HTPC

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14 Jul 2010
Posts
42
Hi all,

I have decided to invest a bit of money in building a HTPC, and below is my list of hardware that will be used, i want peoples opinion on whether the components will work effectively together and if the total price can be made cheaper:

Case: BitFenix Prodigy Mini-ITX Cube Case - Reason being because it is only to be used for HTPC, hence the smaller size for the case.

Storage: Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - Reason for only the OS, i have a NAS which will be used for storing and viewing from, so just need 1 disk for os and some basic software.

Motherboard: MSI Z87I Gaming AC Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard - Sounds good, but not sure if anything else is as good at that price.

Memory: Corsair Vengeance RED 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMZ8GX3M2A2133C11R) - Not much experience with RAM, but sounds good and the colour matches the case.

CPU: Intel Core i5-4590 3.30GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor- Again not much experience in knowing the detail differences, but this seems good for a HTPC.

Graphics Card: MSI GeForce GTX 760 OC Gaming Edition 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card - Seems good for multimedia HD.

PSU: Aerocool Strike-X 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply - Seems enough for the parts.

Cooler: Cooler Master V8GTS 8 Heatpipe Vapor Chamber Dual PWM Fan - Seems cool and no other reason.

I would like to know what people think and if the combination is a good one. The total approx price will be £600, if i can get this lower without compromising the performance for my purpose that would be a result.

Look forward to hearing.

Rgds.,

H
 
Hi Hussain,

Will you be gaming on this? What will it be used for exactly?

Prodigy cases require PSUs of less than 160mm depth. The Aerocool is 165mm, so would be tight.

Given you selected a locked CPU (non-K), I take it you're not looking to do any overclocking? If so, then no need for aftermarket cooler, or for an expensive Z87/97 motherboard.

Do you have the OS already?
 
This is where I'd spend the money.

Power supply is much better quality and will easily power the rig

Graphics card is cheaper for equivalent performance

Case is smaller - the Prodigy cases aren't actually that small. 250 x 404 x 359mm (Prodigy) vs 240 x 207.4 x 401.4mm (Coolermaster)

The cooler is a very good quality low profile cooler

YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 270X Vapor-X OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Card £149.99
1 x Seasonic S12II 520W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £59.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 120 Advanced Mini-ITX Case - Black £39.95
1 x Noctua NH-L9i CPU Cooler Low Profile - 92mm £34.99
Total : £294.52 (includes shipping : £8.00).

 
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I'd get a z97 over the z87 as its the new tech for about the same money and also wait for the 4690k or get the 4670k, as then you can overclock it if you need to.
As said above though its well over spec'd for movies as you can get away with a G3220 (about £40) CPU and you wont need a GPU, however if its gaming then your on the right lines
 
wow, thanks a bunch everyone for the useful feedback.

The system will purely be for watching HD content, i will need to read and digest this, as there is a lot of information :)
 
wow, thanks a bunch everyone for the useful feedback.

The system will purely be for watching HD content, i will need to read and digest this, as there is a lot of information :)

Actually, I might reconsider the option from not playing any games to playing games.

Any changes to my setup? i don't want to go over the current price of what i have.

I am looking to play emulator i.e. ps2 etc... Maybe some newish pc games.

Thanks.
 
Actually, I might reconsider the option from not playing any games to playing games.

Any changes to my setup? i don't want to go over the current price of what i have.

I am looking to play emulator i.e. ps2 etc... Maybe some newish pc games.

Thanks.

Right - so cost of the setup in you opening post is £750 or thereabouts excluding postage.

Lets see if we can't put a decent mini-itx build together for less than that.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 270X Vapor-X OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Card £149.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4590 3.30GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £145.99
1 x Gigabyte Z97N-WIFI Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £103.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £67.99
1 x Seasonic S12II 520W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £59.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan RED 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLD38G2133HC11ADC01) £53.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache WD10EZEX - OEM ** Single Platter ** HDD £52.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 120 Advanced Mini-ITX Case - Black £39.95
1 x Raijintek Zelos Low Profile CPU Cooler £15.95
1 x LiteOn IHAS124-14 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £11.99
Total : £712.42 (includes shipping : £8.00).




For less than the cost of your proposed spec we have managed to add in an optical drive and a 1Tb storage drive.

The GPU has both display port and HDMI, is cheaper and trades blows with the 760. The case is very small. The motherboard has the latest Z97 chipset. I've added a low profile cooler but you can drop that if you like and stay with the retail cooler.

The power supply is a big improvement and will easily power this rig

The above will play games well and stream media with no issues.
 
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