Building a HTPC anything I need to know?

[jonnyboy]

I'm looking to build a PC to use in the lounge purley to play back movies and brose the web. Coupld of possibilities I'm looking at are either just transfering my main PC over into a new case or building one from scratch. Is there anything I need to know with either option? Are the cases a different standard to normal PC cases ie they need different motherboards etc?

Thanks!

 

[Revels]

Get a Mac Mini!!

 

[MickM]

If you get a mac make sure it is the new dual core, not a fan of the older minis

 

[beavis]

What formats are you looking to playback and what hardware do you have at the moment?

Your current motherboard will most likely be ATX, the other option you have is MicroATX. Cases are available for either so it depends how big you want it to be.

Take a look at Windows XP Media Centre Edition (MCE) or one of the versions of Vista with MCE.

The most important thing is noise, and therefore cooling - plan to pay a bit more than you would for a normal desktop.

 

[ChavyBoy]

I have built my own and a Dual core processor is a must. SATA II drive is also a must. I have my operating system on a sepearte disk and the recordings on the SATA II disk. ALot of people buy a motherboard with SATA II raid and use the drives in an array configuration for higher read write performance.

Also at least 1gb of DDR2 ram if not higher.
You will also need a sound card that will output in Dolby 5.1.

Also I use a micro ATX board (ASUS) which has built in Hi Def video and Dolby 5.1 sound.

Hope this helps.

 

[cava83]

I have some excellent Acer Media centers for sale if you want

 

[jonnyboy]

depends what case they are in gabi if its in a 19" wide dvd player type format try me

PS I dont do MACs!

 

[MickM]

You can install wundows on the mac jonnyboy, incase you didnt know.

 

[Ex-User (19928)]

You can install wundows on the mac jonnyboy, incase you didnt know.

Why buy a Mac to run windows though ??

No upgradability etc.

 

[MickM]

Very small limited space? dunno not much point tbh