Thread: Home Theater PC

How many of you have a Home Theater PC as part of your home theater installation??

Did you buy an off the shelf HTPC or did you build it/have someone build it for you?

Specs? What Media Center software do you run/prefer???

Originally Posted by socal714

How many of you have a Home Theater PC as part of your home theater installation??

Did you buy an off the shelf HTPC or did you build it/have someone build it for you?

Specs? What Media Center software do you run/prefer???

some off the shelf "htpc" are not worth the money from the reviews I have seen on AVS, so I am building my own.

Intel Core i7-3770K Ivy Bridge
ASRock Z77 Extreme4-M
G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (4 x 2GB)
Dont know what GPU yet :/ (I will game along with movies.. From what I have read about IVB chips is that it takes out the need for a gpu for "light" gaming)
600watt PSU
Celton TV tuner
give or take 8TB -20TB lol


oh and Maybe watercool lol.

I have a Nmediapc 5000b case ( I dont like it.. so I waiting for a wisena case lol)

Right now I use my laptop (HP HDX16) via HDMI to my tv lol.

I use windows media center, its free, and easy to set-up. Many plug-ins.

I also use XBMC. I dont like the whole no live tv native thing yet. Many plug-ins.

I not only plan on saving my movie collection but play modern games like battlefield3 or black-ops in ultra settings also include Control4 for automation ect, ect, ect ....

What exactly is a home theater pc used for/do?

window media center.



XBMC


I figured it would be easier to throw a video then to read lol.

beats spending $20k for a kaleidoscope system.

only down side, this is a gray area, since you rip blue-rays and dvd's to a hard drive, but if your not into the illegal distribution, then you are fine

Originally Posted by Dirty*Penguin

window media center.



XBMC


I figured it would be easier to throw a video then to read lol.

beats spending $20k for a kaleidoscope system.

only down side, this is a gray area, since you rip blue-rays and dvd's to a hard drive, but if your not into the illegal distribution, then you are fine

Just curious, what's the benefit of using a media center vs Renting the movies off iTunes/Netflix etc..?

Originally Posted by VR1

Just curious, what's the benefit of using a media center vs Renting the movies off iTunes/Netflix etc..?

In a media center setup you typically own all your media, as opposed to renting. Also you can keep all your music, pictures, videos in 1 place, and then on your tv via xbmc or whatever, play anything you have.
I have over 200 movies, dozens of tv shows (full seasons), almost 20 years worth of pictures and home videos my dad ripped from old VHSs and negative camera rolls. All on a 4TB buffalo NAS drive hooked up to a media center, hooked up to the plasma.

You can still have iTunes/Netflix. Windows Media Center Netflix is part of the WMC program. On XBMC you have to add it as a plug in, just a little simple download, no biggy.

It takes time to set-up a home theater computer, and that's on my laptop with the little messing around I have done. I can only imagine when I have more hard drives for programs, games and add my movie collection lol.

WOW, I love the XBMC setup!! Where would one start to learn to build a hardcore home theater PC??? I have and always been a Mac user, know nothing about PCs...

Originally Posted by MSRT8:Nik

WOW, I love the XBMC setup!! Where would one start to learn to build a hardcore home theater PC??? I have and always been a Mac user, know nothing about PCs...

you can buy something like this:
http://www.asus.com.au/Eee/EeeBox_PC...1021/#overview
or
Newegg.com - Zotac ZBOX ZBOX-ID82-U Nettop Computer - Intel Core i3 i3-2330M 2.20 GHz

slap on a copy of windows, install XBMC, they already have a HDD inside them, but if you want a larger one, you can either just hook up an external, or replace the one it came with, (i use a 4TB NAS drive). At that point you have a full computer in your living room. if you just keep XBMC always running, you'll never have a problem. you can set up a remote app on your iphone/ipad/android device and control it from you couch. you'll have full streaming services like netflix etc, and if you download / rip movies, you can do it right to that device. or if it's to a different device, it'll autoscan and automatically update it's library when you get something new.

really not difficult to make a htpc, and making a bigass and expensive one is basically useless, since HD video is not intense on the hardware at all.

hope that helped a bit

You can ditch windows7 and go linux/ubuntu for the zotac or ASUS unit. IMHO, those units suck, I had a Zotax unit and a blew chunks, no optical drive, you have to usb install OS, its would struggle at times and get hot as hell.

You can build a ITX or mITX units for around the same price with window, programs( xbmc, coded stuff ect ect.), Blue-ray drives,1tb HD and 3d/1080p capable.