for a while to see if Blu-Ray or HD-DVD wins the standardisation battle)
- buy a good surround system

This decision will give me the better of two worlds. I can get into implementation phase now - today! And I still have a HTPC project to look forward to! I can already now play with a server solution and my network - the step to HTPC can be made gradually but will probably speed up when it starts to get dark in Sweden next time (November 2008). I will for sure have lots of use of Lotsofjazz comments and will come back to the Forum when it´s time for technical details

So - again - thanks guys for your input. It solved my dilemma at the same time as I still have a project to look forward to.

/Johan

Haha! I thought you allready had a Marantz!.. But OK, buying one is still a very good idea then going for some cheaper surround system, it really is worth the money.

With surround system you mean the speakers I suppose. Well, that is very personal.. Since you are spending a lot of money I would certainly take the time and money to buy some good speakers..listen to them first.. A good audio shop will let you try out the speakers AT HOME with your system, before decide to buy them. Make sure the front center and back speakers are of the same brand, so the sound color is the same (not one speaker sounds the same, you need all speakers have about the same sound color, otherwise the surroundsound effect could be negatively affected) And dont forget to add a good active subwoofer to that, that fits your room (Bigger is not allways better in this case.. too big and you get the speaker only mumbling a little, to small and it must work too hard.. it must just fit your room, so the speaker feels happy and produces the sub audio you need)

As Darre said, if I would be buying a HTPC system now (and mine is just 6 months old!!), I would buy a BlueRay disk player/burner for inside the HTPC.. you allways can play normal DVD's and burn normal DVD's with them as well. For stand alone, I am not so sure, Blue ray stand alone players are quite expensive, and with the Blue ray inside the HTPC, you can play HD via the PC if you have a HDMI output (720P, 1080i or 1080P).. You only need the stand alone player to play DVD's with the best quality beause the HTPC can not put out 576P signal (well at least mine cannot, dont know for sure if there are video cards that can put out really 576P, because that is a signal that goes over component cable(YuV) only).. So it is still a good idea to buy a stand alone DVD player, and they are not so expensive anyway. Just look for a DVD player with a component video output, to get 576P. and Optical SPDIF digital audio out, to connect it with your marantz. Pioneer makes very good DVD players, and are not expensive.

Oh, and about time...

I do not agree with Petsa.. If you have all components, it is just two to thee evenings of putting it all together and at least working.. the investigation before takes much more time!, but allso, with this investigating you learn the same time exactly how all must be put together so at the time you have all components you know exactly what to do, and where which cable goes, so you are ready before you know it... my personal experience.

But OK, after that initial building you will start tweaking, try different codecs, try to find the best software and plug ins... It was after 4 months I heard about MediaPortal.. in a way.. you will keep on tweaking all the time, try out new things etc.

I wish you lots of success with your investigation and have fun with buying and putting it together..BEWARE, you will be overwhelmed with the new experience of HD television and Big Surround Sound! compared to the old stuff you have right now!

Lots

 

[Neptuni]

LCD smartie

Hello Peter,


I have an simular setup but another motherboard, I noticed that you are using LCDSmartie for the VFD.
What are the advantages and are you using the LCDsmartie MP plugin for it?

I am running a TV-server/client upstairs with a Nova T-500, that doesn't wake up properly after hibernate, It will be replace by an Terratec 2400i soon.

Mikael

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

I am running a TV-server/client upstairs with a Nova T-500

Have you set a 10 sec, delay on restart either in TVserver config and MP config (if autostart enabled, mine is).

OK i'm only running MP0.2.3.0 with MyTV, but not had a failed recording due to the T500 no video\audio error.

everytime pc comes out of standby MP autolaunches to taskbar after the ten secs, green mce button on remote, toggles to fullscreen and is letting me watch TV with no problems now.

 

[Neptuni]

Hello Ray,

The problem is that after an resume, all of the T-500 tuners are not recognized in TV-server, so sometimes the only avaliable tuner is the analogue PVR-250. Sometimes it resume with one tuner, sometimes 2 tuners and a few times with no T-500 tuner...this also mess up the priority settings of tuners...

But if I start restart from cold it will always find all tuners correctly, I have notice that other MP users have these issues due to the fact that the T-500 is a USB based tuner on an PCI-board...

And I have an 10 s delay before starting MP.

Strange that you dont have any issues, my motherboard is an Asus A2NPV-VM.

/Mikael

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

I've had issues since i owned it, just got around them, using PVRScheduler.

As i said i have just set up xp as dualboot with vista, and with the settings i have, just with stable 0.2.3.0 installed, for the first time need no external application to flawlessly go into standby|S3 and resume with both tuners working.

This is using the latest hauppauge drivers only package.

 

[petsa]

Hi Neptuni,

Well, I just found LCD smartie useful since it displays what I want and it also has plugins for Speedfan if that is of interest. I mainly started with LCDSmartie because I had problems with the display to reinitialize. It turned out to be a combination of the standby issue with Nova 500 and a faulty USB cable...

Anyway, it works fine and never change a working config, except when there is a new MP SVN
/Peter