Ready to buy this HTPC..

[fobose]

I have been after a cheap HTPC for some time now. I have had various specs over the last few months but I am ready to buy this now. It will be used for bluray / 1080p across the network and I already have vista HP ready to be installed on it

Is there something I am overlooking? The mobo I have chosen seems highly rated here which is why I chose it (rather than going for yet another asus board to add to my collection).

AMD Athlon X2 5050e Socket AM2 45W Energy Efficient Retail Boxed Processor

Scythe Mini Ninja Socket 478/775/754/939/940/AM2 Heatpipe Cooler

Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H 780G Socket AM2+ onboard VGA 8 channel audio mATX Motherboard

Corsair 4GB Kit (2x2GB) DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 XMS2 Memory Non-ECC Unbuffered CL5 Lifetime Warranty

Western Digital WD3200AAKS 320GB SATAII 16MB Cache 7200 RPM - OEM

Antec NSK 2480 MATX Desktop Case Black & Silver - With 380W EarthWatts PSU

Sony BDU-X10S Blu-Ray BD-ROM SATA Black Internal - Retail Box with Cyberlink Software

Newlink Gold Plated HDMI to HDMI Cable 2m

Total: £348.37

An added note, I going to connect this up to the family TV using HDMI, and expect the sound to work through the HDMI cable.

 

[freddie64]

Should be a good HTPC. The only thing i would add is a bigger hard drive for storage, but if your running it on a network you should be fine.
Also the sound should be ok through the hdmi cable.

Good luck with the build.

 

[fobose]

I have all my media stored on my main PC, which is always left on so its kinda the media source in my house. If I add a TV tuner to this HTPC later on, I am hoping I can record across the network to my main PC (I could with my old nebula card but thats not supported in vista x64). If not I guess I could add a cheap 1TB drive, or re-use an old 300GB drive I have lying around.

I would have opted for a smaller HDD if I could, but for only a few more quid I can get a slightly bigger drive, and with 16MB cache rather than 8MB.

Can anyone else see any problems with this build? I did want to go down the intel route, but it bumps the price up quite a bit. AMD still seems the best way forward for a HTPC. I am also planning on running the CPU passive with the mini ninja aswell to keep noise levels down!

Blast, the 5050e has just gone out of stock. I will have to go for the 4850e instead (about £3 cheaper).

 

[fobose]

Even worse, the gigabyte board has just gone up £9, which makes the setup only £30 cheaper than the Intel spec I had came up with prior to it.

For peace of mind, I would rather go with Intel, its only £30 more after all. This is the mobo/cpu combo I am thinking of

ASUS P5Q-EM iG45 Socket 775 onboard VGA 8 channel audio mATX Motherboard
Intel Pentium Dual Core E5200 2.5GHz Socket 775 800FSB 2MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor

Total (with same conponents as before except cpu/mobo) £380.17

What do you guys think? AMD or Intel on this one?

 

[fobose]

I have dropped the bluray drive as .mkv files across the network are going to be the main use, I have also dropped the WD hard drive as I have sourced a 1 year old 250GB Maxtor drive thats very quiet and is pretty quick (taken from parents PC).

I am going to be using a wireless keyboard that I have which has a built in mouse "joystick" to start with, and might get something better at a later date. I would really appreciate some more input before I take the plunge and buy this.

ASUS P5Q-EM iG45 Socket 775 onboard VGA 8 channel audio mATX Motherboard
Corsair 4GB Kit (2x2GB) DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 XMS2 Memory Non-ECC Unbuffered CL5 Lifetime Warranty
Intel Pentium Dual Core E5200 2.5GHz Socket 775 800FSB 2MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor
Scythe Mini Ninja Socket 478/775/754/939/940/AM2 Heatpipe Cooler
Antec NSK 2480 MATX Desktop Case Black & Silver - With 380W EarthWatts PSU
LiteOn LH-20A1S 20X SATA DVD±RW DL & Ram Black Bare Drive - OEM
Newlink Gold Plated HDMI to HDMI Cable 2m

Total £306.51 inc p&p

What would you change and why?