Building the ultimate Media Centre PC?

dubstub

I'm researching into Media Centre PCs and trying to build up a list of components to base my Media Centre PC on.
Did you guys build a Media Centre yourselves, buy one pre-made, or simply add a TV tuner to your existing machine?
I want something that will look good, not just like a PC sitting beside the TV and it has to be deathly quiet!
My other requirements for the system are:

2 standard TV tuners plus (ideally) 2 HD TV tuners
300gb (at least) hard drive
AMD dual core processor
1 gig of RAM
Good quality graphics card with DVI outputs for the TV (any suggestions?)
Windows Media Centre 2005
Wireless and Ethernet networking
Sound will be sent to external amplifier and speakers so just need a sound card with decent line out (options?)
Wireless keyboard and mouse
Media Centre remote control

I'd appreciate any help you could give me with sourcing components. I'm trying to keep the cost of the system below €1500. I've never built a system before but I'm quite technical and shouldn't find it too much of a problem.
Also, I'll have the Media Centre PC in one room doing all the work. Is there a set-top box I can put in another room to link up wirelessly and play content (movies, music and recorded tv) from the Media Centre server?
It seems there is a big gap in the market for decent Media Centres and consumer electronics to keep all your media in one place and share out across the house.

8T8

Most will have been self built as pre-built Media PC's are still a little sparse when it comes to choice see these examples.

First up pick a case you want as it will be an important part of the build and what can be put in it.

HDTV tuners aren't going to do you a fat lot of good as there is no HD over the air broadcast service unless you are in the USA.

CPU wise get an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ €145 or a Core 2 Duo E4300 €165.

RAM get anything that is the cheapest 1GB DDR-2 667 €107.

GPU get could be a problem if this is to be silent as fan less cooling only available on select models. The type of case you pick will also affect the kind of GPU you can fit. Take this fan less Radeon X1600XT for €127 for instance, not great for games but will do for GPU acceleration, comes with DVI, AVIVO MCE DVD decoder and no fan means no noise.

Unless price is an issue don't bother with MCE 2005 get Windows Vista Premium as it has the new MCE & is available at the end of this month.

Wired networking will be provided via the motherboard, wireless can be gotten in internal PCI or external USB form.

At the moment the only extender for MCE is the Xbox 360 console and it only streams MCE officially supported video/audio WMV, MPEG-2, DVR-MS(recordings) LiveTV, Music MP3/WMA etc no XviD or H.264 support. There are supposedly new extenders coming down the pipe that are more AV like but no news yet.

Anyway the first step is the important one pick a case as you can then fine tune what can go into it.

Cases to peruse over;
Komplett
QuietPC
OcUK - OriginAE or Zalman
Pixmania - Silverstone
Kustom PC's

dubstub

Thanks for that, appreciate any help! The HD tuner comment is because I'll probably be hooking up Sky's HD tuner box to it in order to record HD broadcasts . You're right that I'm simply trying to future proof the system. I suppose the benefit of building the PC myself is that I can simply add in a tuner card for HD later. I'm not even sure what the output from the Sky HD box is. I imagine it's Scart so perhaps a Scart to component cable and then component inputs on the tuner card would do it?

8T8

You wont be able to record the HD output from the Sky box because;
* The Sky box outputs HD over component or HDMI
* HD Capture cards for component or HDMI cost an awful lot of money neither of which are suported by MCE or other Media Centre's I'm aware of.
* MCE does not support RGB capture so you cannot capture component video or anything better than s-video over analogue sources.
* Current HD tuners uses ATSC a signal format that is used by the USA only, Sky uses DVB-S or DVB-S2 our equivalent of over the air tuners would be DVB-T of which there are no HD services in this area.

It's not imposable to record the HD output just there are a lot of hurdles to jump.

Currently the best picture quality you can squeeze out of Sky through MCE is to get a special card DVB-S card which fools MCE into thinking it is a DVB-T card the only kind MCE currently supports you then get the pure digital standard definition signal straight into MCE more details here.

SouperComputer

Rule #1. Futureproofing an illusion. Generally it causes you to pay a premiuim for features that you wil not use and by the time you need them, it will be siginifcantly cheaper.

The ulitmate media rig, does all you want and costs as little money as possible. What to have listed up there is overkill. HD content is not common and unless you plan on buying a HD-DVD or Blue ray drive in the very near future, go for a lower spec machine. Maybe even grab some used parts, a new PSU and case and spend the rest of the money on a trip away.

If you want top mix sources, you will have to bin media centre and go with MythTV (linux) or perhaps mediaportal.

You can access content from the 2nd media centre machine by using fileshares, but you will not be able to access it through the MCE interface like you could withh an extender.

Generally, you should avoid wireless as much as you can, its only barely up to the job. It's an absolute last resort.

If you plan having a proper client/server setup that is scaleable and supports a variety of hardware MythTV is really the way to go.

Over here I have a MythTV backend capturing a raw HD stream via firewire from two Motorols DCT-6200 STB's. You cant do this cleanly with MCE.

With MythTV you can use all kinds of hardware as frontends, including Hauppages MVP, an original Xbox and of course a PC. You can buy specially designed SFF PC's for use as MythTV fronends too.

So if you plan intsalling a HD-DVD drive in this PC in the next year, then go with the spec you have, if not a P4 1.7 or above will do the job competantly. The you can get the spec you need for HD content for about 40% less cost

karltimber

Hi,

I have the Antec Overture 2 as my case but is now out of production.
But Antec have a new one here - very nice. Check for GC height etc.

I have my mce wired to my pc upstairs and works perfectly as Souper said.
When using wireless -it can stutter sometimes -depends on location and router etc.
I got the chrimping tool off ebay before xmas and made my own cables - very easy to do. Cat5 cable is very cheap and here is a tutorial on the wiring.

I had the standard remote but I got the MCE wireless keyboard and it's fantastic. Some folks do not like the pointer but you get used to it.
You do not get an IR with the keyboard so it's either buy the normal remote which comes with an IR and then the keyboard or try and get an IR separately (none on ebay at the moment :mad: )

I went with DiamondMax10 hard drives as they are very quiet - alot of mags have hd & gc "noise" articles every few months - do a search for them.
And partition your HD's also, so you can easily setup all your folders in mce and not have the hd's searching 300gb for info.

K

8T8

Sky HD box has no firewire outputs so you cannot capture HD streams like you can in the USA through that method.

That method is actually possible in MCE as well though obviously not as slick as MythTV' setup, not that it does anyone here any good

mukki

dont forget that the original xbox works as a media extender too

SouperComputer

8T8 wrote:

Sky HD box has no firewire outputs so you cannot capture HD streams like you can in the USA through that method.

That method is actually possible in MCE as well though obviously not as slick as MythTV' setup, not that it does anyone here any good

Thats one of the many reasons I made the switch to MythTV. The other problem is that you still need a tuner card to capture from firewire, and I wasnt willing to pay for them if I didnt need to.

It works very well well , I have a 15" powerbook on the wall in the kitchen for the missus.:



I just reboot my PC if I want to watch anything.

You can get a Myth frontend for windows, but I'm happy enough to reboot to enjoy all of the features. The backend sits permanently in the living room.

Its a shame the SkyHD box has no firewire.

dubstub

Cheers guys! Thanks for all the replies.

Still checking on the details but think I'll go with something like:
Cooler Master Cavalier 4 case Black Desktop w/300W PSU
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=309269

€95.00

AMD AM2 Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Mainboard, 1024MB
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=311944

€299.95

Radeon X1600Pro Graphics Card
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=323042

€104.00

Samsung 500gb Hard Drive
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=327715

€149.96

Hauppage TV Tuner
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=117285

€156.00

DVD recorder
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=325546

€35.00

Wireless networking
http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=321909

€29.00

Total

€868.91

Total ex VAT

€718.11

I'll put it through my company so I'll get the VAT back. Still have to find a decent TV/monitor about 21" for downstairs. I'll probably go with the Linux solution (or a copy of Windows Media Centre 2005 I have) for the moment until I decide if Vista is worth it or decent Media Centre Extenders come out that handle streamed DivX (for downloaded TV episodes). Also have to pick up some decent speakers for the downstairs. I've a room upstairs that'll have the main TV and surround sound system. That's where the extender will go so I can watch recorded/downloaded TV and listen to my music collection up there as well.
Still loads of research to go!

dubstub

Cheers guys! Thanks for all the replies.

Still checking on the details but think I'll go with something like:
Cooler Master Cavalier 4 case Black Desktop w/300W PSU €95.00
AMD AM2 Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Mainboard, 1024MB €299.95
Radeon X1600Pro Graphics Card €104.00
Samsung 500gb Hard Drive €149.96
Hauppage TV Tuner €156.00
DVD recorder €35.00
Wireless networking €29.00
Total: €868.91 Total ex VAT: €718.11

I'll put it through my company so I'll get the VAT back (strictly company use, of course ). Still have to find a decent TV/monitor about 21" for downstairs. I'll probably go with the Linux solution (or a copy of Windows Media Centre 2005 I have) for the moment until I decide if Vista is worth it or decent Media Centre Extenders come out that handle streamed DivX (for downloaded TV episodes). Also have to pick up some decent speakers for the downstairs. I've a room upstairs that'll have the main TV and surround sound system. That's where the extender will go so I can watch recorded/downloaded TV and listen to my music collection up there as well.
Still loads of research to go!

EDIT: I can't imagine there would be a problem with fitting a micro-ATX board into an ATX case but will it still be easy to link up the USB ports to the front of the box?

8T8

Keep in mind that Coolermaster case uses a custom size PSU should the PSU ever die you cannot use off the shelf parts.

There isn't a problem fitting mATX into ATX cases that is fine. USB ports use standard headers if the motherboard has got them then they will work in the case.

{That upgrade kit comes with the CPU & RAM also has the motherboard so you may want to buy the items separate if you already have another motherboard in mind}

That tuner wont work with MCE if you go that route they must be MCE certified like this one.



The whole TV show in XviD thing is tricky as none of the big players want to support it for obvious reasons even though it's what everyone wants. There are streamers out there from no-name vendors but usually the products are no where near as polished with often poor supporting software. What you may see first is someone adopt MPEG-4 ASP in MP4 containers which is what they should be in instead of AVI as it would only be a matter of time before the encoders switch to the MP4 container.

XviD/DivX/3viX/NeroDigital are all derivatives of MPEG-4 ASP

x264/NeroDigital AVC/Apple H.264 are derivatives of MPEG-4 AVC also known as H.264.

Microsoft may allow H.264 video playback (but it's looking slim from the latest update to the thread at Doom9) in the Xbox 360 extender.

If the Apple TV which is running PC hardware is hacked that would be a great little player to use as it has the power to handle even 720p HD encodes. The Apple TV unit actually supports MPEG-4 ASP & AVC but they are Apples own peculiar implementation of those formats so anything which actually encodes to the normal standards of those formats wont work.

dubstub

Ok, you're really making me feel like a n00b now! Didn't notice that the TV tuner wasn't compatible with MCE. I've updated to use another tuner - the dual-tuner AVerMedia M1A2 DUO MCE. Hopefully this won't be broken by Vista, when it becomes available.
I'm not worried about the integrated PSU. For the price of the case, if the PSU blows, I'll just replace the whole lot.
I'm aware that the upgrade pack includes a mainboard. I was going to buy seperately but it seems to give me all that I need and at a decent price.
The codec issue is a pain. The AppleTv player looks sweet indeed. I love the way it'll sync over wireless and then play from its internal hard drive. Hopefully someone will build in support for the standard movie formats.
It really is a minefield this whole thing. I'm suprised because it seems like such a desirable piece of kit to have in your home that you'd think some company would mass-produce linux based boxes to handle all this stuff. A good quality consumer electronic kit would sway me but you'd never have the freedom you get with a full-fledged PC.
I think I'll go ahead with the order come February. I can always swap in and out components as my needs change. I think the base system should give me all I need for now.
Thanks again!

8T8

Yup it's a bit of a mess, the tuner should be okay for Vista (just in case) as the last time I was at Avermedia's (UK) website they had Vista 32/64-bit drivers available for many of their tuners.

FYI that particular model is an OEM model not a retail unit so the drivers are on a different section of their site you'll be wanting the PAL ones of course, at the moment MCE 2005 only.

Revalco

Wow i should have looked here first, lots of cool ideas.

karltimber, where could i buy the overture 2, Komplett? or is there a retailer in Dublin that sells them? price? could suit me down to the ground

karltimber wrote:

Hi,

I have the Antec Overture 2 as my case but is now out of production.
But Antec have a new one here - very nice. Check for GC height etc.

K

Was looking at the Thermaltake Mozart w/medialab & VFD on
Komplett but HTPC's are new to me, anybody ever bought the case?

The more I look, the more I want

karltimber

when I was looking for my Overture 2 case , I could have got from Engerland but got it from Elara instead. A few quid extra.

I think the Overture range is gone -maybe I am wrong - but Elere has this one here.
It's a nice case but 194euro.
remember it's an M-atx board.

K.

Revalco

Cool, cheers for the quick reply

Will probably wait to hear back from Komplett, seems to be the better option.

Cheers,
Rev

quozl

For an alternative set of hardware, one I'm very happy with:

Commel LV675D mini-itx motherboard
Pentium M 1.86ghz

Passively cooled in a Tranquil T2e case via a heat-pipe and a 1kg aluminium heat-sink. http://tranquilpc.co.uk/

3 Analogue tv tuners, 2 on a PVR-500 and 1 on a mini-pci MPC622. They've got hardware based mpeg2 encoders supported by ivtv in Linux so only take a couple of percent CPU while encoding.

The power supply is also passive so there's no fans in the unit at all - the only moving parts are the hard-drive and the slim-line slot-loading dvd drive. Both of which were chosen for their noise levels.

Having as quiet a system as possible was my main aim. I used to have a passively cooled 1.3ghz via sp13000 using mpeg2 hardware decoding but upgraded to the Pentium M as a new project. Pentium M's are good performers clock for clock, low power usage and there's Linux support for speedstep and undervolting on the fly so very suitable for something that'll be on all the time. Also easier to passively cool than something like an athlon.

This is all running MythTV and I couldn't be happier with it. It's a setup for NTL analogue but the case/motherboard would work with digital tuner cards too of course.