HTPC Build

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14 May 2008
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136
Pretty much I want to be able to play my 1080p films and MAME etc~ and to be quiet

Atm i have media on my external usb 3TB drive but i think i would prefer it all in one location so was thinking of 2x2tb harddrives and use the external for backups.

This is what i guessed tbh for specs and want to make it cheaper but still have great performance.

Mobo- Gigabyte GA-MA78LMT-US2H, AMD 760G, AM3, PCI-E 2.0, DDR3 1866/1333, SATA 3Gb/s RAID, mATX, VGA

PSU- 380W Antec EA 380D EarthWatts Green, 80 PLUS Bronze, 82% Eff', EPS 12V, 80mm Fan, ATX12V v2.3

HDD- (2x)2TB Samsung HD204UI/Z4 Spinpoint F4EG, SATA 3Gb/s, 5400rpm, 32MB Cache, 8.9ms, NCQ

GPU- 1GB Asus GT 430, 40nm, 1600MHz GDDR3, GPU 700MHz, 96 Cores, D-Sub/ Dual Link DVI-I/ HDMI

RAM- 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair DDR3 XMS3, PC3-10666 (1333), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 8-8-8-24, 1.65V

CASE- Silverstone Milo ML03B Micro ATX, Black, Slim/HTPC Case with USB3 w/o PSU (ATX)

CPU- AMD Athlon II X3 460, Triple Core, S AM3, 3.4GHz, 1.5MB Cache, 95W, Retail


Total
£409.06

Now this was all from the one vendor

So what can i get away with making this cheaper Should i get the hdd later and get an SSD for OS etc and use external for now or 2hdd and use a usb live boot for now till i get an ssd =z Would prefer to spend around £400 tops any help would be great think mobo might need downgrading only need/want 2 ram slots and not 4
 
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going for coolermaster 330/335/340 case + AMd lllano build + corsair 430W PSU + 2gm value ramwill come to around £400

id prefer to spend mroe on stuff inside than the actual case but im able to hide away a mid tower pretty easily.

APU on par to gt430, better than x3 and will produce less heat/use less power.
 
i assume you already have a SATA DVD or blu-ray drive somewhere since you havent listed one on the spec

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Llano A8-3850 2.90GHz (Socket FM1) APU Processor (AD3850WNGXBOX) £113.99
1 x MSI A75MA-G55 AMD Hudson D3 (Socket FM1) DDR3 Llano MIcro-ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Cooler Master Silencio RC-550 Silent Tower Case - Black £67.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA-II 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARS) £58.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 ATX '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUKV2) £36.98
1 x OCZ Special OPS 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3SOE1600LV4GK) £31.99
Total : £396.94 (includes shipping : £12.50).

there is a huge lack of HTPC cases at OcUK, so this quiet case is the best i could do
 
OcUK used to do the Antec Fusion Remote Black. A great little media case which came with a remote. No need for wireless keyboards and mice.

An A6 would do for 1080p output if you wanted to save ££.

£130 :eek:
way more than i would pay for it myself, but it certainly looks like a good HTPC case

YOUR BASKET
1 x Antec Fusion Remote HTPC Case - Black £129.98
1 x AMD Llano A6-3650 2.60GHz (Socket FM1) APU Processor (AD3650WNGXBOX) £95.99
1 x MSI A75MA-G55 AMD Hudson D3 (Socket FM1) DDR3 Llano MIcro-ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA-II 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARS) £58.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 ATX '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUKV2) £36.98
1 x Corsair Value 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low Voltage Dual-Channel Kit £23.98
Total : £432.91 (includes shipping : £12.50).
 
Aye OC used to have a nice selection, kinda why i was going for a different case that fits in well with my set up well any black case that fits in would be nice. Looked at llano builds but not to sure about future proof of them myself. Was gonna have the htpc going through my amp on hdmi aswell.
 
The Llano chip has some good graphics power behind it for onchip graphics. You can also use hybrid crossfire later on down the road if more graphics power is needed with either a 6570* or 6650*.
* recommended combo's see here

way more than i would pay for it myself, but it certainly looks like a good HTPC case

Yeah it is a bit pricey, used to be cheaper on OcUK though. Its on my list of things to get next month :)
 
Have you considered AMD Zacate at all? Not as powerful at AMD Athlon II X3 or Llano but has integrated GPU so will save you a bit of money there. Also they run very cool and are very power efficient. Will be fine for playing back 1080p video (can't comment on MAME however). OcUK's selection of HTPC cases is virtually none-existent. That Silverstone case looks good for the money. I was considering it a while back but was out of stock then unfortunately so went with something else. Regarding temperatures, Athlon II will get considerably warmer than Zacate. My HTPC is of a similar size to the Silverstone one and it gets pretty warm in there in this weather. (Athlon II X2 240 & passive Radeon HD5450). CPU idles at 35-40ºC and the 5450 at 55-60ºC! SSD is a luxury item, I have the Crucial M4 64GB in mine and it's great. Boots into XBMC in about 12s. Personally I could make do without it happily but it is nice to have. Maybe add this in later? Will you be running a linux distro or Windows 7? Other than considering Zacate, the rest of the system looks spot on! Not sure if I'm allow to mention this...but if you head over to AVforums they have some pretty long threads on HTPCs built around AMD Zacate sytems.
 
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Gotta go for Llano over Zacate for the extra grunt I'd think.

I'd disagree. :D Depends on what is important for the OP. For a pure media solution to stream and play HD content Zacate is perfect! Looking at the OPs sig it seems he/she already has a main (gaming) system and doesn't really need the extra power (not to forget heat, noise, electricity bills)! :p
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte GA-E350N-USB3 Zacate with HD6310 iGPU - AMD Fusion (ITX) £119.98
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA-II 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARS) £58.99
1 x Samsung SH-B123L/BSBP 12x BluRay ROM / 16x DVD±RW Lightscribe SATA-II Optical Drive - Black (OEM) £49.99
1 x OCZ Agility Series 30GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-1AGT30G) £46.99
1 x Lian Li PC-Q07I Mini-ITX Case - Blue £44.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 ATX '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUKV2) £36.98
1 x OCZ Gold 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low-Voltage Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3G1333LV4GK) £23.99
Total : £393.91 (includes shipping : £10.00).



OR

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Llano A8-3850 2.90GHz (Socket FM1) APU Processor (AD3850WNGXBOX) £113.99
1 x MSI A75MA-G55 AMD Hudson D3 (Socket FM1) DDR3 Llano MIcro-ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Fractal Design Arc Mini Tower Case - Black £66.98
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA-II 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARS) £58.99
1 x Samsung SH-B123L/BSBP 12x BluRay ROM / 16x DVD±RW Lightscribe SATA-II Optical Drive - Black (OEM) £49.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 ATX '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUKV2) £36.98
1 x OCZ Gold 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low-Voltage Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3G1333LV4GK) £23.99
Total : £437.92 (includes shipping : £12.50).



OR


YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-2100 3.10GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £91.99
1 x Fractal Design Arc Mini Tower Case - Black £66.98
1 x MSI H67MA-E35 Intel H67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Micro-ATX Motherboard - (Sandybridge) **B3 REVISION** *WITH FREE MSI GRENADE* £59.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB SATA-II 64MB Cache - OEM (WD20EARS) £58.99
1 x Samsung SH-B123L/BSBP 12x BluRay ROM / 16x DVD±RW Lightscribe SATA-II Optical Drive - Black (OEM) £49.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 ATX '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUKV2) £36.98
1 x OCZ Gold 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low-Voltage Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3G1333LV4GK) £23.99
Total : £403.92 (includes shipping : £12.50).

 
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