Need Help in building new HTPC (1 Viewer)

[ADL]

Hello guys,
I am planning to build an HTPC in my lounge room and connect to a 40 inches LCD
I need help in selecting major hardware, following is my first hardware list, please advise me if they are bad combination or what changes I need to improve the system. any help ur suggestion will be much appreciated

Motherboard
MSI 945PL Neo Intel i945P
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=744

Processor
Intel Pentium E6400 Core 2 Duo (Single die-dual core at 2.13GHz with 4MB Shared L2 Cache)

Heatsink
CoolerMaster Hyper48

RAM
2x512MB Kingston Value DDR2 Dual Channel RAM at 533MHz

Harddisk
Maxtor DiamondMAX 250GB SATA II Interface, 16MB Cache Hard Disk Drives

HDTV card
FusionHDTV Dvico card dual tuner (is this a good HDTV card? I choose this because it is availble in computer store near my house)
requirement for TV card will be able to watch at least 1 HDTV and free to air analogue TV, 1 RCA input(for my digital recorder) and listen to FM radio

VGA card
Leadtek PX7600GS, 256MB DDR2 Video RAM, 1U Passive cooling OR
GeForce 7600GS, 256MB DDR2 Video RAM (need to have ability to give 1368 * 768 connect to my LCD hehehe )

External DVD Burner
??? (need help in selecting a region free and quite DVD reader/ writter)

The HTPC will main use for watching and recording HDTV, DVD and playing music. Not planning to install any games on it. So basic requirement will be quite, able to control MP with remote control and able to read all region DVD.

 

[knutinh]

I suggest that you have a look at the following threads:

Guide to hardware selection

Guide for connecting HTPC to flatscreen

I am sorry for not answering your questions directly, but they seem very similar to other questions that are posted regularly. My aim is to be able to give general advice without having to repeat myself every week ;-)

Note that if you choose to spend thousands of $/£/etc on flatscreen and HTPC without scimming those advice threads, then you are no longer entitled to advice on getting it up and running here. Only kidding

best regards
Knut

 

[ADL]

Thanks for the link, I did search and read the forum for hours but just want to confirm that the parts that I am putting together will not cause any major issue,many hardware been suggested in forum the problem is i can't get certain of them in local computer store, so hope anyone can advise on those part that i mention above which avalaible in my town.
I couldn't see anyone have the exact same system in the forum (which is nothing to supprise as there are so many option in market), so just wondering any expert in CPU can give me advices. sorry for being a computer dump but trying hard to educated myself here and thanks for the Guide for connecting HTPC to flatscreen, will read through that.

still hoping someone will give me more direct answer
Thanks

 

[ADL]

by the way the 40" flat screen was 2nd hand and pretty cheap

 

[elconejito]

Hello guys,
I am planning to build an HTPC in my lounge room and connect to a 40 inches LCD
I need help in selecting major hardware, following is my first hardware list, please advise me if they are bad combination or what changes I need to improve the system. any help ur suggestion will be much appreciated

Motherboard
MSI 945PL Neo Intel i945P
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=744

Processor
Intel Pentium E6400 Core 2 Duo (Single die-dual core at 2.13GHz with 4MB Shared L2 Cache)

Heatsink
CoolerMaster Hyper48

RAM
2x512MB Kingston Value DDR2 Dual Channel RAM at 533MHz

Harddisk
Maxtor DiamondMAX 250GB SATA II Interface, 16MB Cache Hard Disk Drives

HDTV card
FusionHDTV Dvico card dual tuner (is this a good HDTV card? I choose this because it is availble in computer store near my house)
requirement for TV card will be able to watch at least 1 HDTV and free to air analogue TV, 1 RCA input(for my digital recorder) and listen to FM radio

VGA card
Leadtek PX7600GS, 256MB DDR2 Video RAM, 1U Passive cooling OR
GeForce 7600GS, 256MB DDR2 Video RAM (need to have ability to give 1368 * 768 connect to my LCD hehehe )

External DVD Burner
??? (need help in selecting a region free and quite DVD reader/ writter)

The HTPC will main use for watching and recording HDTV, DVD and playing music. Not planning to install any games on it. So basic requirement will be quite, able to control MP with remote control and able to read all region DVD.

I'm don't know that particular motherboard firsthand, but what i noticed on the picture is that the power connecter (20 or 24pin, cant tell) may be hard to reach depending on your CPU fan (I havent seen that one). I had an issue where the cable just *barely* cleared a Zalman fan to reach the power connector. My layout is very similar to yours, and if the cable from the power supply isn't long enough you may have some issues.

Maxtor Harddisk? I don't know where you are from, but maxtor quality here is TERRIBLE (location does make a big difference I think). General consensus is that Seagate are reliable but noisy. the newer, large (500GB) western digitals are very quiet, and the Samsungs are very quiet as well. For more info you can check out http://forums.storagereview.net/ and http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/.

Just out of curiosity, why do you want an external DVD burner? Internal ones can be very cheap, faster, and you can control noise with a program like Nero's drivespeed.