Building a Low Cost HTPC for my Bedroom

[TSX420J]

I would swap the Phenom II X2 for the Athlon II X3, its cheaper, faster and can potentially unlock!

I would change the motherboard, the 760G chipset isnt great. Get a 785G chipset or a 880G chipset as you'll get a much more powerful integrated card for HD movie playback.

That Rosewil PSU looks dodgy!.............well not really but for the price you could probably find better.

AMD Athlon II X3 425 2.7GHz Socket AM3 95W Triple-...
AMD Athlon II X3 445 Rana 3.1GHz 3 x 512KB L2 Cach...

Edit:
880g
785g

Either way, the build you posted above will do the job, I'm just more critical that most lol.

LOL, I ordered last night haha. I pretty much got the phenom over the athlon because of the 6mb L3 Cache. Also, I will be trying to unlock the other two cores to make it a x4, is there a way to reverse that if it does not work out so well? The power supply has 40a on a 12v rail, that is pretty much why I chose it over a lot of others I have seen. Eventually I will add a video card so I need those 40a on one rail.

Do you think it is too late to change out the mobo? Is it that big of a deal? Remember I will be putting in my gtx 260 in the future when I upgrade my desktop. If that doesn't work I am for sure going to upgrade the video. What are your thoughts? Because if I have to, I will cancel my order because no one works today. I have a full day to do everything before anything get processed and shipped.

Thanks, I wish you would've posted that yesterday, LOL.

 

[Dent1]

I will be trying to unlock the other two cores to make it a x4, is there a way to reverse that if it does not work out so well?

Yes you just simpily disable the ACC feature in the bios.

BTW does your motherboard support ACC? because some 760G chipsets do not.

Do you think it is too late to change out the mobo? Is it that big of a deal? Remember I will be putting in my gtx 260 in the future when I upgrade my desktop. If that doesn't work I am for sure going to upgrade the video. What are your thoughts? Because if I have to, I will cancel my order because no one works today. I have a full day to do everything before anything get processed and shipped.

Thanks, I wish you would've posted that yesterday, LOL.

The motherboard change would be to your advantage because the 785G and 880G chipsets are newer and better supported so you're more likely to get consistant bios updates and support. Also because their upper-midrange chipsets I would be more confident that if the AM3 bulldozers would arrive it would most likely on those chipsets than the 760G. The faster integrated video card of the HD 4xxx series is a bonus, but not essential if you're getting a dedicated card anyways.

Adding a GTX260 to a HTPC defeats the purpose, a HTPC is supposed to be quiet, cool and low in power consumption, something which the GTX260 doesnt promote, but the 5770 does at the same performance level, saying that integrated video should play movies fine. Also the to my knowledge the GTX 2xx doesnt support 7.1 HD audio and video via HDMI which is a must for a HTPC.

 

[TSX420J]

Yes you just simpily disable the ACC feature in the bios.

BTW does your motherboard support ACC? because some 760G chipsets do not.

I think I remember reading that it does. I could be wrong though I spent hour/days
looking for a good setup and deal, lol.

The motherboard change would be to your advantage because the 785G and 880G chipsets are newer and better supported so you're more likely to get consistant bios updates and support. Also because their midrange chipsets I would be more confident that if the AM3 bulldozers would arrive it would most likely on those chipsets.

Ahh, ok, now I understand. Doh!! I should have waited. :shadedshu I got excited and
ordered,already have a tracking number and all. Those people at newegg are fast and they have people working 24/7. I messaged them at 1am to try and swap out the OEM BD drive for a retail version and they said they cannot change the order once the order is ready to ship @ 1:15am. Do they have people responding to emails all night? I just ordered the retail BD drive and am going to return the other. Maybe I'll do the same for the mobo if they let me.

Adding a GTX260 to a HTPC defeats the purpose, it's supposed to be quiet, cool and low in power consumption, something which the GTX260 doesnt promote, but the 5770 does at the same performance level. Also the to my knowledge the GTX 2xx doesnt support 7.1 HD audio and video via HDMI which is a must for a HTPC. Saying that integrated video should play movies fine.

Going to look into that because I would like to upgrade that machine so that I can
do anything on it.

HD Gaming
Emulation
Watching HD Videos
Recording HDTV
Web Browsing


Thanks for your help.

 

[Kenshai]

Whag you ordered will work fine the other boards are better I would probably cancel. Also a gtx260 is overkill foran htpc but if its what you have and you don't have to spend anything extra have at it.

 

[TSX420J]

Ok you people convinced me. LOL. I just ordered another mobo.


ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO AM3 AMD 785G HDMI ATX AMD Moth...

Not bad for on-chip graphics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nB0dKx9M6Jo

 

[Dent1]

Ok you people convinced me. LOL. I just ordered another mobo.


ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO AM3 AMD 785G HDMI ATX AMD Moth...

I'm using that motherboard, its pretty stable, if you plan on overclocking the CPU I recommend upgrading the firmware to the latest version as it allowed me to get more stable results when overclocking the memory and CPU.

Not bad for on-chip graphics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nB0dKx9M6Jo

How can you tell that its not bad? I've noticed recently that people turning to low quality game videos on youtube rather than reviews. That video does not show the frame rate, it could be running at low detail @ 20 FPS playing at 2x speed for all we know. From owning that motherboard I can tell you that for gaming performance its rubbish, games are bearly playable as with all integrated video cards. Although for movie playback I can confirm that it can play 720p and 1080p with ease which was your main requirement of the HTPC.

 

[TSX420J]

I'm using that motherboard, its pretty stable, if you plan on overclocking the CPU I recommend upgrading the firmware to the latest version as it allowed me to get more stable results when overclocking the memory and CPU.



How can you tell that its not bad? I've noticed recently that people turning to low quality game videos on youtube rather than reviews. That video does not show the frame rate, it could be running at low detail @ 20 FPS playing at 2x speed for all we know. From owning that motherboard I can tell you that for gaming performance its rubbish, games are bearly playable as with all integrated video cards. Although for movie playback I can confirm that it can play 720p and 1080p with ease which was your main requirement of the HTPC.

Oh, I thought if it could play newer games even at the lowest settings it could
definitely play my emulators with ease. Like PJ64 or PSX.

Definitely do not think it can play crysis wars. My main machine can get only get 25-59 FPS Full settings 1080p no AA no Vsync.

 

[TSX420J]

Got Some Parts In!!!!!

So I got the case, mobo, ram, psu, cpu and bd. The mobo box looked open even though
I didn't open it because I am getting another mobo in the mail. The OEM BD drive came with
the software the customer service rep said it didn't. Cant wait for the mobo to come in so I
can put everything together. Going to have to send back the retail BD drive and the MSI mobo
when the BD drive arrives tomorrow.

Here are some pics of my cables so far. Cant wait to see how it comes out. I been thinking
of putting in my red fans from my main computer.







Going to have to sleeve those front panel wires too.

 

[TSX420J]

Hello,
I am putting together a small, quiet HTPC out of an old laptop (Dell Inspiron 6000) and a 22" widescreen monitor a friend gave me. However I'm looking for more than just an HTPC out of it, I want it to be an alarm clock/information panel of sorts and wondered if anyone here has any suggestions for applications.

First of all its functionality as an HTPC should be akin to a Media Center Extender since I have tuners and recorded content on my main Media Center PC. I've never run two Media Center boxes so is it possible for a second to interface with the tuners on the main workstation to essentially stream that "live" TV? I'd like it to be able to send commands to the main workstation so it shares its recorded TV schedule and can tell it to add/remove programs from that queue just as if I were using the main workstation.

Second, and this is why I left this post out of the HTPC forum, is I would like for this laptop to stay in standby and be able to wake up on certain events. For instance when I normally wake up in the morning it would be fantastic if I could schedule the laptop to come out of standby while I'm in the shower and bring up traffic, news, weather. This could be in the form of multiple internet sites opened up in a specific array of windows or it could be their own applications. The idea would be to give me an overview of these things as I'm getting dressed, then turn itself back into standby for the day when I leave (just at a set time).
Thanks
_______________________
Fireplace Render

I once had an idea like that, where the computer would wake you up and open any programs
or websites you program it to. I am not sure if there exist any software like that but it would be a great idea.