HTPC for... this side of £350?

Stains · 9 Sep 2011 at 22:03

I have been wanting to build one for a little while now and getting increasingly keen on the idea. But can only really top about £350 at the moment. Would it be possible to put together a system that can handle Blu-Ray & 1080p content running through XBMC, SSD drive for operating system and all Artwork etc, and maybe a couple of Samsung F3's or something similar to give me a few TB's of storage?

Any help would be muchly appreciated. I showed Miss Stains a few YouTube vids of XBMC to show her the sort of thing i'm looking at and she likes, so think now might be a good time to go for it.

Stains

Stains · 9 Sep 2011 at 23:22

It will mainly be used for xbmc, with a bit of surfing every now and again. Just want it to run perfectly smooth.

Stains · 9 Sep 2011 at 23:45

How fast does your system boot up in?

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 00:02

Ok, thanks for that. Part of the reason why i'm leaning towards SSD as i am hearing of 15 second boot times and such. I have allowed for it in my budget so think I might just go for it.

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 00:12

any in particular you would suggest? Am i right in thinking I need to have all the artwork on the SSD too or had that sit on the HDD with the rest of my media?

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 08:47

saitrix said:
dbmzk1,

I suggest you learn how to use xbmc properly with the software to compliment it before saying its useless. If you use xbmc with a combo of sabnzbd, sickbeard and couchpotato you would find you wouldn't ever have another problem with naming, plus get other bonuses. The system I suggested is an su2300 based system which is a lot better than the atom but doesn't use much extra power, for example it idles at 23w for the whole nd22 system.

If you want fast booting then look on YouTube for openelec boot time with ssd. Though I suggest keeping with nvidia gpu's with Linux based OS's.

Any chance you could expand a little on your spec? It will be running off of Win 7 64-bit as i would rather stick with what I know (Not including Win 7 in budget btw).

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 09:41

Smaller the better mate. I am not to up on all this so excuse if it's a dumb question but when you refer to "nas/downloader box" what you mean by that?

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 13:00

Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehus. There is sooooooo many choices. Not too sure on the ND22, the poor performances on the wifi tests would be a worry and not sure I can really justify the cost of that. I don't mind something a bit bigger if I will get more for my money.

Soooo... now i'm stuck again. Can't even find a case I want!

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 13:15

Antec VERIS FUSION REMOTE BLACK any good?

Stains · 10 Sep 2011 at 18:34

Nameless_87 said:
How much are you looking to spend on the case?

The Antec s good... I myself prefer Lian Li or Silverstone

Something like Silverstone GD05 (pretty cheap)

But for almost the same price as the Antec.. you can get teh Lian Li PC-C50B (this is the one I'm getting)... just be careful on the selection of the blu-ray rom (for example, samsung is not recommended as the eject button is not compatable with the eject button of the case.

Had a little look at those and not to keen tbh. I didn't want to spend too much on a case but the Antec has me thinking again.