[AndyB588]

I've been reading the forums for a while now and had built a big tower a few years ago for my office that also doubled as my HTPC. But I've gotten tired of switching between the office and living room set up and am now building a dedicated HTPC.

Below are the specs of what I've got on order.

But one thing that's got me stumped is the remote/mouse/keyboard. Currently I've got the Logitech K800 that lights up in my office and the Logitech Performance MX mouse and their both great. I had been using Bluetooth before but had to many interference issues. So now I use a Dell (but it's really a Logitech) Bluetooth multimedia keyboard, Logitech Dinovio Media Pad and a Gyration remote mouse. These are all a few years old and I find the Gyration mouse remote to be a pain to use.

Anyone tried either of these:

Cideko Air Keyboard Wireless Media Keyboard & Gyro Mouse

Superior Loftek Rii Touch N7 Mini Wireless Keyboard

New Build on order:
----------------------
Via Amazon:
SilverStone Lascala LC20B-M ATX Case
OCZ ModXStream Pro 500W Modular High-Performance Power Supply
Medialink - USB Bluetooth Adapter

Via NewEgg:
GIGABYTE GA-880GA-UD3H ATX AMD Motherboard
AMD Phenom II X4 945 3.0GHz Socket AM3 95W Quad-Core Desktop
Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB 3.5" SATA 6.0Gb/s
Corsair Force Series 3 CSSD-F60GB3-BK 2.5" Internal Solid State Drive
ENERMAX UC-8EB Case Fan x2
GELID Solutions FN-TX09-20 Case Fan x2
CORSAIR Vengeance 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2000
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional SP1 64-bit

[GundamWZero]

I've been reading the forums for a while now and had built a big tower a few years ago for my office that also doubled as my HTPC. But I've gotten tired of switching between the office and living room set up and am now building a dedicated HTPC.

Below are the specs of what I've got on order.

But one thing that's got me stumped is the remote/mouse/keyboard. Currently I've got the Logitech K800 that lights up in my office and the Logitech Performance MX mouse and their both great. I had been using Bluetooth before but had to many interference issues. So now I use a Dell (but it's really a Logitech) Bluetooth multimedia keyboard, Logitech Dinovio Media Pad and a Gyration remote mouse. These are all a few years old and I find the Gyration mouse remote to be a pain to use.

Anyone tried either of these:

Cideko Air Keyboard Wireless Media Keyboard & Gyro Mouse

Superior Loftek Rii Touch N7 Mini Wireless Keyboard

New Build on order:
----------------------
Via Amazon:
SilverStone Lascala LC20B-M ATX Case
OCZ ModXStream Pro 500W Modular High-Performance Power Supply
Medialink - USB Bluetooth Adapter

Via NewEgg:
GIGABYTE GA-880GA-UD3H ATX AMD Motherboard
AMD Phenom II X4 945 3.0GHz Socket AM3 95W Quad-Core Desktop
Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB 3.5" SATA 6.0Gb/s
Corsair Force Series 3 CSSD-F60GB3-BK 2.5" Internal Solid State Drive
ENERMAX UC-8EB Case Fan x2
GELID Solutions FN-TX09-20 Case Fan x2
CORSAIR Vengeance 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2000
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional SP1 64-bit

Get a Logitech diNovo Bluetooth Keyboard. It comes with a touchpad for the mouse. It is what I use to set up and shuffel movies.

Now, I also use the Logitech Harmony 1100 Advanced Remote to run my HTPC, XBMC and my audio video center. Some of its functions acts like a mouse as well... but I haven't fully programmed that remote yet.

[eskro]

Hello AndyB588,
PowerFuL HTPC your planning to buy!

its actually an overKiLL
you need that much power in your HTPC?

[AndyB588]

Re: Logitech diNovo Bluetooth Keyboard...

I used to have one a few years back and they are slick and great looking keyboards.. but I had nothing but trouble with the Logitech bluetooth drivers..

The remote that came with the case actually seems like it might be a decent mouse.. so we'll see.

The Harmony remote is pretty sweet as well.. though I'm thinking if I'm going to spend that much money I might maybe just get a droid tablet and use it as a wi-fi remote.

[AndyB588]

Yeah.. I kind of thought maybe that I was getting carried away,, but I can't help myself. Seems like I'm always in need of more power.. there's always some application that I need to install that is going to be way cooler than everything else.. and it always ends up being power hungry. It never ends.

Hopefully though the machine will be fairly quiet.

[bluray]

Andy- you'll enjoy your htpc. oh, my friend said his cideko air keyboard is awesome!

[Kirky99]

I know someone who really likes this: http://www.amazon.com/nMediapc-HTPCKB-Wi...272&sr=1-1

I was planning on having someone else order this for their setup.

I was able to play around a little bit and build quality seemed pretty good, I can't speak to range.

[Quartermass]

Did you have a look at the Pulse Eight one Andy?

[AndyB588]

Did you have a look at the Pulse Eight one Andy?

I like the concept but expect I'll want a larger keyboard, to email and surf the web from.

[eskro]

try the Superior Loftek Rii Touch N7 Mini Wireless Keyboard,
you might like it

[AndyB588]

I was pretty proud of my self last time when my last machine started up and ran flawlessly.. but this one has been more of a challenge.

I do tend to "skim" the instructions and read the details later.. not that any of these guys instruction manuals are much help anyways.

Via Amazon:
SilverStone Lascala LC20B-M ATX Case

I like the case, it looks great and feels pretty solid. As mentioned in other reviews the hard drive placement is kind of a pain and 6 drives would be tight. If I ever add any add in cards I'll have to extend the ATX 12V cable since the power supply is at the "bottom" of the case and so the cable has to run further than in a normal setup.

I think I like the iMon display and mouse set up.. but haven't used it enough for sure. I'm using a real mouse to set it all up.

OCZ ModXStream Pro 500W Modular High-Performance Power Supply

So far so good. And it is quiet.

Medialink - USB Bluetooth Adapter

So far so good.

Via NewEgg:
GIGABYTE GA-880GA-UD3H ATX AMD Motherboard v3.0
AMD Phenom II X4 945 3.0GHz Socket AM3 95W Quad-Core Desktop

The bios on this motherboard was a challenge. It took a couple tries to get the settings right for the SSD drive. And the bios seemed slow to respond, ie I'd change the setting and save then reboot and then no change, so I'd shut it down and then no change, so then I'd reset the bios.. it seemed as if the time necessary between changing settings took forever. Plus then I found out that if you have cdrom drive selected as one of the boot options it really slows down the boot.

But now that it's working it seems to be all good. The windows 7 index gives it a 7.3

Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB 3.5" SATA 6.0Gb/s

Corsair Force Series 3 CSSD-F60GB3-BK 2.5" Internal Solid State Drive

ENERMAX UC-8EB Case Fan x2
GELID Solutions FN-TX09-20 Case Fan x2

These fans are all pretty quiet.

CORSAIR Vengeance 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2000

This memory was a pain in the @ss. According to Gigabites website the DDR3 2000 was compatible, Corsairs website was a bit merky and Neweggs info was conflicting. After to many bluescreens of death I went and got some DDR3 1600. I couldn't get the latest memory to run at 1600 without crashing and so I just let the bios auto manage to 1333 and now it's running great.

I'm not an overclocker so this all very well could have been my fault, but in anycase it's working good now.

Microsoft Windows 7 Professional SP1 64-bit[/quote]

The windows 7 taskbar annoys me! Vista was nice because they let you live in the past and change your task bar to look like XP, so why won't 7 let me set it to look like Vista. I'll probably hide to hide it and find a launcher that is prettier. Or maybe the iMon launcher will do..

[eskro]

yeah sometimes RAM can be a pain in general,,,,

even tho the mobo is supposed to support it,

you often need to tweak its settings in order to have stable ram,,,,,

stuff like Timing / Voltage / mem Clock

it can be messy

[AndyB588]

yeah sometimes RAM can be a pain in general,,,,

even tho the mobo is supposed to support it,

you often need to tweak its settings in order to have stable ram,,,,,

stuff like Timing / Voltage / mem Clock

it can be messy

Mem's running good now.. but now one thing that's bugging me is the video.

Maybe this is just an ATI thing as my other as my other computer would do it to.. So when my Stereo Receiver (Pioneer VSX-820) and Flatscreen (Samsung LNA 40" 650) is turned off or changes source then my computer (i assume) thinks that my monitor is off and then maybe goes to sleep.

Then when I switch back to it I often have to log back in.. or I've ended up doing a hard reboot as I can't get the video back up.. even though, based on the sound effects, it sounds as if it's running normal.

Is this an HDMI thing, would I be better off using DVI? Anyone know how to shut down the "auto sensing" type function?

[bluray]

Mem's running good now.. but now one thing that's bugging me is the video.

Maybe this is just an ATI thing as my other as my other computer would do it to.. So when my Stereo Receiver (Pioneer VSX-820) and Flatscreen (Samsung LNA 40" 650) is turned off or changes source then my computer (i assume) thinks that my monitor is off and then maybe goes to sleep.

Then when I switch back to it I often have to log back in.. or I've ended up doing a hard reboot as I can't get the video back up.. even though, based on the sound effects, it sounds as if it's running normal.

Is this an HDMI thing, would I be better off using DVI? Anyone know how to shut down the "auto sensing" type function?

if there is an option in your pioneer setting, you need to set it to passthrough. this way, you still can watch movie with just htpc and htdtv without avr on!