£1000 media PC spec

gazza0371 · 13 Apr 2008 at 22:18

Advice appreciated on spec, mainly regarding mobo, gfx and sound, for a media PC for maximum of £1000 - my thoughts so far:

- Quiet is important
- Ideally based around Zalman HD160XT case
- I already have the following that will go into the PC from another system: 4GB of Corsair DDR2 and Hauppauge Nova-500 tuner, Vista Ultimate license (not part of £1000 budget)

Main use of PC will be for connecting to a LCD TV for freeview and DVD, etc. Also plan to link in to my music system for playback. Probably use for a bit of surfing, but keyboard/mouse needs to be compact and easily tucked away.

I'm not too bothered about Blu-ray, so DVD R/W will be fine for the moment and I can upgrade to Blu-ray later.

Thoughts, comments ?

gazza0371 · 14 Apr 2008 at 07:09

Thanks for the quick responses - I had a feeling that some might say overkill, so wanted to guage that - it has been crossing my mind whether to spec it down a bit and save the extra money towards the new TV.

@crazyDAJT,
Vista is a retail copy, so can happily use it on a new box. Also, I'm not planning on HD yet, but the system must be capable of either running it or a very minor upgrade (i.e. I don't want to have to replace the thing when I go HD).

The aim is to not store too much on the box itself in terms of DVDs, music, etc, but to use network storage and to stream it as appropriate, and maybe just use a small amount of local storage as a cache - I want to use N wireless if possible for most of it.

So, from what I can tell, the general feeling is that you don't need a monster of a spec for a media PC; AMD and onboard graphics/HDMI is fine ?

@DingleBerry, by C2D I assume you mean Core 2 Duo ? If so, what one would you recommend for a media PC and appropriate mobo?

gazza0371 · 14 Apr 2008 at 09:10

@fobose - so I'm hearing Xbox 360 fromyuor corner ;-)

It was something that I thought about, but in the end I prefered the idea of building a custom system - doesn't necessarily make financial sense, but that's just me !

@hp7909 - what price point is the 4850e expected to come in at ?

gazza0371 · 14 Apr 2008 at 14:11

TBH, I'm re-thinking and might drop down to the HD160+ case - save myself close to £200 and spend that on a better TV. It seems a bit excessive to have the case cost as much as what is inside it (but it does look nice!).

Anyone know when the AMD 4850e is due on the shelves so to speak ? It sounds ideal for a quiet system

gazza0371 · 14 Apr 2008 at 18:29

Cases....Hmm, choices, choices....

Back on the internals for a bit - anyone know an ETA for the 4850e? That sounds (no pun intended) good to help keep the noise down.

Also, CPU coolers; the processor socket looks pretty close to the memory slots and have been reading about problems with some coolers fitting to the micro-ATX boards. Any views on quiet coolers that would fit ?

gazza0371 · 15 Apr 2008 at 07:01

Thanks for the advice all - decision is currently:

Pioneer DVR-215DBK 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - £19.96
Samsung SpinPoint F1 750GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD753LJ) - £78.71
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ 2.20GHz (Socket AM2) - £41.11 - might wait for the 4850e is it is going to be around in the next few weeks
Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H AMD 780G Micro-ATX (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £62.26
Zalman HD160+ Aluminium HTPC Case - Silver £199.74
Akasa AK-392 CPU Cooler (Socket AM2) £29.36
Akasa Ultra Quiet 400W Paxpower Active PFC ATX2.2 PSU - £41.11

So that's £485 inc VAT and delivery

I'm going to try it on my wireless and then make a decision on whether to go for more internal storage or wired LAN.

Thanks everyone for your help, I think you saved me a heap of money

gazza0371 · 16 Apr 2008 at 23:19

hp7909 said:
Don't think that can handle a Dual-Core processor Besides, you'll find because of the fan size it will be loud

Recommend you have a look at the Zalman range (here) in particular CNPS8700. Should fit fine in the HTPC case & run much quieter

Looks like those coolers will cover one of the RAM slots, which will be a pain for me as I want to use 4 GB from another rig so will use all slots.

gazza0371 · 17 Apr 2008 at 07:37

I think the problem is that on the AM2 board that the processor socket is much closer to the DIMM slots - interesting the RAM in the picture is similar physically to the type I will be using so at least I can now judge a bit better.