Htpc

[ajmilton]

it's probably been done before, but it's my turn to make a htpc, and the idea i'm working with is to put it inside an old VCR or receiver. something that looks like it "belongs" around a tv/media center.

been speccing out parts today, and it looks like i'll be able to do the whole thing for right around $500

the question i have for y'all is, do any of you folks know where i could find a bunch of old hi-fi gear to browse through? i plan on hitting up e-bay when i get home, and maybe checking out some flea markets and garage sales over the weekend. anybody know of any websites that sells that sort of junk?

i'll probably start a worklog if i can get something gutted and start buying the new guts. warning though, i'm a slow worker, and paychecks are sadly smaller than i'd like (aren't they all :P)

-aj

Edit:
if you want to see the current parts list:
http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/wishlist/PublicWishDetail.asp?WishListNumber=4189148
any feedback is welcome/requested/etc.

[xdxforever]

my suggestions are:
1. dont get that ram, its silly marketing. i would suggest corsair or the OCZ platinum if you want to OC but your motherboard wont do anything really extreme so i would suggest getting a gig of the cheapest DDR2 800 available, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820227082
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820227126
now that i look OCZ has the best deals...
2. you can get a better image from a new ATI card than that old 6600 cheak these out: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Submit=ENE&N=2000380048+1069609641+106790809&Subcategory=48&description=&srchInDesc=
one has passive cooling and others are half hight, great for a smaller case! (same price too for those first two, which both look good)

[ajmilton]

part of my emphasis was on low cost, and from what i'm told, 512mb is adequate memory for the project, especially since there's a dedicated tuner and vid card. (i thought that was the cheapest stick of 512 on newegg, gonna go look again :P) you're right though, i don't really have any intention of oc'ing this. not much space for hardcore cooling, and that costs more money, and won't give me much improvement in the long run for what i want to do with the machine anyways.

i'm somewhat undecided on passive vs active cooling. if this is all going to be crammed into a small space, i'd like to have a fan near the vid card :p maybe stick one in the back instead though, that might work.

one of the concerns i have to make sure of with the hardware is that it will play nicely in ubuntu with mythtv. not going to bother with buying (or "finding") winXP media center. wasn't ATI on the chopping block recently for not opening its driver source for linux?
i'll check out those ati's tho.


as for height, there's a company out there that makes riser cards - i'd need to get one at least because the hauppauge tuner cards only come in normal height (as far as i can tell)
http://store.mycableshop.com/itemdesc~product~Pci%2DExpress+X16+%2B+Pci%2D32+Co mbo+Riser~ic~eprx16b.htm
^^ that's the one i'm thinking about. will let me run the vid card and the tuner horizontally. gotta get in touch with that company and see how much they want for it though, their standard risers are like $35 per, so i'm hoping this one isn't much more than that.

-aj

[a.Bird]

i really dont know much about this area, but i read in a review for that psu that it doesnt support PCIe. i dont know, just thought i should mention it if it means anything.

[xdxforever]

If you arent concerned with max performance then there is about a $25 price drop to get DDR2 667 instead of the 800 and in most applications that makes only a few percent difference in speed. dont go lower than 667 though, the couple dollars isnt worth getting 533, I would still suggest 1 GB though, it makes a serious performance difference from 512 in everyday tasks, even if its slower ram. and its not much cheaper.
I dont know about drivers much, but these cheap nvidias would also be better:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Submit=ENE&N=2010380048+1069609641+106790717&Subcategory=48&description=&srchInDesc=

[CanaBalistic]

You should look into a smaller PSU. An ATX psu is pretty big and will take up a large portion of your usable space. As for the PCI-E issue stated above, it doesnt matter unless the video card your installing needs a seprate power plug (ie, x1900, 7900, ect)

Dont buy your case off of some site. You can find a better deal at a garage sale. Now that i think of it... I have a late 90's model RCA amp that i gutted to make a htpc. I didnt build it but i still have the case. The problem i had with it was that there was no where to put a cd drive. With some bondo and an imagination it could be accomplished. If your intrested, i could give it to you for the shipping cost. I could stand to clear some space in my closet :)

http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/Cana-Balistic/100_19581.jpg

[xdxforever]

An amp is a good idea, cause they are just tall enough to eliminate some space issues. Any low end vid card has no extra plug so dont worry about it. you could even go down to 250, maybe even this baby: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817104903
since you arent ocing. this one look better actually: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817103507

[chedabob]

^^

xdx, i got a pci riser card. if you dont need pci-express, itll work sweet. its yours for $5 shipped

[ajmilton]

re a.Bird: higher end pci-e cards have a separate power connection. i'm not getting one that's got that requirement, so i don't think that'll be an issue. as long as the ps supplies the min power for the card i should be fine.
on a side note, is it just me, or are these damn pcie cards a power sink? i don't recall the agp cards i've purchased in the past needing 350v min, but i've seen that on most of the low-end pcie cards i've looked at. the high-end ones are even more nuts. >shrug< the price of new tech eh :P

re xdx: that's a good point. slightly slower ram could very well save me a good bit :P things to look into when i get bored today at work. same with those cheap nvidia 7 series'. i reckon i'll poke around some ubuntu forums and see if there's support for the newer ati cards too.

re cana: i was pondering looking for a smaller psu. after taking a quick glance at the newegg pages, and the manufacturer's pages in some cases, i couldn't find the power usage per component. also, if you'll send me the inside dimensions of that amp i'll think about it. i'd kind of like to look around my area still, i was looking forward to ripping the guts out myself ;)


i think the best procedure for me at this point is going to be to find my enclosure and see what dimensions i have to work with before i get settled on any hardware. but keep the advice coming in, is always welcome :)

[ajmilton]

oh, another question. meant to ask it earlier, but apparently it slipped my mind.
is there a good rule of thumb somewhere for determining power for the psu? i'd like to have as minimal a psu as possible in this thing, but i can't find anything coherent as to minimum/maximum power consumption on a lot of the components i'm looking at.

i think i'm going to see if i can call around to some electronics repair shops and see if they have any dead amps or receivers that i could have/buy on the cheap. went around to some secondhand stores, found a couple of things that might work, but they were in functional condition and wanted like 70 bucks :P
it's sort of weird going into a store and leaving because i couldn't find something that didn't work :P