Some advice please.. (1 Viewer)

[leemarkadams]

Hello there, looking to get a Media centre PC for the lounge and have seen the Advent models in PC World starting from £699 (I think) Now I know they are not the best in the world, but they are all up and running and complete with wireless keyboard, OS etc…

However I have an old (ish) system in the loft that I no longer use and the specs are as follows:

Normal Tower case
P4 2.8GHz CPU
Unsure as to the motherboard spec…
1 Gig RAM
200 Gb HDD
128 mb Geforce 4 Ti Gfx card
DVD Writer drive
Running Win XP

What would be the minimum I would need to add to that system to get a Media Centre style PC using MP.

I was thinking of:

TV in and out card (s)
Some remote keyboard/remote controllers (like the Win Media Edition remotes)
A decent case to blend in more…and be quieter…
PVR and recording software
FM radio card


Any advice greatly appreciated, such as do I need XP Media Edition, and what TV card should I get, can I get an MCE style remote and remote keyboard etc...

Thanks

Lee

 

[Callifo]

The windows media centre remotes are ideal for MP so go with one of those.

A newer graphics card would be of some benefit too, better connectivity options and dx9 compliance.

Youll find that a lot of analogue hardware cards come with FM radio built in so you wont need a seperate card. A Hauppauge PVR-150MCE is recommended, or a PVR-500MCE if you want dual tuner. You havent mentioned if your location uses digital or analogue tv so....

You dont need XP MCE05, Windows XP SP2 (home/pro) is sufficient.

 

[leemarkadams]

Thanks for that, where is the best place to get an MCE remote?

Lee

 

[Callifo]

Cant help you with that unless you live in Oz.

 

[Marcusb]

Tell us your location and most likely someone will have suggestions.
For me the best place is a shop in Melbourne (aus) but that may not be of any benefit to you...

Go for the european model too. The US one is missing four very useful buttons down the bottom.

 

[leemarkadams]

Sorry, should have said, i live in the UK...

Lee

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

Hi Leemarkadams

Got my MCE remote and keyboard from ebay, max you should pay is £35 for remote including Postage if you want the dogs dinner with the MCE keyboard £80 including postage again the only problem i can see with your existing system is a cheap graphics upgrade to a FX5200 DX9 compatible card and a dvb-t tuner most are alright the biggest complaint is how crap the software is with them. went for duo card cos borderline freeview area but so far so good but not a hardware mpeg card saying that have no problems recording whilst surfing internet or emailing with the setup ive got.

Ray 8)

Lifeview DVB-T duo Athlon xp2800 1GB pc2700 FX5200

 

[Nemulate]

Hauppage PVR 150MCE TV Card comes with MS Media Center remote as does the other Hauppage MCE editions I think!

 

[Callifo]

Hauppage PVR 150MCE TV Card comes with MS Media Center remote as does the other Hauppage MCE editions I think!

Positive about that? Distributor for Aus that I queried about that said the MCE part meant it was a system integrators pack and came with nothing but the card and a cardboard box (and thats exactly what I got). One advantage over a non-mce is it came with an FM radio though.

 

[Nemulate]

Well this one did as I brought it! It even came with FM module which wasn't advertised so maybe it was a mistake!

http://uk.insight.com/apps/productpresentation/index.php?product_id=HAUOA04JS1&nbs_search=K=pvr+150