View Full Version : One for the Techies
Pimp Cat
20-01-11, 09:52 AM
Fancy a challange?
The Mission, If you choose to except it.
Find me the components for a new media centre as cheep as possible.
It will pretty much only be used for video / music. And will be running something like Media Portal / XBMC and will be connected to my 42” LG tv.
I have a 1.5 Tb drive that will be used for data however a second smaller disc will be needed for the OS.
The case I will be using is one of these if it makes any difference, unless you can find any thing similar / better.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/APlus-A-Case-CS-GL-3-Black-HTPC-RoHS-/250421450871?pt=UK_Computing_DesktopComponents_RL&hash=item3a4e481877 (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/APlus-A-Case-CS-GL-3-Black-HTPC-RoHS-/250421450871?pt=UK_Computing_DesktopComponents_RL&hash=item3a4e481877)
So what can you do…..?
Prizes for the winner of any 3 things they like from my office vending machine! :cool:
Cheers.
Colin.
Do you really need 6 drive bays?? The case you've linked to looks massive.
I'd go for one of these.
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/239649
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 10:49 AM
Do you really need 6 drive bays?? The case you've lined to looks massive.
I'd go for one of these.
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/239649
+1, agreed, a lot less hassle. Only takes one 2.5" SATA, but that'll give you 1TB capacity for an extra 50 quid.
Stick a Linux OS on it and it'll run like a beauty.
Didn't realise it only took 2,5" drives. If you did go for that you could get a small 2.5" drive for the OS then get a USB caddy for the 1.5 TB drive you have.
SoulKiss
20-01-11, 11:06 AM
Why build a PC?
There are media player boxes out there that ill do this - all for < £100?
Unless you want to play games/surf, then why build a PC?
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 11:17 AM
There are media player boxes out there that ill do this - all for < £100?
Linky pls!?
I have a 32" flatscreen CRT TV and 5.1 home theater system connected via S-video to an old Dell Pentium 4 2.8 GHz at the moment. It allows me to watch iPlayer, online TV, photo's, play all my MP3 through the home theater, etc. I've been in rented houses for the last 2 years. It's analogue resolution, but no worse than we've all been watching on CRT TV's for most of our lives. The Dell tower desktop is bulky, but it sits between the TV corner cabinet and the wall, so not too bad.
Once we finally sell our house in Scotland and buy in Northamptonshire, I'll be looking for a 40" + flatscreen mounted on the wall, a compact HDMi media player, and a decent sound system suited to both music and surround sound, BOSE or similar, with digital inputs all round.
Pimp Cat
20-01-11, 11:22 AM
I wanted to build a pc as it will play almost all file types, Will have a DVD / CD burner on it for copying off music to play in the car. Will be running a Bit torrent client for more downloads, and will allow me to add a remote for controling media portal / xbmc. plus i would be able to run a remote desktop to it from my laptop if i needed to sort any files or anything out on it.
Plus being able to expand the storage on it once the 1.5 TB drive is full up.
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 11:25 AM
Anyone seen anything smart for remote control of media players, other than having to have a wireless keyboard and touchpad? (though would probably have one of these as well for websurfing on the TV)
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 11:28 AM
I wanted to build a pc as it will play almost all file types, Will have a DVD / CD burner on it for copying off music to play in the car. Will be running a Bit torrent client for more downloads, and will allow me to add a remote for controling media portal / xbmc. plus i would be able to run a remote desktop to it from my laptop if i needed to sort any files or anything out on it.
Plus being able to expand the storage on it once the 1.5 TB drive is full up.
Which of these things do you think you would be unable to do with the link posted by L3nny?
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 11:31 AM
Granted for expanding storage it would be better if it had a gigabit LAN card, not 10/100, think that's an oversight on a media player personally, but it has 5 USB ports.
benji106
20-01-11, 11:35 AM
Anyone seen anything smart for remote control of media players, other than having to have a wireless keyboard and touchpad? (though would probably have one of these as well for websurfing on the TV)
http://www.firebox.com/product/2691/Air-Keyboard?via=ser
Its still a keyboard like, as opposed to a more media biased remote, but pretty cool nonetheless and solves the problem of seperate mouse/touchpad.
Which of these things do you think you would be unable to do with the link posted by L3nny?
Sorry don't follow you there?? Should be able to do the lot.
I personally use a PS3 or just plug my laptop into the TV via HDMI on the rare occasion I want to play a file format the PS3 doesn't like and I don't have time to convert it.
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 12:08 PM
Should be able to do the lot.
It will be able to do the lot, though he may need to purchase the DVD/RW drive separately as it's an optional extra.
Which is why I'm asking the question. Which bit did Pimp Cat think it wouldn't be able to do?
Ahh right, yer that is just a barebones system so memory and drives would eed to be purchased as well.
Pimp Cat
20-01-11, 12:24 PM
I'm sure that the one in the link from lenny would be able to do all that but the dvd writer / extra hard drives would have to be in there own caddy and pluged in by usb meaning more power leads usb leads and ending up with 3 / 4 little boxes instead of one bigger one.
Bluepete
20-01-11, 12:33 PM
A Sony Bluray player links to our wifi network. It streams all the content off the laptops and the kids PC. Plus, it is wired to the router so streams BBC Iplayer, demand five etc, plus loads of other internet TV. You can surf the net and control it all via an Ipad. I can plug an SD card or USB dongle into it to deal with images and HD videos from my camera.
For mass storage, an external HDD plugsinto the back via another USB and I can send data and images to that via the Wifi.
£150 for the Bluray
Pete ;)
You can fit an internal DVD writer to that box but if you want to be able to fit full size hard drives then that's not for you so I guess I will have to try harder to win the vending machine bounty.
If you want to go with that case on Ebay, then pretty much any compononets will fit so just buy the most powerful ones you can afford.
Ebuyer is pretty good for components.
-Ralph-
20-01-11, 01:02 PM
Personally to expand on storage I'd buy a NAS device, not plug in extra USB's, which is why I said it's a pity it doesn't have Gigabit Ethernet, but if BluePete's is streaming eveything over WiFi... does it really need Gigabit?
The NAS device can sit in a cupboard somewhere, give you literally terabytes of extra storage, and act as a shared central data repository for the whole family to get access to the same music collection, photo's, videos, etc from laptops, iPhones, etc, and also act as a backup device for those laptops, etc.
Of course it's up to you, if you want to build a PC, go ahead. I'm just saying what I would do.
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