[joelwatsonfish]

I'd like to set up an HTPC, but I haven't built a computer in at least a decade. I was thinking of trying to simplify life by just buying a bare bones pc. In particular, I've been looking at the following:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6856205005

and I was wondering if this would fit my needs. Basically we want to cut the cord and stream Netflix, Hulu plus, watch movies on iTunes, back up and watch our own dvds, and use a program like PlayOn to (re)stream to other wireless devices in the house (in particular, to stream to a TV in the living room). Depending on the apartment layout (we are moving soon) we may also use a powerline device to stream from the HTPC, which will be located in the bedroom, to the TV in the living room. We almost certainly won't be playing any graphics intensive video games (nothing newer than five years old, and probably not even that). In fact we could probably do with no video games at all, but you never know.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

[Dougie Fresh]

I think you could build your own for less and have a more powerful (but no too powerful) system given your requirements. Something G530/G620 or A6-based would do the job. You could also go with a barebones if you didn't want to build it out yourself (just add an SSD and Windows -- assuming Windows since you mention Netflix and Hulu). There have been a few A6-based bedroom HTPCs built here lately and there is a barebones of these builds available for much less than the barebones you linked.

[GortWillSaveUs]

In my experience,...I tried the "Barebones" system that most sites offer. I've had nothing but grief when I have tried building one.
Either they were just that,..BAREBONES,...or they were overly expensive, and still missing critical parts.

I'd highly recommend building your own system using individual parts you've personally chosen.

[bluray]

Why barebone? If you want to make life easier, just get a prebuilt and it should be ready for XBMC out of the box- Xtreamer Ultra2, Lenovo IdeaCentre Q180 ........

[assassin]

Why would anyone intentionally buy a zacate or atom?

Isn't a llano or celeron/pentium a much better choice?

[bluray]

Why would anyone intentionally buy a zacate or atom?

Isn't a llano or celeron/pentium a much better choice?

Those two prebuilt I suggested included a nice GPU in it......the price is right for everything they included, and it should playback everything in his OP.....

For sure, he can build a more powerful HTPC for less money........

[assassin]

Why would anyone intentionally buy a zacate or atom?

Isn't a llano or celeron/pentium a much better choice?

Those two prebuilt I suggested included a nice GPU in it......the price is right for everything they included, and it should playback everything in his OP.....

For sure, he can build a more powerful HTPC for less money........

I disagree. This is what he said...

Basically we want to cut the cord and stream Netflix, Hulu plus, watch movies on iTunes, back up and watch our own dvds, and use a program like PlayOn to (re)stream to other wireless devices in the house (in particular, to stream to a TV in the living room).

He is going to have a lot of problems with what you recommended.

[bluray]

Basically we want to cut the cord and stream Netflix, Hulu plus, watch movies on iTunes, back up and watch our own dvds, and use a program like PlayOn to (re)stream to other wireless devices in the house (in particular, to stream to a TV in the living room).

He is going to have a lot of problems with what you recommended.

I read this "Zotac ZBOX ID80 Plus Mini PC Review" a while ago.....they said it can stream HD conten from the web fine.....the ZBOX in the test have identical "2.13 Dual Core Intel Cedar Trail Atom D2700 and Geforce GT 520M" as what I suggested......

and this guy in AVS- Lenovo Q180 - Atom D2700 - not bad so far

it seems to handle XBMC really well too- Xtreamer Ultra2 - Raw Video Demo

[assassin]

Basically we want to cut the cord and stream Netflix, Hulu plus, watch movies on iTunes, back up and watch our own dvds, and use a program like PlayOn to (re)stream to other wireless devices in the house (in particular, to stream to a TV in the living room).

He is going to have a lot of problems with what you recommended.

I read this "Zotac ZBOX ID80 Plus Mini PC Review" a while ago.....they said it can stream HD conten from the web fine.....the ZBOX in the test have identical "2.13 Dual Core Intel Cedar Trail Atom D2700 and Geforce GT 520M" as what I suggested......

and this guy in AVS- Lenovo Q180 - Atom D2700 - not bad so far

it seems to handle XBMC really well too- Xtreamer Ultra2 - Raw Video Demo

Hmmm.....

1080p MKV file with DTS soundtrack - sound dropouts. Oh well, the joys of HTPC.

Everything seems OK except for the video streaming.

While watching Netflix streaming on the Q180 the video, sometimes it is OK but quite often (maybe 50% of the time) it is extremely jerky with somewhat fuzzy images. I tried Netflix inside of Windows Media Center and also at the website in Google Chrome. Same results for both. Whenever the video streaming was bad, I would check my internet speed, and it always read between 8 and 12 Mbps.

The results are the same bad streaming each time.

Netflix streaming is very bad.

I sent the 180 back. I think its a good machine, but with my wireless internet, I need something with more horsepower.

I did not send mine back but it went to my wife's office for Microsoft Office duty.

The thing just can't do streaming video, Atom is just not enough for that.

And more...

And then the best parts of that thread...

I have a hard time understanding the attraction of an underpowered Atom for $300 or $350 when for $330 one can buy a full fledged small pc with a G620 cpu, decent graphics, 4gb of ram etc. BTW, just as a point of comparison, the Passmark score for the Atom D2700 is 763. The Passmark score for the G620 is 2480. There is no comparison. And it leaves at least some capability for repairs and upgrades.

Just a quick update. I did build an HTPC based on the Intel I3 SandyBridge. I was looking for something that would be equal to my LG BX580, but this system far surpasses it. Netflix comes in with no pixelization; just a little fuzziness when my internet signal is bad. Most of the time the picture looks great. I guess the built in graphics of the I3 makes it a lot better for streaming than the Atom processor.

Don't use atom or zacate. There just is no point as there are better options for about the same or just a little more money. And don't believe everything that "they" say. Sometimes "they" don't know what they are talking about.

[assassin]

I read this "Zotac ZBOX ID80 Plus Mini PC Review" a while ago.....they said it can stream HD conten from the web fine.....the ZBOX in the test have identical "2.13 Dual Core Intel Cedar Trail Atom D2700 and Geforce GT 520M" as what I suggested......

BTW I had time to read that review. I didn't see anywhere where they test Netflix HD.

[Dougie Fresh]

I tested it, albeit without the integrated GT520M, and I was able to test Netflix HD with the latest Silverlight (the previous would not play at all). There was a lot of stuttering. I have not tried reducing my account settings to 'medium' as suggested elsewhere here to see if it will stop the stuttering. CPU usage was not 100% so I suspected a driver issue at the time (two months ago). I haven't retested it. I have no idea if the GT520M would make a difference.

I can say however for the price of the D2700 + GT520M motherboard wholesale, I could buy an i3-2100 + H61 + low profile cooler and not just at MicroCenter. So, even if worked, it would not be worth it. I won't be building any.

I also was not impressed with the overall performance of the system, even compared to the D525MW, but I hear it's better these days, likely due to improved drivers. I like Atom for small, cheap and passive non-HTPC (surfing/Facebook/etc.) builds and Zacate, at least the ASUS E35M1-I with the 6 x SATA mini-ITX motherboard has made for a very good server board. The ASUS C60M1-I looks like an interesting NAS board.

But, yeah, Windows HTPC not so much considering the price-to-peformance.

[bluray]

I read this "Zotac ZBOX ID80 Plus Mini PC Review" a while ago.....they said it can stream HD conten from the web fine.....the ZBOX in the test have identical "2.13 Dual Core Intel Cedar Trail Atom D2700 and Geforce GT 520M" as what I suggested......

BTW I had time to read that review. I didn't see anywhere where they test Netflix HD.

They didn't say much about it, but at beginning of the article they said-

"Unless you live way out in the boonies, you're probably rocking a broadband Internet connection, which is your gateway to any number of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, HBO Go, VUDU, Pandora, and so forth. With so much online content to choose from, you could easily ditch your cable provider and not skip a beat.

In order to do that, you need a way to pipe all that content into your living room. Companies looking to cash in on the streaming craze have begun rolling out set-top media players at a frenzied pace. Minus a fancy feature here and there, these are mostly basic boxes designed to grab hold of feeds from cyberspace and pipe them through to your HDTV. They're simple solutions, but not as sexy as a dedicated home theater PC (HTPC)."

and at the end they said-

"Streaming video is really what the ZBOX ID80 Plus is all about, and while the system struggles with 3D gaming, it does a much better job serving up HD content from the Web and on your desktop. In the screenshot above, we streamed a 1080p movie trailer in full screen from YouTube over an 802.11n Wi-Fi connection and watched the CPU utilization bounce around from 10 percent to 15 percent."

[assassin]

I read this "Zotac ZBOX ID80 Plus Mini PC Review" a while ago.....they said it can stream HD conten from the web fine.....the ZBOX in the test have identical "2.13 Dual Core Intel Cedar Trail Atom D2700 and Geforce GT 520M" as what I suggested......

BTW I had time to read that review. I didn't see anywhere where they test Netflix HD.

They didn't say much about it, but at beginning of the article they said-

"Unless you live way out in the boonies, you're probably rocking a broadband Internet connection, which is your gateway to any number of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, HBO Go, VUDU, Pandora, and so forth. With so much online content to choose from, you could easily ditch your cable provider and not skip a beat.

In order to do that, you need a way to pipe all that content into your living room. Companies looking to cash in on the streaming craze have begun rolling out set-top media players at a frenzied pace. Minus a fancy feature here and there, these are mostly basic boxes designed to grab hold of feeds from cyberspace and pipe them through to your HDTV. They're simple solutions, but not as sexy as a dedicated home theater PC (HTPC)."

and at the end they said-

"Streaming video is really what the ZBOX ID80 Plus is all about, and while the system struggles with 3D gaming, it does a much better job serving up HD content from the Web and on your desktop. In the screenshot above, we streamed a 1080p movie trailer in full screen from YouTube over an 802.11n Wi-Fi connection and watched the CPU utilization bounce around from 10 percent to 15 percent."

YouTube HD is a lot different than Netflix HD.

And as I pointed out that AVS thread you linked had more than a few disappointed users.

[bluray]

I tested it, albeit without the integrated GT520M, and I was able to test Netflix HD with the latest Silverlight (the previous would not play at all). There was a lot of stuttering. I have not tried reducing my account settings to 'medium' as suggested elsewhere here to see if it will stop the stuttering. CPU usage was not 100% so I suspected a driver issue at the time (two months ago). I haven't retested it. I have no idea if the GT520M would make a difference.

I mentioned to you in several threads regarding the latest Silverlight. It doesn't work very well. Without adjusting video quality in your Netflix account, you'll have stuttering issue. It stuttering on the i5 too. It's a known issue.......and they haven't fix it.......they are doing as shown below at the momment-



and IdeaCentre Q180 have HD6450......

[Dougie Fresh]

The issue is Silverlight. Even though SL5 is supposed to have HW acceleration, Netflix is either not taking advantage of it or it's not working with DRM content or some other thing.

Here's the/a bug at Microsoft Connect:
http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudi...ix-content

Google "silverlight netflix" too see the latest. At least it's gone from doesn't work to should work .