My HTPC potential setup
#1
Hello guys,

This is my first post to the forums but the support and information I've got from reading other posts over the past few weeks has been astonishing! What a wealth of clever, dedicated and helpful people!

Here's what I think my budget HTPC is going to consist of:
  • Case - Inwin BL641 (300w PSU included) - £55 (ebay)
  • Grahpics - Asus GT430 (engt430) low profile - £45 (amazon)
  • Mobo - Gigabyte S1155 Intel H61 DDR3 mATX - £42 (dabs)
  • CPU - Celeron G530 - £33 (ebay)
  • RAM - 1 x 4gb 1066mhz DDR3 - £19 (novatech)
  • Additional NIC - PCE-e low profile gigabit card - ~£10 (ebay)
  • HD - 1.5TB Green WD (already owned)
  • Harmony remote & IR receiver (already owned)

So basically I'm replacing my current Zotac ION mini-itx setup sitting under my TV in the living room. Running Ubuntu, it has the following tasks:
  • Acts as firewall/internet gateway with some QOS/filtering (the reason I need an additional NIC)
  • Runs home automation scripts for heating & lighting (a bunch of homebrew Perl scripts and mySQL DB with Apache/PHP serving as a front end. A really geeky passion of mine!)
  • XBMC (sickbeard, couchpotato, sabnzbd providing most the content)

Suprisingly, the Zotac ION has done me really proud over the last year or so but recently I'm starting to get a bit of stutter & dropped frames in movies (usually 1080p) when the machine inevitably has other things to do (unpacking nzbs, tricky mySQL queries etc).

I've managed to tame these issues (for the most part) by setting process priorities and also a script detecting when XBMC is playing and throttling CPU intensive background daemons.

As you can probably tell from my specs I'm on a budget but would really welcome any advice.

A few questions I currently have:

1) Has anyone had any experience with the Inwin 641 case? Is the PSU quiet? Low noise is obviously a big factor an HTPC. I could always swap it out if I find it too loud I suppose.

Also considering the Silverstone ML03B which seems to be very well thought of but would mean shelling out more and requires a seperate PSU.

Because of the restrictions of my TV cabinet any case I choose has to be under 13.5cm or failing that a major review of my entertainment system layout!

Really looking for at least 2 x 3.5" hdd slots in the case as I will no doubt add more storage when prices eventually return to normal! Also looking to get a 2.5" SSD system drive in the near future too.

2) Asus GT430 seems a good bet with for Linux with VDPAU etc and perhaps a bit more future proof than a GeForce g210? I have been reading posts about not being able to get the sound to work over HDMI. Is this still an issue?

3) Have gone down the Sandy Bridge 1155 route, again for a bit of future-proofness. I reckon a Celeron G530 should be ample just now if my current Atom based setup is only JUST struggling!

This setup should also give me the option to experiment with CPU only graphics if Intel ever get 24p properly sorted.

My thanks in advance for any help/advice/suggestions you can give! Smile
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#2
1) nope but its likely to have a crappy PSU. noisy too.

2) there's tweaks to get the HDMI sound work under LInux. GT430 is for 3D playback.

3) yes, G530 is enough for HTPC use, definitely pawns your ATOM CPU on the ZOTAC.
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#3
Go for the ML03 really nice case.
With the PSU I dont really know what you can buy in the UK, in germany its hard to get the smaller Seasonics so I got a be quiet 350w its really silent and kinda cheap.
Enermax Ecos should also be good but again I dont know about the availability in the UK.
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#4
Thanks guys. Think you may have sold me on the ML03. Thanks for the PSU advice TeKo, I'll do some more research Smile

Edit: I've come across the Corsair corsair CX430 for £35. Seems like a good buy?
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