New HTPC Suggestions Please

[ogreboy]

I am going to build a windows 7 HTPC, and eventually will run 5 extenders, 2 of witch will be for (not tech savvy) older people. So I have been debating the parts to use and have a list. I plan on starting with an over the air tuner and adding a ceton card or 2 later when I switch form satellite to Comcast cable. I will want to rip blu rays with this machine also. I need/want 3d blu ray support on the main computer not extenders.

Thermaltake V3 Black Edition Case $40
Nexus VALUE 430 430W Active PFC Quiet Power Suppy $60
MSI ATX Motherboard Z77A-G41 $88
Intel Core i5-3570K Quad-Core Processor 3.4 GHz (using the Intel HD 4000 graphics) $215
Crucial m4 64GB 2.5-Inch Solid State Drive $73
Corsair Vengeance 8 GB ( 2 x 4 GB ) DDR3 1600 MHz $45
LITE-ON Black 4X Blu-ray Reader $25
AVerMedia A188 HD Duet (this is just to test until I switch to cable, then I will get 1 or 2 Ceton cards) $50

I'm not sure what version of windows 7 to get but that will be somewhere in the $100 range.

So please tell me where I'm wasting money on this or what I'm missing or need more of. I need to make sure this works well so my wife will be on board with this.

Thanks, Dan.

[ogreboy]

Opps I will keep the recordings on a Firewire 800 Drobo, probably have to get a card for the firewire.

[Bryan]

Looks pretty good to me so far. Windows 7 Home Premium is what you need, Media Center is included.

What do you plan on using for extenders? If at all possible, I'd make sure they have a wired network connection.

What about your Blu-ray rip playback? I spent a long time trying to make Media Center play all mine, but eventually gave up and now have Media Browser using MPC-HC as an external player.

[Crash2009]

Check the feedback over at Newegg on that power supply. You should be able to find something better for 60 or a bit more. Rosewill Hive has been pretty good to me so far. Some, maybe all, Antek's have a lifetime warranty. Modular is the way to go.....reduced amount of cableing inside the case=better airflow and lower temps. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6817182132

[ogreboy]

I haven't got that far yet, its hard to follow all of that with out a system to try it out on. That is to bad that there is no good integrated program. What about just ripping as an ISO and playing them back as a disk?

Any hard ware suggestions are still welcome.

[ogreboy]

Check the feedback over at Newegg on that power supply. You should be able to find something better for 60 or a bit more. Rosewill Hive has been pretty good to me so far. Some, maybe all, Antek's have a lifetime warranty. Modular is the way to go.....reduced amount of cableing inside the case=better airflow and lower temps. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6817182132

Thanks I tried to find a quieter power supply but that was before I change from the core i3 to the i5, so that will help.

[Crash2009]

You might be able to save yourself $50 right off the bat. There's a good possibility that the Ceton Infini4 will receive over the air (OTA) broadcasts by just adding an antenna or ordering a 20.00/mo cable package. Check with the experts over in the Tuner section, or over in the Ceton section. I'm pretty sure it will work, but I havn't tried it.

[adam1991]

InfiniTV is not for OTA, but they say it should get clear QAM off the cable without a cableCARD. Dunno, haven't tried it.

The problem with clear QAM is how MC doesn't recognize or use the virtual channel numbers. It uses the raw frequencies. And when those change around, so does your guide mapping. Big PITA, frankly. Even with the lifeline service, I'd have a cableCARD just to keep the channel mapping correct no matter what the cable company does. It's WELL worth the couple of bucks a month.

[1454]

InfiniTV is not for OTA, but they say it should get clear QAM off the cable without a cableCARD. Dunno, haven't tried it.

The problem with clear QAM is how MC doesn't recognize or use the virtual channel numbers. It uses the raw frequencies. And when those change around, so does your guide mapping. Big PITA, frankly. Even with the lifeline service, I'd have a cableCARD just to keep the channel mapping correct no matter what the cable company does. It's WELL worth the couple of bucks a month.

Correct, Ceton does not do ota. I had to buy an hdhomerun to get ota channels. (not the hdhomerun prime, the dual hdhomerun). Also, if your cable company is a worthless pos like mine, you'll have to pick up a ntsc tuner in order to get the 2-80 block of channels. As they don't have them in clear qam like I figured they would.

[ogreboy]

You might be able to save yourself $50 right off the bat. There's a good possibility that the Ceton Infini4 will receive over the air (OTA) broadcasts by just adding an antenna or ordering a 20.00/mo cable package. Check with the experts over in the Tuner section, or over in the Ceton section. I'm pretty sure it will work, but I havn't tried it.

That is a good idea but the Ceton tuner was just on sale and I was hopping that it would go on sale again, before I was ready to buy. But if the InfiniTV4 will take the basic cable and get the OTA channels in HD that would work better.

[Bryan]

I haven't got that far yet, its hard to follow all of that with out a system to try it out on. That is to bad that there is no good integrated program. What about just ripping as an ISO and playing them back as a disk?

Any hard ware suggestions are still welcome.

Long ago I tried copying DVD's to .iso and mounting them, but found it a hassle even when trying to make it seamless. Even doing that, you'll need third party software such as DaemonTools.

It's really not hard to setup MPC-HC as an external player, and it can play a lot more file types than Media Center can, which saves me having to install a bunch of codecs.

[Crash2009]

InfiniTV is not for OTA, but they say it should get clear QAM off the cable without a cableCARD. Dunno, haven't tried it.

The problem with clear QAM is how MC doesn't recognize or use the virtual channel numbers. It uses the raw frequencies. And when those change around, so does your guide mapping. Big PITA, frankly. Even with the lifeline service, I'd have a cableCARD just to keep the channel mapping correct no matter what the cable company does. It's WELL worth the couple of bucks a month.

Clear QAM off the cable without a cableCARD is one thing I did try. We get 32 channels here in 48103. Never did try it thouroughly with mapping and everything. I would say it works well enough to get you a signal to the monitor, you can record what you are watching, good enough for testing, but that's about it. The raw frequencies you mention, explain the weird channel numbers I was getting. 7 came in as 7.2, 62 came in as 62.2, everything came in with a decimal. There was a couple channels up in the thousands, I forget exactly, but something like 683838.2, 683838.3. I could go through the guide and hit a channel, but the guide was unable to display what show was being broadcast. I used it this way for about a month, then ordered the Digital Starter Package and a cableCARD. cableCARD is the way to go.

[ogreboy]

Long ago I tried copying DVD's to .iso and mounting them, but found it a hassle even when trying to make it seamless. Even doing that, you'll need third party software such as DaemonTools.

It's really not hard to setup MPC-HC as an external player, and it can play a lot more file types than Media Center can, which saves me having to install a bunch of codecs.

Whatever works easier should be fine.

The mother board seems fine to everyone? Thats kind of one of the most important parts. Anybody used MSI ATX Motherboard Z77A-G41?

[LuckyDay]

If your primary (and possibly only) use is going to be for media and tv, the 3570K is overkill IMO.

I would either get a nice i3 and use the HD 4000, or if you're planning on doing a little gaming get a 2500K and a cheap mid range video card.

The K series is meant for overclocking. Chances are you're not going to do that on an HTPC machine, and even if you are, the 2500K is a beast in that department and runs faster and cooler.

Motherboard is nice. Chipset's good for the future and I've liked the couple of MSI boards I've used in the past (although my personal favorite is Gigabyte)

[Crash2009]

The motherboard will probably work out OK for you. Just know what you are getting into and you won't be disappointed. Sorry, I have no direct experience with this board. I have only worked with one other MSI (MS-7366 Ver 1.0) Runs fine, seems like MSI have their own way of doing things. As long as you do it their way you'll be OK.

"Z77A-G41 review" typed into your favorite search engine will let you know what to expect. Here is a sample of what you will find http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/09/ ... ard_review

[ogreboy]

If your primary (and possibly only) use is going to be for media and tv, the 3570K is overkill IMO.

I would either get a nice i3 and use the HD 4000, or if you're planning on doing a little gaming get a 2500K and a cheap mid range video card.

I wondered about that, I plan on streaming or recording up to 8 tuners eventually, and I want to be able to rip a disk or do some other task in the background on the computer without affecting the stability of the DVR the other 6 people may be relying on. If a dual core i3 can handle it all at the same time then I could save myself the $70, but if I can pay $70 to make sure that I won't hit a limmet on my CPU then I think its worth it.

On the motherboard I have read some reviews and they don't talk about media center stuff, what I would really like to know is how well does the HDMI pass video and audio, what about lossless audio codecs and 3d blu ray.

[barnabas1969]

I disagree about the i3. If you're planning to run four or five extenders, you need the i5. Microsoft recommends one CPU core per extender.

Also, I'd recommend Windows 7 Professional, not Home Premium. There are a lot of extra security options in Professional, and it only costs a few bucks more if you get the OEM version.

[LuckyDay]

It never hurts to play it safe, but I'd still expect something like the 3225 to handle 3-4 extenders simultaneously no problem. HT goes a long way towards something simple like streaming data, especially if you don't expect all of the extenders to be in use at the same time.

I guess if there are lots of people in your house and the extenders will all be in use at the same time while using your PC for other tasks, you should consider the i5.

[barnabas1969]

The reason Microsoft recommends one core per extender is so that the menus in each extender will be snappy. Running five extenders on a quad-core i5 actually doesn't meet this recommendation... but it should be fine. I wouldn't try 5 extenders on a dual-core CPU.

[foxwood]

All of the i3's support Hyperthreading, so your 2 cores provide 4 threads. But streaming and ripping are not CPU intensive anyway, so it's not a major issue. Unless you plan to transcode your Blu-Ray rips, you shouldn't encounter any CPU bottlenecks for a TV server. (Analysis for skipping conmmercials can also be CPU intensive, but if your content is copy protected, you won't be doing much of that anyway).

You can't(*) tell Media Center to record to a removable drive - will your firewire connected Drobo look like a removable drive? I'd be inclined to suggest an internal HD for your recordings - most of them will be transient anyway, you can keep your Drobo for your rips (though I've given up on ripping optical media - I just don't re-watch enough of it to be worth the bother).