HTPC Vs Xbox 360

mythrandyr

mythrandyr

mythrandyr

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Hi guys,

I was wondering which would make the better multimedia machine for gaming, watching dvd's etc...

an Xbox 360 which is what i use now or a budgetted HTPC (no more than £600 ideally, under £500 would be more than ideal but would be a streatch)? it does'nt need to have overclocking potential etc... just good enough, standard components that allow for good gaming. It does'nt need to be anything like a core 2 quad or I7.

I've already took the liberty of scanning OCUK for eligable components but i've never built a HTPC before and dont know if i would require any specialist components such as video cards but this is what i came up with:

92479468.jpg


let me know what you think,


Myth.
 
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exactly shinester, thats why i am tempted to scrap the 360 for a HTPC. The main focal points of the HTPC system will be the graphics, hard drives and CPU. It's the only time in recent years that i have considered using an Athlon X2 in favour of an intel for gaming and i want a nice, beffy graphics card, i won't use onboard sh*te. I have the lan sorted out but i am not certain if i would need a tv card or if i can use a graphics card such as that one for purposes of sending/recieving TV signals and providing sound. Like i say, i have never built a HTPC before so i don't know what the crack is, but how much different from a standard pc can they be anyway?
 
I've also been mulling over the same dilemna, the only difference would be I would be using my current PC as the HTPC after I buy a new one. The main point I've been thinking about is the number of games you could play with more than one player on one PC. I don't think you can play split screen on many FPS PC games!

PK!
 
I'd go with the HTPC, a lot more versatile. It depends on if you were wanting to play lots of console games. You could set up a 360 as a media center extender in your network though.
 
More info is needed methinks. My Vista HP htpc allows me to watch ripped dvds across the network (.vob files). A 360 extender will not allow this for copyright reasons, so that's a negative imho.
A 360 acts as an extender only if another pc/server/whatever is actually switched on and is sharing its media files.
Most folk use an htpc to watch tv (amongst other things), so the main difference between a htpc and a regular pc is really the tv card, because most motherboards nowadays come with HD audio/video onboard anyway. Then you have the form factor. htpc cases try to look like a hi-fi separate kind of deal so it camoflauges well with your other equipment, but you already know that seeing as you've picked out a Silverstone ;)
 
The huge problem with the 360 is the noise the thing makes and the heat it kicks out! Saying that, with that CPU/GPU, may be hard to keep the noise down? Really distracting if the sound system can't be turned up for whatever reason. I've just built one myself for pretty much that reason. Well, that and I can archive everything on there, CD's, DVD's etc.

Oh and Blu-ray can be added for around £60 if the hardware supports it, big plus if you want it.
 
Ive been using my 360m as a Media Centre for best part of a year now.
The main thing that annoys me is that TVersity has been hit and miss recently requiring reboots in order to get it working.
The Xbox was recently replaced with an elite, and Im still thinking of making a HTPC, I see it as being so much mroe convenient, wel that and I can probably slap in a nice chunk of storage.

Im also stuck with HDDVD on teh 360, dont get me wrong nothing wrong with the format and mroe than happy with the discs I have but there are some blue rays that have caught my attention and I would like these blueray readers are getting damn cheap now.

I wouldnt be using a cpu as expensive as you've selected and from what I've read a half decent o/b gfx should be able to cope with 1080/720 fine.

Was looking at the lascala and the antec fusion case wise, the one thing that has put me off tho is I cant find a half decent touchscreen, part of the niggle with the 360 is needing the TV on to play music, would be nice to be able to do this with a touchscreen.


LostPhil said:
The huge problem with the 360 is the noise the thing makes and the heat it kicks out! Saying that, with that CPU/GPU, may be hard to keep the noise down? Really distracting if the sound system can't be turned up for whatever reason. I've just built one myself for pretty much that reason. Well, that and I can archive everything on there, CD's, DVD's etc.
Oh and Blu-ray can be added for around £60 if the hardware supports it, big plus if you want it.
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In all honesty if your streaming media across to the 360 then there should be no added noise, unless your using a TV that wont go past 5 on the volume then you'd be fine.
I've watched a lot of media thru the 360 using TVersity, Movies , Docus and TV shows and of course there have been quiet points, never noticed the 360 being that loud to distract from whats being watched tbh.
 
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the lack of codec support took the wind of of my 360 mc ideas :( AFAIK vob files work if you remove the encription. I bloody hope so other wise ripping my dvd collection is going to be pointless and the 360 will be sold

PS3 has media centre wotsits too, anyone got any info if its any good? I heard it was.
 
[TW]Taggart;13706789 said:
the lack of codec support took the wind of of my 360 mc ideas :( AFAIK vob files work if you remove the encription. I bloody hope so other wise ripping my dvd collection is going to be pointless and the 360 will be sold
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Problem is you cannot perform the 'dvd library' hack on a 360 like you can windows vista mce, (which allows you to actually have a dvd library). You can rip to avi i believe or some other format, but i prefer the full dvd content etc so i use anydvd and stick to my htpc.
 
~Divine~Wind~ said:
In all honesty if your streaming media across to the 360 then there should be no added noise, unless your using a TV that wont go past 5 on the volume then you'd be fine.
I've watched a lot of media thru the 360 using TVersity, Movies , Docus and TV shows and of course there have been quiet points, never noticed the 360 being that loud to distract from whats being watched tbh.
Click to expand...

Good point, a lot of it is the optical drive although the fans are far from silent when/if they do kick in. Could never stream media to it due to the setup I had (Vista/Mcafee wouldn't play ball) so I can't say either way in that regard.

Watching DVD's would be affected, however, and was implied in the post.
 
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