Help me spec a HTPC for a friend

MylesB89

MylesB89

MylesB89

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Hi Guys, Firstly Happy New Year & I Hope you guys had a good christmas!

Now, over the christmas period a friend of mine asked me if i would be able to spec/build him a home theater PC. Needless to say this is not my area of expertise!

He has 100s of DVDs, and wants to be able to rip these and store them digitally (which would mean a hefty amount of storage is necessary i guess!)

He already has a decent TV but would like wireless 5.1 surround sound built in to the HTPC, Is this possible without spending massive amounts?

He also wanted me to spec him 3 systems, 1 Budget (with compromises of course), 1 Hi-Spec (To give him an idea of what is out there if he had the money) and then one that fits his budget of between £300-£400.

Also, is there any software that you guys whould recommend for cataloguing his library in an aesthetically pleasing way, whilst still remaining simple to use?

Thanks! :)

Myles
 
Basic but still good...

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Better, could overclock, add a GPU and use for gaming.

Untitled_zps291f3142.jpg


Wouldn't really suggest more than these two for just HTPC use.
 
AMD build:

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD A10-5800K Black Edition 3.80GHz (Socket FM2) APU Trinity Quad Core Processor (AD580KWOHJBOX) £95.99
1 x Mach Xtreme Technology 120GB 2.5" SATA 6GB/s MX-DS FUSION SSD £81.98
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARX) £79.99
1 x ASRock FM2A75M-DGS AMD A75 Chipset (Socket FM2) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £52.99
1 x TeamGroup Xtreem LV 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TXD38G2133HC11DC01) £39.95
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020046-UK) £36.98
1 x Samsung SH-224BB/BEBE 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
1 x Zalman T1 Mini Tower Case - Black £17.99
Total : £436.46 (includes shipping : £10.50).



or a lower spec AMD build:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Mach Xtreme Technology 120GB 2.5" SATA 6GB/s MX-DS FUSION SSD £81.98
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARX) £79.99
1 x AMD A8-5500 3.20GHz (Socket FM2) APU Trinity Quad Core Processor (AD5500OKHJBOX) £77.99
1 x ASRock FM2A75M-DGS AMD A75 Chipset (Socket FM2) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £52.99
1 x TeamGroup Xtreem LV 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TXD38G2133HC11DC01) £39.95
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020046-UK) £36.98
1 x Zalman T1 Mini Tower Case - Black £17.99
1 x Samsung SH-224BB/BEBE 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
Total : £418.46 (includes shipping : £10.50).



Regards.

C.
 
 
CEUOTC said:
Or finally this:

snip
Click to expand...

The PSU won't fit in that case. Max lenght of compatible PSU is 140mm. Other than that a nice build. AMD Trinity defo the way to go.

As close to £400 as I can get.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Corsair Force Series 3 120GB SATA 2.5" 6Gb/s Solid State Drive (CSSD-F120GB3A-B) £85.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARX) £79.99
1 x ASRock FM2A75 Pro4-M AMD A75 Chipset (Socket FM2) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £59.99
1 x Silverstone Milo ML03 HTPC Case - Black (SST-ML03B) £52.99
1 x AMD A6-5400K Black Edition 3.60GHz (Socket FM2) APU Trinity Dual Core Processor (AD540KOKHJBOX) £49.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430w Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020058-UK) £38.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX) £35.99
Total : £403.93 (includes shipping : FREE).



  • Modular 140mm PSU so less cable inside the case.
  • Dual core CPU with integrated GPU. Will play media perfectly fine and only 65W TDP so cooling won't be an issue in a HTPC case.
  • Not the fastest RAM but for a media centre there's no need for it. The fast RAM really helps with iGPU performance so if gaming you'd be looking a the higher end Trinity processors anyway.
 
Good spot Shadow boxer. 20mm too long lol.

Regards.

C.
 
Last edited:
Surround sound can be done by most motherboards or a £15 sound card.

Add a blu-ray drive, they're getting cheap enough to put in and he'll probably want to rip blu-rays soon if not already.

Get as much hard drive space as you can fit in the box, I chewed through 3TB and I don't have a particularly extensive collection.

A good CPU is pointless for playback, any basic/inbuilt GPU would do the job - but for ripping and encoding them you'll want more power. I'd advise speccing the rest for a nice quiet small system with 4TB+ ideally (which would give him space for ~800-1000 DVD rips with no quality loss, or up to 3000/4000/5000 with good/fairly good/reasonable quality encoding.

How many DVDs does he have, and does he want DVD quality or would he be okay with compressed files? It would save a fair chunk on HDD space but takes more effort to encode the files - you're trading quality against storage space and ease of use (high quality = more disk space needed but faster ripping, low quality = less disk space needed but you have to encode after ripping, and you'll want to spend money on a better CPU so it doesn't take hours to encode)
 
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