Hooking up an HTPC new build

Diamond7

Hi there...
I have started building an HTPC and would love some advice on linking it to SAT and terestrial TV, internet TV and radio. Apologies if this thread resembles others on here but i am still unclear on some things. Mods feel free to edit.

Basicly i have an i5-2500 CPU, and am about to buy an Asus ATX mobo intergrating onboard graphics, an extra quiet mid tower, 2x2gb RAM, wireless card and one 1TB HDD to start with moving to RAID at a later date. This will wire direct to my 37" 1080p TV

I would love to keep everything internal but price is a factor too. I see a few people mention the BGT3595, am i wrong or is this very pricy? What i need is to view and record terestrial tv and sky from our skybox. I understand i need DVB-T and DVB-S(or S2 ???), is it better or cheaper to get seperate cards or everything on one.

Can i record from the skybox or do i have to go skyplus? can i access freesat through sky and record them on the HTPC? I have no interest in HD TV unless it is no extra hastle and i wont pay sky for it(I will play and store bluray for HD experience).

I was planning to run Win7 ultimate. (i have no experience of win 7). Will this in itself provide me with a home theater interface or would i find better quality in other software or OS?

This is all new to me and i am a first timer so any advice/ criticism would be thankfully accepted...

mcgovern

Diamond7 wrote: »

Hi there...
I have started building an HTPC and would love some advice on linking it to SAT and terestrial TV, internet TV and radio. Apologies if this thread resembles others on here but i am still unclear on some things. Mods feel free to edit.

Basicly i have an i5-2500 CPU, and am about to buy an Asus ATX mobo intergrating onboard graphics, an extra quiet mid tower, 2x2gb RAM, wireless card and one 1TB HDD to start with moving to RAID at a later date. This will wire direct to my 37" 1080p TV

I would love to keep everything internal but price is a factor too. I see a few people mention the BGT3595, am i wrong or is this very pricy? What i need is to view and record terestrial tv and sky from our skybox. I understand i need DVB-T and DVB-S(or S2 ???), is it better or cheaper to get seperate cards or everything on one.

Can i record from the skybox or do i have to go skyplus? can i access freesat through sky and record them on the HTPC? I have no interest in HD TV unless it is no extra hastle and i wont pay sky for it(I will play and store bluray for HD experience).

I was planning to run Win7 ultimate. (i have no experience of win 7). Will this in itself provide me with a home theater interface or would i find better quality in other software or OS?

This is all new to me and i am a first timer so any advice/ criticism would be thankfully accepted...

As far as I know, to get Sky working, its pretty complicated and needs some extra hardware (to decrypt it etc).
Windows Media Centre on W7 is pretty good for TV, I use it myself, but its not great for movies/tv shows, compared to say, XBMC. My Movies plugin can improve it a little though.

Diamond7

Thanks for the reply Mcgovern.

I have done a bit of research since starting this thread and realise now what I wanted would not be as simple as I thaught. I think sky will be out af the question for me and it would be easier just to buy a dish, a quad LNB and a couple of DVB-s/s2 cards. The blackgold bgt3595 actually works out reasonable compaired to buying quality seperate cards.

I am nearly ready to order my initial build. I will buy everything needed to run a TV signal through it, at a later date. I will run the machine with win7 (ult) and try out XBMC as quite a few people on here recomend it.

I have plenty of research to do before buying a sat dish. I want to get freesat and Siorsat on the one dish in the future if thats possable. It will be a happy day when I can tell sky to feck off.;)

mcgovern

Diamond7 wrote: »

Thanks for the reply Mcgovern.

I have done a bit of research since starting this thread and realise now what I wanted would not be as simple as I thaught. I think sky will be out af the question for me and it would be easier just to buy a dish, a quad LNB and a couple of DVB-s/s2 cards. The blackgold bgt3595 actually works out reasonable compaired to buying quality seperate cards.

I am nearly ready to order my initial build. I will buy everything needed to run a TV signal through it, at a later date. I will run the machine with win7 (ult) and try out XBMC as quite a few people on here recomend it.

I have plenty of research to do before buying a sat dish. I want to get freesat and Siorsat on the one dish in the future if thats possable. It will be a happy day when I can tell sky to feck off.;)

No problem, I don't have sky myself so only pick up freesat, but that's enough for me, I rarely watch it anyway.
For me, when I upgraded to W7, WMC did all the channel scanning pretty much automatically.