Spec me HTPC

BigBrisy

BigBrisy

BigBrisy

Associate
Joined
12 Mar 2003
Posts
304
Location
Glasgow
Hello folks

Looking to build a HTPC, its gonna sit inside my TV unit so looking for a nice case such as the Antec Fusion, quite happy to go with the onboard graphics on the mobo as i plan to stick a gfx card in it later and also add a blu-ray drive, ideally i'd like a mobo that gives me plenty of upgrade options like sticking a quad core processor in it at a later date......looking to spend £350, any pointers would be appretiated.

what i thought would be a good set up.....

Maxtor Diamondmax 21 250GB SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM (STM3250310AS) £32.99 (£38.76)
Antec Fusion Black HTPC Case - 430HE Watt PSU £104.99 (£123.36)
Abit Fatal1ty F-I90HD ATI Micro ATX (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £57.99 (£68.14)
Intel Core 2 Duo E6550 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.33GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £93.99 (£110.44)
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) £20.99 (£24.66)
Pioneer DVR-215DBK 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99 (£19.96)

Sub Total : £327.94

Shipping : £9.95
VAT : £59.13
Total : £397.02
 
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People on here generally tend to stay away from Maztor HDDs. I've not personally heard any nasty stories myself but the general feeling is that they're not as reliable as the WD and Seagate ones. If you wanna be safe then go for one of them.

Oh and for the CPU, whilst there's nothing at all wrong with the E6550, you could save yourself quite a bit of cash by going for the E2200 or the E2180 unless you plan on doin some pretty intensive cpu operations. Heck if you even get a half decent cpu fan you could clock it up to the 6550 speeds. The only thing you'd be losing out on though would be the cache, although how valuable you think that is is intirely up to you :)
 
thanks for the input guys, if i was gonna cut costs i think i would maybe opt for a different cae, although i like the VDU on this case i dont honestly know ow much i'd use it, as far as the cpu goes i would like to keep it pretty powerful as i wouldn't wanna upgrade it for sometime.

Antec NSK2480 MATX Desktop Case Black & Silver - With 380W EarthWatts PSU
Intel Core 2 Duo E6550 2.33GHz (1333MHz) Socket 775 4MB L2 Cache OEM Processor
OCZ 2GB Kit (2x1GB) DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 CL 5-6-6-15 Value Series Memory
Pioneer DVR-215DBK 20X SATA DVD±RW DL Int Black - OEM
Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H GeForce 7100 Socket 775 onboard VGA 8 channel audio mATX Motherboard
Seagate ST3250310AS 250GB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 8MB Cache - OEM

Could get the above for about £290?
 
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For a bit more you can get a much better set already able to play Blue-Ray discs as the on-board gfx on the mobo does all the decoding.

Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H AMD 780G Micro-ATX (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H AMD 780G Micro-ATX (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £59.99
(£70.49) £59.99
(£70.49)
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ 2.20GHz (Socket AM2) - Retail AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ 2.20GHz (Socket AM2) - Retail £33.99
(£39.94) £33.99
(£39.94)
Pioneer BDC-202BK 5x BD-ROM + 12x12 DVD±RW Serial ATA Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) - OEM Pioneer BDC-202BK 5x BD-ROM + 12x12 DVD±RW Serial ATA Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) - OEM £72.99
(£85.76) £72.99
(£85.76)
Antec Fusion Black HTPC Case - 430HE Watt PSU Antec Fusion Black HTPC Case - 430HE Watt PSU £104.99
(£123.36) £104.99
(£123.36)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 750GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST3750330AS) Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 750GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST3750330AS) £86.99
(£102.21) £86.99
(£102.21)
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) £20.99
(£24.66) £20.99
(£24.66)
Sub Total : £379.94
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £68.41
Total : £459.30
 
I take it the gigabyte board doesn't have a HDMI socket, not that it matters really, could just connect it to my tv using the VGA socket
 
This is my latest options for the HTPC build, what do you think? bearing in mind i'll be putting a gfx card and a blu-ray drive in at a later date are these parts a good choice? gonna order tomorrow so i'll need to make my mind up soon.

Antec NSK 2480 Desktop Case - 380W Earth Watts PSU £57.99 (£68.14)
Intel Core 2 Duo E6550 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.33GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £93.99 (£110.44)
Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H GeForce 7100 Micro-ATX (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £43.99 (£51.69)
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) £20.99 (£24.66)
Western Digital Caviar SE16 250GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD2500AAKS) £37.99 (£44.64)
Pioneer DVR-215DSV 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Silver) - OEM £15.99 (£18.79)

Sub Total : £270.94
Shipping : £9.95
VAT : £49.16
Total : £330.05
 
as far as i can see the mobo i have choosen has HDMI and can play HD too, Always been an Intel man too so gonna stick with Intel board, even if the mobo aint that clever with playing HD stuff i'll be getting a GFX card later on hopefully...was more looking for some pointers if this mobo and processor will do the job for me when that time comes :D
 
Only the current AMD 780G chipset will truly play HD content back by tacking the load off the CPU, the one you've chosen now will still put a load on the CPU and you might get dropped frames.

As Acid Hell has said, at the moment go the AMD route for a HTPC, it's the better all round package.
 
thinking off adding the following graphics card to help out with the HD stuff and for playing games on, cant grumble at it for under £50:D

Asus ATI Radeon EAH3650/HTDI/256M HD 3650 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail
 
BigBrisy said:
thinking off adding the following graphics card to help out with the HD stuff and for playing games on, cant grumble at it for under £50:D

Asus ATI Radeon EAH3650/HTDI/256M HD 3650 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail
Click to expand...

But for that price you could buy a blue ray drive and be fully hd ready.
 
Can you post a spec you would get if you had £300 - £350 to spend please AcidHell, will be interesting to have a look at my options
 
Slightly over budget and basically the same as someones already posted.
1679_Untitled.jpg


If you want a htpc I would go amd, if you want to play games then intels better. But how many games are you going to play on a htpc?
 
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it certainly is gonna be used more for movies but i'd occasionaly play some games on it, used to be a CS geek so i'd probably stick CS Source on every now and then for a laugh. Will need to think over this more now...you've got me thinking even more now AcidHell, thanks though for giving me your opinions...appretiaited;)
 
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