My New HTPC

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Well, here are some early shots of my custom "built-from-scratch" HTPC:

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[Adam]

Dual blu-ray/HD-DVD drives? Sweet!

How are you liking it?

 

[Warpdrv]

Holy Schnikeys !!! It looks like a Classe' preamp/amp...

Totally cool buddy... Nice Job

So what OS are you running it with... curious....

 

[GlocksRock]

Very nice! What model drives are those? I have the LG GGW-H20L but it looks differnt than the ones you have.

 

[mperfct]

I like it! Nice work

 

[Nemo128]

Linux with XBMC would own, but I'm guessing Vista.

 

[ParadigmDawg]

I don't even know you anymore....

You went from a complete analog guy, that had to turn the volume knob of each amp to change the level, to a digital computer guy....

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Actually I have not installed most of the insides yet, but I'm liking it a lot just from looking at it.

I've installed the Power Supply, VFD display, HDDs, & BD/HDDVD-ROMs. But I have not installed the motherboard & CPU because they have not arrived yet from Amazon.

Wow, I did not realize that it looks like the Classe units. Very cool.
Hmmm, I might have to get a Classe amp just to match.

For now, I'll be using Vista. But I will most likely be using Windows 7 soon.

The LG model is GGC-H20L.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I don't even know you anymore....

You went from a complete analog guy, that had to turn the volume knob of each amp to change the level, to a digital computer guy....

The times - they are changing.

Who knows. Like they say, what goes around comes around.

I may end up just getting an analog Classe 5Ch amp and sell both the Denon AVR + BD player. Then I'll use the HTPC as a pre-pro. It does have the 7.1 analog preout.

Or not.

Like they say, you just never know in life!

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Vfd & Psu

Installation of the VFD display & Power Suppy.

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[ChunkyDark]

You got a purdy drive

Nice setup, very sleek.

 

[davidtwotrees]

So. Give us the skinny on just what this thing will do. How much memory? Will you store movies in there? Are you going to put your cd collection on there, or do you have music stored on another hard drive already? Is there a budget on this project? Is this all HDMI from that thing? Links for us to look at?
I have my Sammy BluRay that plays blurays and streams Netflix and Pandora. My Escient is a music server with Internet radio capability that can also take music from my computers drive and store it. Will your HTPC have all these capabilities?
Enquiring minds want to know.
And P.Dawg hit the nail on the head. It's like you've been assimilated into the Borg or something!

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

So. Give us the skinny on just what this thing will do. How much memory? Will you store movies in there? Are you going to put your cd collection on there, or do you have music stored on another hard drive already? Is there a budget on this project? Is this all HDMI from that thing? Links for us to look at?
I have my Sammy BluRay that plays blurays and streams Netflix and Pandora. My Escient is a music server with Internet radio capability that can also take music from my computers drive and store it. Will your HTPC have all these capabilities?
Enquiring minds want to know.
And P.Dawg hit the nail on the head. It's like you've been assimilated into the Borg or something!

Well, I'm putting 8GB RAM + 8TB HDD into this thing.

I'll be storing blu-ray movies (ISO) + CD collection (WAV) on this 8TB HDD.

TT Mozart Case + VFD + Remote = $220
TT Power Supply = $90
ASUS P5Q Motherboard = $125
Intel E8500 CPU = $190
ASUS Xonar HDAV1.3 Sound PCI-E x 2 cards = $220
ATI Radeon HD4850 1GB Graphics card = $130
WD 2TB Caviar Green HDD x 4 = 8TB = $1200
LG BD/HD DVD Drive x 2 = $250
Lynksis Wireless-G PCI = $50
6 USB Port PCI = $20
Extra Fan PCI = $30

Software: Windows OS - Vista/Windows 7, TMT3, ESET Smart Security 4, AnyDVD HD, DVDFab 6 --- already have or will get (Windows 7).

Total ~ $2500.

Yes, there will be a single HDMI cable (the Velocity HDMI cable that Gene gave me as part of that survey drawing) going from this Mozart HTPC to my Denon receiver.

http://thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?C=1147&ID=1432#Tab3

http://thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?C=1257&ID=1484

http://thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?C=1264&ID=1526

http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=709&l4=0&model=2164&modelmenu=1

http://processorfinder.intel.com/details.aspx?sSpec=SLAPK

http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=25&l2=150&l3=0&l4=0&model=2385&modelmenu=1

http://www.sapphiretech.com/presentation/product/?psn=000101&pid=214

http://store.westerndigital.com/store/wdus/en_US/DisplayProductDetailsPage/categoryID.13095400/parid.13092500/catid.13094900

http://ca.lge.com/en/products/model/detail/supermultiblue_ggch20l.jhtml

I've tried the Nefflix HD streaming, but it's not for me.

First, there are not as many movies available on streaming.

Second, the picture quality is NOT as good as a blu-ray ISO file.

Third, the sound quality is NOT as good. In addition, you cannot get TrueHD or DTS-HD or LPCM when streaming.

Also, the only "TV" I watch is NFL football.

I watch a lot of TV shows, but only on Blu-ray - I get the entire seasons on blu-ray.

So this new Mozart HTPC will give me Fast blu-ray ripping ability into my 8TB HDD. And it will allow me to watch those movies directly from the HDD and output the sound of Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD MA, and LPCM.

 

[copperfox]

Nice setup, here are some of my thoughts:

- 8GB memory is totally overkill. For a machine who's primary role is media copying and playback, 2GB would probably have been enough, and 4 at the most. Tom's hardware did an article about how adding more than 3GB ram gives diminishing returns unless you are doing something very demanding like 3D modeling/rendering.

- If you are not gaming on this machine, then the Radeon 4850 is overkill. Even the 4550 (approx $40-50) can smoothly playback 1080p. If you are gaming, however, then good choice.

- I can see your desire for lots of HDD space, but unless you intend to fill all 8GB right away, you spent a lot more money per GB than you needed to. If you were willing to sacrifice half that capacity, even four 1TB WD drives would have only been ~$400, saving a whopping $800. Half the capacity but only 1/3 the price.

Otherwise it's nice.

 

[darien87]

So this new Mozart HTPC will give me Fast blu-ray ripping ability into my 8TB HDD. And it will allow me to watch those movies directly from the HDD and output the sound of Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD MA, and LPCM.

You hope. Oh, the horror stories I've heard of compatability issues with HTPC's.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Nice setup, here are some of my thoughts:

- 8GB memory is totally overkill. For a machine who's primary role is media copying and playback, 2GB would probably have been enough, and 4 at the most. Tom's hardware did an article about how adding more than 3GB ram gives diminishing returns unless you are doing something very demanding like 3D modeling/rendering.

- If you are not gaming on this machine, then the Radeon 4850 is overkill. Even the 4550 (approx $40-50) can smoothly playback 1080p. If you are gaming, however, then good choice.

- I can see your desire for lots of HDD space, but unless you intend to fill all 8GB right away, you spent a lot more money per GB than you needed to. If you were willing to sacrifice half that capacity, even four 1TB WD drives would have only been ~$400, saving a whopping $800. Half the capacity but only 1/3 the price.

Otherwise it's nice.

What about the CPU?

The price difference between the E8600 (3.3GHz) & E8500 (3.16GHz) was kind of ridiculous.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

You hope. Oh, the horror stories I've heard of compatability issues with HTPC's.

Yeah, I know.

It's kind of scary.

I know the ASUS HDAV1.3 can decode TrueHD & DTS-HD and send via LPCM. That's the easy part. The hard part is bitstreaming!

Plan A: Bitstream
Plan B: PCM

Maybe Windows 7 will be better than Vista when it comes to HTPC - I hope.

 

[darien87]

Nice setup, here are some of my thoughts:

- 8GB memory is totally overkill. For a machine who's primary role is media copying and playback, 2GB would probably have been enough, and 4 at the most. Tom's hardware did an article about how adding more than 3GB ram gives diminishing returns unless you are doing something very demanding like 3D modeling/rendering.

- If you are not gaming on this machine, then the Radeon 4850 is overkill. Even the 4550 (approx $40-50) can smoothly playback 1080p. If you are gaming, however, then good choice.

- I can see your desire for lots of HDD space, but unless you intend to fill all 8GB right away, you spent a lot more money per GB than you needed to. If you were willing to sacrifice half that capacity, even four 1TB WD drives would have only been ~$400, saving a whopping $800. Half the capacity but only 1/3 the price.

Otherwise it's nice.

Dude, check out how many times he's changed his system. His middle name is overkill.

Acu-Deftech-Overkill-Guy

 

[GlocksRock]

I have a radeon 4350 and it plays blu ray .iso files just fine and my media pc has 3 gigs of ram, and a Pentium D 3.0 ghz. processor. No need for a crazy high end system for media playback. Now I wouldn't mind a faster processor, but I got the PC pretty stripped down and really cheap, as a brand new clearance item from dell, it was the N series so it didn't even come with an OS. But even a C2D 2.2 would be plenty of CPU for that machine. And as for HDD space, the new 2 TB drives aren't even 7200 RPM, so I personally would have gone with 1.5 TB drives. I just got one for $119 shipped from newegg. Of course at least with the slower hard drives he is using, there will be a bit less heat. I have heard of issues using > 1 TB drives in a raid config also, but I don't know much about that, so I can't comment. Not sure if a raid setup is what he was going for.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

2tb Hdd

WD 2TB Caviar Green HDD

Capacity: 2TB (2000GB)
Spindle speed: between 5400 and 7200 RPM
Cache: 32MB
Host interface: SATA (3Gbps)
Read/write speeds: 90.4MB/s average read, 85.8MB/s average write
Acoustics: 25dB – 29dB
Power consumption: 10W at startup, 4W idle, 7W read/write, 1W standby/sleep
Temp: Max 32 Degrees Celsius during testing (Max 89.6 Fahrenheit)

http://www.desktopreview.com/default.asp?newsID=638&review=Western+Digital+2TB+hard+drive