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I am looking for an HTPC that I can watch movies/tv shows, play some emulators and hop on the internet to watch Hulu. Is a $400+ custom build necessary for these tasks or is there a smaller PC or nettop that I won't have to mess with and will just work with little tampering? What's the advantage of a big build?
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Thanks so much for responding! I'm checking out your guide now. So do you think the ZOTAC ND-22 is perfectly fine for what I'm looking for? (movies, emulators, hulu?)
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eskro
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2011-04-19, 18:23
(This post was last modified: 2011-04-19, 18:25 by eskro.)
yes it is...
things it doesnt do is playing 3D movies or pass HD-Audio to a compatible Audio/Video receiver....
but other than that, you'll be fine...
if i were to buy a nettop it would definitely be a ZOTAC ND-22....
but again, if your capable of building your own system, go for it! we can help!
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Now that I look at it, the cost of the Zotac is $269, while half of eskro's custom builds from his thread are that price or less. Is the difference in production out of the customs greater than the convenience of just plugging in a nettop? Btw I have no experience building PCs, I'm a Mac man...
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2011-04-20, 00:55
(This post was last modified: 2011-04-20, 01:00 by SpectreX.)
It depends on what you want from the machine and what OS you want to use on it.
An ION/Atom build is the lowest machine, plays back 1080p but doesn`t do HD audio bitstreaming or 3D Blu Ray. Works fine (out of the box) on Windows + Linux.
An AMD Zacate E350 platform has a better/faster CPU, does HD audio bitstreaming, lower power consumption than Atom/ION, no 3D Blu Ray and works out of the box with Windows, Linux support still needs some tweaking (installing some libraries, compiling your own version of XBMC with VAAPI support etc).
Then comes the Intel Core i3 SandyBridge CPUs, Nvidia GT430 with do HD audio bistreaming, 3D Blu Ray support.
You can build any of these in a small miniITX form factor (mini-ITX = small as a nettop). Or buy a pre-built one from Zotac or AsRock if the price seems ok to you. Generally speaking, bulding yourself means lower costs than a pre-built one.