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1) I recently read some tests in which PC based video cards were blowing stand alone DVD player performance away. (FAR away) That included players such as the Denon DVD-3910!




I have been running HTPCs for a long time now. Software scalers and the software algorithms in players such as WinDVd, Dscaler, FDDshow has surpased quality seen in normal DVD players. The picture gets cleaned up, smoothens up and presents such a natural filmlike presentation. It can also make it worse by digitizing it too much. I have done head to head comparison on some of the DVD players I have vs a HTPC and a properly configured one can surpass it. One major reason is scaling 1:1 so your HTPC output equals the same resolution of viewing source such as matching your HTPC output to native resolution of your projector so no scaling occurs on the projector and the best possible picture is coming out of the HTPC.
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2) TivoHD...$899 + $12.95/month???? There's got to be a better/cheape way to record/playback HD.




If HD DV can be recorded via Firewire I can not see why HD feed can not be decoded and recorded as long as you stay in the digital realm.(Maybe I'm presuming some stuff) HD Camcorders have come out with HD DV content this past year. It is easily transfered over firewire in the digital realm to Final Cut Pro HD or Vegas Video. You do need lots lots lots of space and processing power to capture.
Normal dv is 1 meg a sec (My Sony Mini DV cam captures and transfer at this rate 720x480p)
Hdv is about 16 megs a second 720p (commercial HD DV cams 1280x720p)
True Hd 32 megs a second(professional HD DV cams 1920x1080p)
So if my math is right a 60 minute show in true HD is 115200 megs = 115 gigs to store in its uncompressed format.
Ouchie!!!! lots of hard drive is needed.


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3) Convienence...having my entire music collection ripped at the highest possible bit rate MP3's and stored on disk is hard to pass up. If I want some critical listening, I can always pull the disc off the shelf.




lossless digitizing which many people on this site do. OGG, slap the monkey...i dunno..lots of experts on here on this.


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1) Amplification? We all go out and buy recievers with 120 watts per channel, stand alone amps, etc...what gives? What's driving the 5.1 (or 7.1) channels in a HTPC?




HTPC should have digital out to receivers. You also can attach analog out from HTPC audio card for all channels into analog 7.1 input on receiver. I even tried attaching my tube monoblocks to each output on my HTPC. I would not recommend this as a PC can have dirty output sometimes on startup and a big "POP" can be heard through your speakers as the PC starts up. I thought my tubes exploded!!!!
As for capturing capturing the 5.1/7.1 information since the video is captured via digital realm I am presuming the audio is captured also in the digital realm.

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5) How important is processor speed? RAM? Dual Core? A lot of money can be saved here if the machine doesn't need to be a monster.




Here are some basic info on minimum recommendation to capture HD content. Might be helpful or not since this is based on capturing HD DV and creating DV content.

http://www.videoguys.com/system.htm



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6) (this one is specific to my Sony KDS-60A2000 tv) The TV has an HDMI input and a VGA input, but no DVI. Can I buy a DVI to HDMI cable and run that between the PC and TV?



http://www.lynnprod.com/products1.asp?prodid=178

http://www.quadloft.com/hometheater- new HT