New HTPC Project

T

thecorwin

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Jan 7, 2009
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I’m thinking about building a new HTPC and wanted to know what you think.

Case:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154093
Motherboard:
http://www.jwele.com/motherboard_detail.php?419
CPU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103298
Memory:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227251
Disc Drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136133
CPU Cooler:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835220030
Hard Drive:
??Suggestions??

Its primary use will be HD (1080p) video playback but it will also be used for web browsing and music. I only use HDMI for video and send all the audio through the digital out. I’m not sure if I should use the IGP or if I should use hybrid crossfire and get a HD 3450. My main concern with this setup is heat. I will probably be getting a better fan for the CPU cooler and if I don’t get a video card then I will get a slot fan. Thanks in advance for all your help/suggestions.
 
1080p stuff is the only thing that will push it and that chip looks fine (though i'm not that versed in amd chips so someone else please comment if it's not)
 
nice system.. look good.. only thing id say is the 4 gigs of ram is complete over kill the odds of you even using 1 gig of ram is slim to none unless you plan to run vista on it.. if you do then 2 gigs would be perfectly fine..

cpu cooler should be perfectly fine.. my x2 be-2350 at 3ghz sits at 50C full load with the stock amd heatsink.. at stock speeds it sat at 30C full load.. since the 5050e runs the same 1.2v you should only see temps around 40C with that cooler but with the 780g chipset you should see almost no cpu usage with HD playback.. the only temp id worry about is the chipset temp.. i think when i was using my 780g chipset on my board i was seeing around 40-45C temps but i have a much better cooled case then the one your planning to use but i still see no problems with that..

should be a nice system.. enjoy..

btw if you want you could actually go with a slower CPU.. anywhere between 2.1 and 2.6ghz is perfect though.. without dxva on a 1080p x264 encode i only saw 80% cpu usage on my be-2350 at 2.1ghz.. but its all your preference depending on what you want to do with that box besides HD playback.. since it is a brisbane core they easily overclock though with out changing the voltage.. my be-2350 went to 2.6ghz with out changing anything but the FSB..
 
I figured that the CPU and 4 gigs RAM might be over kill but thats alright. Any suggestions on IGP vs hybrid crossfire? Im running my current HTPC into a Sony VPH-1272Q projector which has a max resoulution of 1600x1200p. However I still want the HTPC to be able to do full 1080p with out issue. Thanks again for the help.
 
I've got the HD3200 on my mobo as well, does 1080p just fine as long as you aren't trying to game :p
 
Id just stick with the IGP....that setup looks great, youll be pleased.
For Hard drive how much space do you need? If you dont need space, then just get something cheap like an 80gb. That what i have because all my recordings, dvd's music everything is all streamed from my server. If your gonna store stuff on here I would get WD1tb GP, or a 1.5tb seagate.
 
As far as HDD goes, I would recommend one of WD green drives.

Yes they are a bit slower, so you may not want to use it if you are going to writting a lot of HD content (DVR) to the drive, but it takes less juice, and generates a lot less heat.

the WD 1TB green drives are regularly on sale for about 100 dollars
 
For HD, I'd recommend the green version of WD's 640 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136298

It and the 1 TB version (WD10EADS) use 320+gb platters so their performance is not too bad.

If WD made a green 320gb single platter, that'd be my first choice. You could also go with a 7200rpm laptop drive - even greener. I'd only go with the laptop drive if you are not going to copy media files often to the htpc.
 
Hybrid Crossfire is strictly for gaming; it does absolutely nothing for HTPC usage and, honestly, is rather useless anyways. The 780G is more powerful then the 3450 anyways.
 
Well I think Im going to take everyones advice and go with a 1TB (WD10EADS) hard drive. Since I dont plan on gaming Im going to forget about the hybrid crossfire and get a slot fan instead. Thanks again for all the help.
 
god luck, if you are going to use VMC check out thegreenbutton.com they one of the best resources on Vista Media Center
 
thecorwin said:
Well I think Im going to take everyones advice and go with a 1TB (WD10EADS) hard drive. Since I dont plan on gaming Im going to forget about the hybrid crossfire and get a slot fan instead. Thanks again for all the help.
Click to expand...


Goto the dell small business site for WD10EADS here: http://search.dell.com/results.aspx?s=bsd&c=us&l=en&cs=04&k=wd10eads&cat=all

Add it to your cart, then apply this coupon KQ1KP7GN7?$HVZ found here: http://www.dealcatcher.com/dell-sb-coupons

You may get a WD10EADs for about $90... and a 2nd for free shipping.
 
That's pretty close to the same setup that I'm building this weekend. :D

I got the Apex MI-008 case instead and a standard DVD drive instead of Blu-Ray. I'll be using a 4850e and probably 64-bit Win XP (SP3) to drive my SageTV server. I was a big supporter of MCE, but started having DRM issues again after two years of great service, so I'm not even going to bother with VMC. I added a WD 640GB drive for local storage, and I'm thinking about converting my (incomplete) WHS to a mini-ITX build as well.
 
Well I got the case the other day and have decided to extend half of the power supply through the case. It will give me about two inches more space inside the case right above the cpu. I got the idea from the Lian Li power supply extenders (PE-01). I’m hoping that this will allow me to use a different cpu cooler. I was thinking about getting a NT01-E or something similar and trying to get it to fit in there.
 
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