Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Looking into HTPC...general question.

So I just got a iPod and a iPhone (awesome things I tell you) and it is making me start to think about HTPC ideas. I just got finished uploading all my CD's to iTunes (25 gigs worth) and the iPhone has a program that lets you control the iTunes wirelessly. So I start thinking well I can hook the PC to my HT system and listen to music outside and have control over it on the phone!

So now im thinking I would like to upload all my movies to the PC as well (dont know if it would go in iTunes or not) I have a nice size of standard DVD's and now I have a PS3 so I will be getting into Blu-Rays. What does SD and BR DVD's take up on a hard drive?

So what I am wondering is in general...I know I could have a HTPC to have the music in itunes and play it on my HT. What about the movies...I am sure the SD dvd's are no problem...but what about BR movies....decoders...HD sound?? Would they be able to play from the HTPC.

I have a old onkyo reciever (that I will upgrade one day) and a PS3 and the means to run hard wire from the HTPC to the HT area.

I would also like something that would have maybe a RAID setup to make backups incase something goes down....it takes a long time to upload 25gigs of music. I want to also use the HTPC as my regular home PC as well with XP on it. I am not sure what is all possible since im just now looking into all this. Any info, link, guidence, would be great! Also...what would this HTPC cost in general...I dont need top of the line either...I am more of a bag for the buck man and with a RAID to keep things backed up I would feel good about going the cheaper route.

A few answers to your many questions (not in order).

1) Size of DVD/BD
DVD-Quality: A ripped DVD (where copy protection is removed) is around 4-6Gb of content on average. You can bring that number down considerably (to around 500/1000Mb if you accept lower quality in both audio and video.
BD disks cannot be copied right now, but there is a reason why they needed dual-layer disks going to 50G (full quality)! A 720P movie with DVD-style audio is about 6Gb.

2) iTunes + iPhone
You either need to take the audio out of your PC (SPDIF or analog) and into your HT directly or through an AirPort. The AirPort approach (the one I use) is only working with iTunes, but the DAC is pretty good. I you have a soundcard with an SPDIF outpout, you can simply pass a regular coax cable back to your soundsystem and then have all your PC audio redirected (that's the reason I use the AirPort; I only want iTunes redirected).
I have the iPod Touch with the "Remote" application, BTW.

Also to add to this....I have DRTV with the HD DVR. Would there be a way to also have the HTPC be the HD for the DVR to increase my room so I dont have to delete stuff. Is it also possible to have the stff from the DVR saved to the movie portion of my HTPC, where my dvd's would be stored? DRTV does this anoying thing now with pay per views. You only have 24hrs to watch before it deletes. Sometimes I want to buy a UFC fight but wont be back home in 24hrs to watch so im SOL. It would be nice to make a copy of it and save it from it being deleted.

Thanks agian

Wow I didnt realize a BR move was so big. If I put BR movies on to a HTPC (when you can) I would want it in full 1080p and HD sound....so that seems it would be frigen huge. Even with 1t drives I would need quite a few to keep a larger selction of BR movies I guess.

I had looked at that airport thing. Does the sound quality remain the same as if it was connected directly??

BR can be copied with AnyDVD HD to bypass the encryption.

Thanks for the link! This can be golden to protect HD-DVD investments (the reason why I got a BD/HD-DVD LG reader for my PC).

The sound out of the AirPort is very good. The DAC in it is alright and since iTunes talks to it directly, the output is not the result of mixing stages on the PC.

I will have to look on the back of my PC to see what outputs I have for the sound card.

I want to back up all my stuff too...as well as have a place to store it all. 400+ cd's take up a lot of room and DVDs take up more. Not to mention the condition of my CD's after being hauled around for 10 years!

For storage you may want to get into NAS's(Network Attached Storage) HP, D-link, Linksys all have some, just to name a few manufacturers. I run the Linksys NAS200 it is the cheapest of the bunch and will hold 2 SATA drives which can be configured to mirror each other for a back up or just run them seperately to max out room.

I don't think you're going to have ANY success trying to offload content from your DTV DVR to a computer.

The DVR can stream content from your computer.

You can add an external HD to your DVR and use it instead of the internal one.

But - again - my understanding is that you can't transfer anything recorded on your DVR to another device. At least until DTV wants you to.

Oh, and we had a scintillating conversation about "RAID is not 'backup'" in the Water Cooler a few weeks ago.

To bad about the DVR stuff...I hate that the PPV is gone in 24 hrs!

I will have to take a look at that thread about RAID....I dont know too much about it. We use it on our work server....

A much easier - if a little pricey - solution rather than RAID is Drobo Have not ponied up the money (yet) myself, but I hear good things. Version one was a tad noisy, but the new version is apparently much improved.

What I like about it is the ease of increasing the disk available for storage: simply - while the unit is being used! - take out the smallest disk in the array and replace it with a larger one, and it automagically brings everything up to date, using its RAID-like redundancy features. You can apparently use any 3.5" SATA I or SATA II hard drives in the enclosure.

I can highly recommend the slysoft software mentioned earlier: I run CloneDVD and AnyDVD on a WinXP vmware virtual machine on my Mac Pro, and it works beautifully. Again, perhaps a bit pricey, but they often have 20%-off sales, and you get a "lifetime" of updates once you purchase. Interesting that they manage to stave of the evil of the RIIA and the like. Perhaps being an Irish company helps: I notice too that their postal address is in Antigua

Regards,
David

I've been looking pretty hard at the sagetv +hd extender combo. It's not cheap by any means but by most accounts it delivers on it's promises. They even have an Axiom-like forum, but you guys are cooler.

Fixed link here.

Not trying to be a "Debbie Downer" but I built a HTPC and never got it working properly. I ended up getting a PS3 which does nearly everything I wanted my HTPC to do, does it better, and cost a quarter as much. Now I use the PS3 for Blu-Ray, DVD, CD, SACD, and MP3 playback. I can even browse my digital photos on it. I just use my cable company DVR. Couldn't be happier. (Well we all know that's a lie, but that's the illness that is hometheateritis.)

Good to know. I was sort of researching to build a HTPC (HD) and just couldn't justify the price.
Definitely going to buy an PS3 soon.

Building a HTPC can take some good PC knowhow but it can payoff majorly in the end. I run SageTV with a PC client in my bedroom and a HD100 extender in my theater and it works very well. I am able to record any HD channel from my cable provider and watch it anywhere in the house, even pausing one room and continuing in another. I can also placeshift my entire DVD, music, and TV collection and watch it on the road. SageTV is hugely capable and infinitely customizable which can make it a bit complicated at times, but if you are technically inclined and don't mind another hobby I really enjoy my setup. I would suggest you start your search on a system agnostic (unlike the sageTV forums which will push you towards SageTV) website like MissingRemote.com and they can help you set up any system you like.

I think it depends on your situation. I need a pc anyway and I have no multi room, multi system issues so why not use what I have to do double duty.

I have no use for another gaming system as I don't play much.

The only items that make this any different from a normal PC are some quiet components like the power supply and the addition of a video card to handle HD out when they get around to making that work. If you want to put all your music and movies online, you need to add external storage to the PS3 anyway.

I thought I'd resurrect this thread instead of start a new one.

Question for the Nerd Herd - how do you feel about the power and value proposition of AMD processors nowadays? I am thinking of my next build (primarily for the wife, but I like to future-proof things for maximum flexibility). It seems like I can save some money by going with a quad-core phenom instead of a Core 2 Duo.

On a related topic, how does one best balance the number of cores v. clock speed?

Thanks for your always clever guidance.

I'm reading an article on the newest Phenom II right now.

I'm pondering buying within the next few months, and I've decided I want a quad, even if all I do is play games on that machine. If you get a high clock quad, you're set, as far as I can tell. The duals just seem like a bit of a dead end to me.

I'm looking a lot more at the Core i7/920 than a Phenom, but I also don't have to replace the case or various other bits, so I can pig out on the parts I'm buying a bit.

I'll let Ken handle the AMD vs. intel thing since I'm not up the latest details there.

In cores vs clock speed, additional cores will only be of use to software that is designed to take advantage of it. Some tasks are better parallelized (i.e. split into chunks that can be run simultaneously on mulitple cores) than others.

Since computing power has been moving, in earnest, in a multi-core direction for about 3 years (on the consumer end of things, anyway), more an more developers are (or should be) taking this into account when they write their software.

Ideally, you should know if the software you'll be running is written to take advantage of multi-cores before you make the call on which chip to get. Since we live in the real world, I'd say put a slightly higher priority on the clock speed at this point.

Thank you, gentlemen. That is helpful.

As a further note, I have a Core 2 Quad Q9400 (2.66GHz). I'll never go back... It's very, very quick at normal operations.

I have one Core 2 duo E6725(?)and one system running an AMD dual core of equivalent specs. The AMD system just seems to be faster than the Intel box, it boots up about 5 seconds faster and everything else just feels quicker, could just be me.

Well, we really don't do gaming, so based on Peter's comment, I'm questioning the value of quad-cores. They also seem to demand quite a bit more power, and we typically just leave everything on. I'm trying to find a way to be "happy" with less than a E8400 (which I have in another machine, and am happy with).

If you don't mess with the BIOS, I think generally all of the modern quads power down cores. I know the Core i7s do, and I'm pretty sure the Phenom IIs do, but I'm not certain about the Core 2 Quads.

I'm running my HTPC with a E6300(?) dual core and it runs fine playing 1080p content, bluray/hddvd rom drive plays HD content fine as well. As long as you're not re encoding videos or other intensive tasks while you're trying to play your movie you should be good to go... also running with a ATI 3870 graphics card. don't forget the CPU is important but you need to factor in a good video & sound card too!... having said that Quad core would likely make you more future proof when they come out with 5090p & super duper quad HDDDD DTS sound...

This potential build for Mrs. Tuttle needs to accommodate only these types of tasks:

1. XP for now, W7 later probably.
2. Webstuff
3. MS Office
4. Video streaming (Netflix, Hulu, possibly Directv2pc)

I still have some angst over the processor. Obviously, I'm trying to do this cheap (like ~$300-350 TOTAL). Build looks like this so far, but obviously I'll have to get a different mobo if I choose an Intel processor.

I want to re-use perfectly nice and legal hard disks, OS, and Antec ATX power supply that I already have.
Silverstone SFF mATX case $70
Radeon HD 4670 HDMI GDDR4 Video card $77
GIGABYTE GA-MA78GM-US2H AM2+/AM2 780G HDMI Micro ATX Motherboard $80
4GB A-Data DDR2 800 memory ~$45

Processor candidates:

Athlon 64 X2 7750 Kuma 2.7GHz Socket AM2+ 95W Dual-Core $60
Athlon X2 7850 Kuma 2.8GHz Socket AM2+ 95W Dual-Core $70
Intel Pentium E5300 2.6GHz 65W Dual-Core Processor $80

I care about power consumption. I don't really want to step up to the $120 processors and above.

Thoughts?

4 GB is overkill if you're just using Windows XP. To save some cash I would recommend going to 2 GB, or spending around the same amount on better quality RAM.

Good advice, Cam! Thank you!

I thought all the new processors were quite efficient and shut down cores when not in use/needed.

In general, unless this is going to be a gaming machine I suspect you will be fine with any of the listed processors.

integrated videocard (VGA&DVI)+ 1gb ethernet + sound card

2 slots for Harddisk + 1 slot for CD/DVD

barebone 129$
2gig ram (2x1gb) 21$
Intel Pentium E5300 2.6GHz 2MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W 69$
1 TB Western digital Green HD 94$

129+21+69+94 = 313$

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200W power supply -> really low energy consumption
low noise -> no graphic card fan (integrated on board)


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The Western Digital Caviar Green 1TB Hard Drive uses less power and supports quieter, cooler-running desktop PCs. Its breakthrough 32 MB cache makes this hard drive suitable for high-performance home and business computing, as it can handle high-end data-intensive and multimedia applications.

This hard drive incorporates WD’s GreenPower technology, which yields lower operating temperatures and low acoustics, best for ultra-quiet PCs and external drives use. The IntelliPower delivers a fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and caching algorithms; IntelliSeek Calculates optimum seek speeds; and IntelliPark automatically unloads the heads during idle. All the features help the drive to operation in lower power consumption and reduced noise environment.

Luc, thank you so much! That is an excellent suggestion.

I actually considered that Shuttle kit. My concern is the integrated graphics and lack of any expansion slots. I just don't feel comfortable spending money on this project and having zero ability to address potential future GPU demands. Also, becoming captive to Shuttle for mobo and power supply makes me uneasy. I guess part of the "fun" for me is leveraging existing and future resources to most effectively address the overall computing needs for our family. With the Shuttle, there is no future. But it does seem like an excellent value.

If my primary concerns were "green" and "small", that would be just the ticket. My primary concern is the video streaming, and I'm just not confident that the Intel GMA 950 is going to get it done.

Does anybody have an opinion (or place where I can find ADD-friendly resources on) the fundamental differences between the 4650 and 4670 video cards? I could shave a little money there (and on the memory) and get a faster processor if that's the sweet spot.

shuttlep2

this one has no videocard included, 400W CERTIFIED PSU. and 1 pci expresss x16



on the other hand
new 4770 review at tomshardware ( 109$ )

If you check the game benchmarks (ie: Crysis) you will see that the 4770 is a huge leap ahead of the 4670, for 109$ I think it's worth it.

places like anandtec.com usually have good articles on graphics platforms and differences.

I'd be looking at anandtech.com or techreport.com.

Techreport looks like a nice site. I've been wanting another tech site to replace Tom's since it has turned to crap.

Thanks Ken.

Thank you very much for the site references. Very helpful. Plan A (with reduced memory) is still looking pretty good at the moment.

I'm basing my HTPC design off of Anandtech's recent sub $800 PC guide. I'm basing it off of the Intel HTPC one...'cept with 8 gigs of ram and two 1TB hard drives it comes out to be about grand. The gigabyte motherboard (w/ NVIDIA 9400 gfx) plus 2.5 ghz Dual Core seems to be a great combo.

Great article, hietpas! Thanks so much.

This has all been fairly validating, actually.

I really like gigabyte motherboards and really don't plan to buy anything else. But - for me - I'd rather spend the money on a dedicated GPU rather than a more expensive mobo with integrated graphics. People really do seem to like that E5200 processor.

Don't forget adequate security:

I have bought this case



It's a full size case but it's very cool. There is a 2 lines LCD which is software controlled. You can display the weather, cpu info and much more.

It blends nicely with the other components and you can adjust the fan speed (3 speeds).

The volume button do control the volume (software assisted).

You can add modules like this

That is a BEAUTIFUL enclosure, Luc! If I were currently building a PC for my equipment rack, I would definitely consider it.

A while back, I built a similar computer using the Silverstone LC-10.



I think it is wonderful that we can get such great cases to match AV equipment.

This is the one I use, Ahanix D4 D-Vine case.

So are you guys using those beasties as preamps, or just sources?

I play all my movies using the DVD player and TheaterTek software. In addition, I cruise the web on my big screen. I have plans to hook it up to my Denon 3808 to play ripped CDs at some point.

Oh yeah, playing pc games rocks.

<---(drools over Ahanix case). That's a good one.

Just a source for me, Ken. FLAC (through Winamp) is pretty much my only music source now. And the video streaming. Web surfing (but only at 61"). Some games (but mostly we play Wii). I need to hire Randy for a full MediaPortal consultation/installation, but I can't afford him.

I don't use MediaPortal anymore, to lazy I guess.

I've been using Windows7 Ultimate on a couple of my laptops and it's remarkable how good it runs so I finally decided to pull the trigger and buy a new HTPC that'll run Win7 at home. Of course, my main priority is to be cheap and efficient running/recording HD vid content. I'm not into gaming but the occasional FlighSim app.
I'm thinking on getting this barebone and this TVTuner card.

Any other recommendations particularly w/ TVTuner cards and/or maybe a cheap external blu-ray player. The PC in going to reside in an utility room so I don't really care about power supply noises or aesthetics.
tia.