Spec me a Linux MCE PC

The_KiD

The_KiD

The_KiD

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West Yorkshire
I am wanting to build a PC to use as a media centre to put in my front room.

I want it to watch DVD's, play music, get freeview etc

and cos it's going in the living room I want it to look small and sleek, it also doesnt want to be making loads ofnoise from the fans.

I am thinking of trying the Linux MCE and if thats no good, giving Windows MCE a go instead.

I dont have a figure in mind as I dont know what sort of money I should be looking at, but I am also not made of cash :)

any help?
 
Don't need a highly specced machine if you're not playing HD. A AMD 3500 Single core, 1GB RAM will be fine, onboard 6150 Nivida. That'll play SD and scale SD to HD fine (1366x768) and possibly scale upto 1080p.

I can't help with Linux, installing is easy, but installing drivers is a nightmare. Linux MCE must be installed on Ubuntu 6.10.

So considering the value of the items in the first paragraph probably looking at couple of hundred at the most. As for quiet PC get a case with 12 cm fans (less noise) The Antec NSK2400 is ok but I would just run a single fan on low. Look at Seasonic PSU's. Also consider a 2.5" if disc space and quietness is priority.

My HTPC is in a Silverstone TJ-08
 
If you want to stick to Windows, platform I would go for XP Home with Media Portal. I've tried XP MCE and don't think much of it. Vista still has the same limitations as XP MCE.
 
ok so barring the OS, what hardware should I go for?

It has been almost 5 years since I last built my own pc.
 
Depends if you want to play HD. My HTPC does everything I want it to do, with plenty of CPU power left over

Asus MATX Nvidia 6150/410
Corsair 1GB RAM
AMD A64 3700+ 2.2ghz
Scythe Ninja
60GB 2.5" WD boot drive
500GB 3.5" Samsung data drive
M-Audio Revolution 5.1
ATI X300 128 PCI-E passive videocard
Seasonic S12 PSU 430W
Silverstone TJ-08 black
MS remote control IR & receiver
XP Pro & Media Portal

Something similar but in AM2 spec, or perhaps one of the dual cores will be sufficient, unless you want loads of hard drives, PCI cards etc.

pc.jpg


Just add IR receiver/remote. If you don't need HTPC to read discs just salvage a optical drive for OS install and remove (my HTPC has no optical drive) A wireless keyboard comes in handy, checkout Keysonic

http://www.keysonic.net/pages/products/keyboards/wireless/ACK_540_RF/ACK_540_RF.html
 
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My MCE system:

Shuttle SN85G4
AMD 2800 Sempron
512mb PC3200 Ram
ATI 9250 128mb
Nova-t Dual Freeview Tuner
DVD-RW

It's a pretty good system, nothing HD, but is cheap to run, and silent. I use MS MCE, found the Media Portal slow and buggy, maybe need 1gb ram for that.
 
My old MCE05 system was a P4 2.4ghz 1GB, i865 (cost me about £70) I upgraded it to a Core2D system a while a ago, and tbh, its virtually identicle when using it, you would never know the difference.

So go for budget parts.

You used to need a decent CPU and GPU if you were planning on on viewing HD stuff, but now with a 8500/8600 GPU you can view all that stuff on a really cheap CPU.
 
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