[eriksmith200]

I'm looking at buying the following completely passively cooled system. It will be a dedicated XBMC box, running windows. It will occasionally be used for some web browsing (mainly YouTube):

• APU: AMD A4-5300 3,4GHz Dual Core 65W
  
• Motherboard: MSI FM2-A75IA-E53
  
• Case: Streacom FC8 Evo Silver
  
• Remote: Streacom Infrared Receiver + Remote
  
• Memory: Kingston HyperX Blu KHX1600C9D3B1K2/4GX
  
• SSD: OCZ Vertex Plus Sata II 2,5" SSD 30GB
  
• PSU: Mini-box picoPSU 120 + 80W Adapter Power Kit
  

(note: I still have to verify if the motherboard fits with the heat-pipes of the case)

I have a few questions:

• Will the picoPSU 120 + 80W adapter work for this system? Will a picoPSU 90 + 80W adapter suffice?
  
• Will it make a difference if I get slower (cheaper) memory?
  
• Is the AMD A4-5300 (dual core) the best 65W CPU to get for a dedicated XBMC box or does XBMC benefit from a quad core CPU?
  

[hdtracer]

See this guy, he made the build with the streacom FC8 case and the MSI mobo:
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=146006

The 90+80W will do more then enough The thing you have to watch is that the PSU has 24 pins and not 20 otherwise it will not fit.

[eriksmith200]

Thanks for the info and the tip, just what I need

[Baswazz]

Another option is the Intel Nuc:
https://www.google.nl/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=i...4034,d.d2k
https://www.google.nl/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=i...4034,d.d2k

It is possible to make the Nuc passively cooled.
http://www.tranquilpcshop.co.uk/nuc/

It is small and energy friendly.

Another passive cooled HTPC with pics:
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=166339

[tential]

I highly doubt you'll see a bonus from using a Quad Core CPU vs Dual Core in XBMC.

Pros of the AMD APU compared to intel:
-Better IGP performance than intel
You'll be able to run low resolution games and ok quality levels. Nothing Spectacular
Cons:
-Slower processing in general:
I really don't know how this will exactly effect you. The problem with benchmarking this kind of stuff and reading reviews about it is that on average, all of this stuff feels THE SAME between most modern day processors. A $1000 processor will get a much higher productivity than my current processor that's 5 years old in a laptop, yet I highly doubt we'll see much of a difference in everyday tasks of webbrowsing and Microsoft Word, despite the increased score. I'm sure my new Desktop I'm setting up has better "productivity" scores but in real world performance I don't think the average user gets to see it.

Here is the review:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/dis...html#sect0

Lists most choices in your budget for CPU. Just ignore the gaming results. No one games at 1080p Medium Settings and expects playable games on integrated graphics. This is simply Hardware Enthusiasts being weird and refusing to be reasonable when benchmarking such things.

If you want better CPU/Mobo help though you have to say why you picked the processor you did (what do you want to do in short)?
I'd pick Intel for anything, and AMD for gaming. I'm not a huge fan of AMD only because it runs hotter and less power efficient.