Building a PC...its been a while!

[Schweppy]

Since moving to mac i have completely got out of touch with the PC side of things.

I am now looking at building a Media Centre PC but can't decide if i should go small form factor (micro/mini ATX/ITX) or go standard ATX so that i have the option to upgrade.

Can the smaller Mobos take decent graphics cards?

Also any reccomendations on what to get?

I have been given a C2D 2.6ghz processor and 2gb DDR2 RAM! lol

 

[Ben^]

not the mobo you should be too bothered about, as long as it has a PCI-E 16x it will be fine. The case size would be your issue. Most of the high end cards are massive and also require around 600 watts+ over power! they get hot too so cooling can be an issue with a small case.

Id go with a cheaper gfx card, something like 8500GT (geeforce) 512mb version as that would be fine in a small case.

 

[Dink]

i've got one of these cases for my media center pc

as it shows you can have a beefy graphics card in it too

 

[Mike_182]

As far as media centre PC's go, look for something with integrated GMA950 or GeForce 9300 graphics. You don't need something external for that!

 

[koi]

check the clearance before you buy as well, couldn't get the cover on mine cause the heatsink was in the way

 

[Darren S]

Since moving to mac i have completely got out of touch with the PC side of things.

I am now looking at building a Media Centre PC but can't decide if i should go small form factor (micro/mini ATX/ITX) or go standard ATX so that i have the option to upgrade.

Can the smaller Mobos take decent graphics cards?

Also any reccomendations on what to get?

I have been given a C2D 2.6ghz processor and 2gb DDR2 RAM! lol

I would have thought both of the above would be good enough for a media centre PC.

D.