Small compact, easy on the eye amp

Phate

Phate

Phate

Caporegime
Joined
1 Nov 2003
Posts
35,691
Location
Lisbon, Portugal
Hi guys,

Currently I've got a spare TV and a spare set of bookshelf speakers.

So naturally, I'm going to setup a mini system in the bedroom for some films etc :D

It's the right thing to do...so I keep telling the girlfriend :p

Anyway, I've bought a wall bracket for the TV so I can fit the TV high enough to watch comfortably when in bed. I've also got wall brackets for the 2 bookshelf speakers, I'll fit those along with the wall bracket this coming weekend.

But what I'm looking for a solution that can...

1) Run XBMC to stream HD content to
2) Drive the speakers as well
3) Small, easy on the eye as this will be in the bedroom ultimately

Does any such thing exist?

If not, a small amp that doesn't look like an amp (if possible) to drive the speakers and then I'll aquire an ATV or HTPC of some description to stream the media.

Thanks :)
Jake
 
I think there are a few things working against you here:

The need for a small HTPC outer box, which means the internals will be cramped, and so this limits the amount of space for any kind of amplifier even a space efficient switch mode T amp. Then there's the amount of power required to do a decent job of driving the speakers (head room etc if you get a bit volume happy of there's big audio peaks) and of course the heat generated on to of the thermal load from the PC itself.

None of these are insurmountable problems. But my guess is that if someone did make such a device it would cost a fortune and so have a very limited market.

Have you looked at the little T amp audio amplifiers? They're very compact and come in a range of qualities from a few tens of pounds to a couple of hundred. I'm confident that something along these lines would do nicely for audio and so allow you to look at a neat solution for streaming.
 
HTPC wise if it will just be an XBMC machine and you have a server streaming media use an acer revo for £130 or an Intel NUC.
 
Thanks for the amp suggestion, I guess one option would be (if the amp was small enough) just to simply hide it away somewhere and have just the HTPC on top of the chest of drawers the tv is above?

I was thinking about giving the Roku box a go :)
 
Thanks for all the help and suggestions, I'm working this weekend so can't input much but will keep checking :)
 
dougal1331 said:
The new NAD D3020 would tick more boxes than anything else I can think of after only one coffee...
I'm a hifi nerd so I shall have a think over the next half hour or so...
Click to expand...

Just gewgled this, really like the look of this!

Unfortunately, £400 is a bit over budget, my amp for my home theatre was less :o
 
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