Please Spec Me A Budget HTPC

Morphosis · 10 Jul 2012 at 14:39

Hi All,

Bit out of touch with this after being out the scene for a little while.
I'm looking to build a HTPC for my front room under a 42" Plasma TV.

Needs to be:-

1) Fairly quiet
2) PVR recording FreeSat and FreeView channels to HD, then archive to NAS
3) Able to play DVD rips from NAS

Looking for a budget system but does not necessarily need to be completely the bottom of the scale.

Many thanks in advance for any help and advice! :-)

Gav_881 · 16 Jul 2012 at 13:15

N40L microserver with a 5450/6450 and a freesat card.

Would recommend minimum 4 Gb of ram to run win7 64 and you can dispense with the nas as it will hold 4 3.5" drives.

jamesfreddie · 16 Jul 2012 at 20:03

Gav_881 said:
N40L microserver with a 5450/6450 and a freesat card.

Would recommend minimum 4 Gb of ram to run win7 64 and you can dispense with the nas as it will hold 4 3.5" drives.

Can't really thing of a better option than above.

Gav_881 · 16 Jul 2012 at 20:20

BTX i think the N40L states EEC ram only but i had XMS3 in it running fine, max clock for the ram is 1333 though so dont break the bank and get 2000Hz stuff as it would be a waste.

Oh and price wise the N40L comes in at about £130-50 after the cashback offer.