Bit of advice for a Media Centre if you will

bazola · 27 Dec 2006 at 20:56

Evening all,

Been looking at building a Media Centre for my parents. I have never done this before so not really sure if i have chosen the correct components.

Would you be able to take a look at it for me and give me some pointers. I need it to be quiet with good thermal properties, overheating cant be an issue! Im not too sure about the power supply i have put on the quote.

Any advice is appreciated as this is totally new to me, and parts you would change etc.

Spec

Case - Zalman HD160 Home Theatre PC Enclosure - Silver
Power Supply - Akasa Ultra Quiet 400W Paxpower Active PFC ATX2.0 PSU - Black Nickel with Blue LED Fan
Motherboard - Gigabyte 965P DS3
Processor - Intel Core 2 DUO LGA775 E6400 2.13GHz Retail
Ram - 2GB Corsair XMS2-6400C5 DDR2 Dual Channel Kit
Hard drive - Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB ST3500630AS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM
Graphics Card - Sapphire X1600 Pro HDMI/SPDIF 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO HDTV/HDCP/DVI (PCI-Express)
Optical Drive - Pioneer DVR-111BK 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) OEM
TV Card - Hauppauge WinTV HVR-4000 Freeview/Digital Satellite TV Tuner
OS - Microsoft Windows XP Media Centre 2005 Edition - OEM - 1Pk (M93-00200)
HDMI Cable - Linx 1.2m Luxury Gold Plated HDMI Cable
Speakers - Acoustic Energy Aego M 2.1 Speakers (Black) - Retail

Thanks and best regards for 2007
:confused:

Bazola

Trigger · 27 Dec 2006 at 21:15

IMO that is waaay over-specced for a media centre PC and I think that something along the lines of this would be better not to mention cheaper and quieter:

Asus M2NPV-VM Micro ATX (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74) AMD Athlon 64 3500+ 2.2GHz (Socket AM2) - Retail £54.99
(£64.61) £54.99
(£64.61) GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) PC5300 667MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX21GB5300DC) £79.99
(£93.99) £79.99
(£93.99) Antec Fusion HTPC Case - 430HE Watt PSU £97.99
(£115.14) £97.99
(£115.14) Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB ST3500630AS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £108.99
(£128.06) £108.99
(£128.06) NEC AD5170 18x18 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
(£19.96) £16.99
(£19.96) Hauppauge WinTV HVR-4000 Freeview/Digital Satellite TV Tuner £124.99
(£146.86) £124.99
Total : £639.06

The motherboard has an on-board HDMI output, eliminating the need for a graphics card which will reduce overall heat output which will make it cooler

Obviously you need to add in your speakers and OS (I forgot

) but it will still be pretty cheap and IMO there's still too much power there :cool:

Conanius · 27 Dec 2006 at 21:21

sorry to jump on the thread, but im looking at building my first media centre pc also.

Im wanting to make it a twin tuner setup, with windows MCE.

Is it literally as simple as putting in two cards, and windows knows to record off one and allow me playback off the other?

I guess my other question after that of course, is does MCE give you the ability to transfer from HDD recordings to standard DVD format?

Deathwish · 27 Dec 2006 at 21:50

Conanius said:
sorry to jump on the thread, but im looking at building my first media centre pc also.

Im wanting to make it a twin tuner setup, with windows MCE.

Is it literally as simple as putting in two cards, and windows knows to record off one and allow me playback off the other?

I guess my other question after that of course, is does MCE give you the ability to transfer from HDD recordings to standard DVD format?

Yep, really is that easy mate just put in two tuners and install MCE. It will detect that you have two (even mentions it during setup) and it will automatically allocate a card for a recording, playback etc.

Do you mean HD recordings or just the files on the Hard drive to DVD? The recorded files are DVR-MS format (proprietary) but they can be converted using DVRMSToolbox and a program called Crunchie.

http://www.xpmediacentre.com.au/com...or/2937-arksofts-crunchie-release-v1-1-a.html

Any more questions just ask

bazola · 27 Dec 2006 at 22:06

Hi,

I would like to be able to record and watch telly at the same time. It would be good if i could record two and watch one.

Does the TV card i have chosen allow me to do that or do i need another card too?

wasnt too sure about the motherboard Asus M2NPV-VM Micro ATX that was suggested by a fellow overclocker regarding the hdmi connector. I couldnt see that listed but probably me being dumb

thanks

squiffy · 27 Dec 2006 at 22:11

Yeah think that spec is OTT as well, a dual core seems like a good idea with HD on the horizon (my 3700+ can play WMV HD without stutters but others have stated you do get missed frames on this CPU)

You don't need 2GB of RAM though
Ditch LED PSU and get one without.
That case is a bit expensive, although it looks nice.

HD & videocard seems fine.

Trigger · 27 Dec 2006 at 22:14

bazola said:
wasnt too sure about the motherboard Asus M2NPV-VM Micro ATX that was suggested by a fellow overclocker regarding the hdmi connector. I couldnt see that listed but probably me being dumb

thanks

Sorry, it actually says HDTV connector

Here. Me reading it too quick so you probably would need a graphics card depending on how you wanted to connect but that board comes with an RGB output via a little HDTV module which it comes with

feriso · 28 Dec 2006 at 01:40

Trigger said:
Sorry, it actually says HDTV connector Here. Me reading it too quick so you probably would need a graphics card depending on how you wanted to connect but that board comes with an RGB output via a little HDTV module which it comes with

Yeah but that is HD component isn;t, not SD component sockets

Gopher_By_Fende · 28 Dec 2006 at 02:37

What kind of tv inputs will you be using? ie sky, freeview, analog, freesat etc.

I only ask because if you plan to use the MCE with Sky, you cannot just plug the satellite into the DVB-S receiver, as there is no way to use your sky card. I came across this problem when i built mine, apparently there is a way to get your sky subscription working with a media center, but it involves extra cards to read your sky card and some hacking and reprogramming. (there is no Sky compatible tv card ATM) This was all above my head so i went the easy way, i used the hauppauge MCE 500 card, which is dual analog, and used a scart to comp converter to send the analog signal from the sky box to the card.

This does mean keeping your set top box and connecting the infrared emitter to it so the card can control it, but it is a much easier option, and with a second box, a multiroom subscription and the second input, you can have 2 sky channels at the same time (Sky+)

To me, the hauppauge HVR-4000 seems an odd choice as (correct me if im wrong here) it looks like you can only have one of each signal type inputted meaning you would have to have a combination of different signals to be able to record and watch different shows at the same time.

You may want to change for either the pvr-500 or a dual freeview tuner, as un less you want to mess around with various signals/boxes, this is the best way to get 2 signals at once.

I can highly recommend the pvr-500, its a great dual card and it comes with the mce remote and transiever (the box that recieves the remote signal and sends it to the box)

As for recording 2 and watching one at the same time, i seem to remember reading that MCE can handle upto three tuners, so you could get a dual card and a single card to do that, but with sky it would again need a third box and multiroom card, as well as a quad LNB (the box on you dish that recieves the signals) and you will run into the problem that the transeiver only has two remote outputs.

I agree with the other comments that it is grossly over specced, mine is running fine with a sempron 3200 skt 754 and 512 meg of ram. i would suggest saving money on the other parts and spending more on storage, i have 500 gig and im now having to try to get another drive coz i've filled it up. this is because as the mce records in uncompressed mpegs, the files are huge (on best quality you're looking at 4 gb/ph)

Anyway, as i said, if you can be more specific on what kind of signals you want to use, we'll probably be able to help you more.

Fr0dders · 28 Dec 2006 at 07:51

bazola said:
Hi,

I would like to be able to record and watch telly at the same time. It would be good if i could record two and watch one.

Does the TV card i have chosen allow me to do that or do i need another card too?

wasnt too sure about the motherboard Asus M2NPV-VM Micro ATX that was suggested by a fellow overclocker regarding the hdmi connector. I couldnt see that listed but probably me being dumb

thanks

not possible with Media Centre

it only supports 2 tuners, thus can only be tuned to 2 different programs.

Supercow · 28 Dec 2006 at 10:12

In my opinion, Microsoft Media Centre edition is pants, and much more prefer the open source products that are out, such as Media Portal, myHTPC , and the "not free but dirt cheap" TVedia

Sorry to Hijack the thread, but can someone reccomend me a good case, that takes microATX motherboards, looks damn pretty, but cost very little? (hopefully some space to put 2-3 HDD's in, 1 x PCI-e and 2 PCI's )
Can an MCE compatible IR reciever be build in any HTPC case?

Edit: Antec Fusion VS Sugo evolution at the moment

Gopher_By_Fende · 28 Dec 2006 at 14:42

I don't know about the other ones you mentioned, but i tried media portal, and i thought you got exactly what you paid for. MCE was much better IMO and very intuitive.

squiffy · 28 Dec 2006 at 15:53

Gopher_By_Fende said:
I don't know about the other ones you mentioned, but i tried media portal, and i thought you got exactly what you paid for. MCE was much better IMO and very intuitive.

I've used Media Centre and Media Portal, Media Portal is a far better front end.

Can use ffdshow DVD-Video scaling
Can ffwd and rrwd faster than 2x.
Faster music browsing
More preview/thumbnail options for pictures.

Supercow · 28 Dec 2006 at 16:11

squiffy said:
I've used Media Centre and Media Portal, Media Portal is a far better front end.

Can use ffdshow DVD-Video scaling
Can ffwd and rrwd faster than 2x.
Faster music browsing
More preview/thumbnail options for pictures.

Add auto-mounting disk images, actually, im not gonna list all the pro's .. it will just take me way too long. I really love this front end, but each to his own i guess. OP: just try it all and see what you prefer

Supercow · 28 Dec 2006 at 18:18

Riight, so... now it's between the Antec Fusion and THIS badboy.
I think I might go for the latter. I have been reading up on it quite a bit, and it seems to be an awesome case. VFD looks ace, covered front panels, up to 3 hdd's, M-atx .. and it's black!!

Please someone, help a man out and make some comments!

squiffy · 29 Dec 2006 at 00:25

Bit stuck with Media Portal

How do configure MP to search and build entire thumbnail database on my photos?

How can I configure view type as standard? ie for pictures medum sized thumbnails, and for music icons (I have downloaded album covers)

I'm sure a earlier version of Media Portal had this feature.