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[tigers_gonads]

Okay, got a bit of a dilemma

My DVD player is on its last legs.
The Hard drive recorder has no digital tuner.
I have literally 1000's of tunes on MP3 on either dvd's of plug in hard drives which I tend to plug into my HiFi via the laptop.
Also, I listen to some internet radio channels.

Replacing this lot with decent quality stuff will cost me a arm and leg so had the mad idea of building a media centre to replace the lot 

I love computers but they hate me so it must be relatively easy to use 

Thinking about a ...............

Slim tower so that it can get stuffed along side the TV.

Reasonable graphics card with HDMI output for the pictures.

Reasonable sound card with RCA / optical / coax output for sound. (music will be played on a Cyrus 2 amp with RCA inputs / DVD or maybe even Blu-ray will be either optical or digital coax to a Yamaha DSP amp )

TV card fitted so that I can use the unit as a DVR.

Internet so that I can use internet radio.

I don't want wires trailing across the living room floor so a wireless keyboard and mouse to control the lot would be needed so I guess that means Bluetooth too 

To keep the cost down, i'd probably end up using a second hand tower and building from there.
I also have plenty of hard drives around and Win 7 Ultimate for the operating system.

I think that lot sounds about right but I haven't got a clue about spec or prices so that's where you lot come in hopefully 

Anybody got something similar ?

[deviator]

OK off the wall suggestion. Try one of these. (First link, for mx box, I haven't checked the pricing or spec to see if there is a better one for you).

There is two things it can't do on your list, play DVD's and DVR, although both are probably resolvable via USB devices.

[Viral_Jim]

Bit left field, but a second hand PS3 and one of THESE would probably do all you want at a fraction of the time and expense of building up a tower pc ie:

DVR (via play tv)
Blue Ray
HDMI out
Optical sound out
Built in Wifi
Easy to use GUI
Bluetooth
choice of controller "proper" blu ray remote or wireless keyboard
Looks neater than any of the budget pc cases out there.

500GB ps3 can be had for about £100-120 from CEX with a warranty. 


EDIT - And I thought my suggestion was cheap deviator 

[deviator]

EDIT - And I thought my suggestion was cheap deviator 

I have one under my TV that I use for all those legal streaming services. It's also a passive box (no fan, no hdd) so is as silent as they come. It's about 2/3 the size of ext 3.5" hdd bay.

[TheBoy]

These come up occasionally on egay:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Elonex-Artisan-M-Pentium-4-with-250W-PSU-DVI-VGA-AV-WIFI-Media-Centre-Working-/251959943983?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item3aa9fba32f

(that one is too expensive, and has one of the front flaps missing). That makes a perfect media centre case (although you'll never get the VFD to work reliably under Windows 7).  Rip out the mobo, and put in a mATX board and a decent i3 or low spec i5  *AND USE THE CPU's INTEGRATED GRAPHICS*.  Couple this up to a fickin big HDD and a pair of Blackgold dual tuners and you'll be close to what I have.

I personally use an MS MCE keyboard, but they are not available new now, so you could try one of the many Rii keyboards (Amazon, £15 ish, but make sure you get UK layout in your chosen format).


The one downside of Vista and later is you can only have one audio endpoint (unlike XP ), so you can't pump audio to amp via SPDIF and to the telly via HDMI simultaneously.

Its well known I am a heavy Media Center user, so if you are planning on using the Microsoft Windows Media Center, I can advise .  But be aware, support for W7 ends in 2020, and Win10 has no Media Center.

[TheBoy]

Mine is that Artisan case, DH67GD mobo, low power i5 (dual core HT) which is similar performance to top notch i3 (but lower power usage), 2Gb RAM, 2 Blackgold BTG3620's and a 3Tb HDD.  Photos and music are stored on a separate server.

2 XBOX360s allow me to use Media Center in 2 other rooms.

[tigers_gonads]

Thanks for that lot TB 
Just found this on egay

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Elonex-Artisan-LX-Media-Centre-PC-windows-bargain-/321770527622?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item4aeb049b86

Would this be a good starting point for the build ?

Had a dig around this morning and found a few hard drives which i've dropped in a caddy and are checking them for bad sectors as I type and a couple of DVD burners off old pc's which have been stuffed in various cubby holes in the house for years 

Also found a couple of disc's with windows XP pro on which I have acquired over the years 
Would these be better then stuffing Win 7 Ultimate on ?

Cheers 

[aaronjb]

TB - how quiet is that case with a modern low power CPU etc in it?  I have a couple of (now quiet aged Atom based) Asus EEE PCs (EB1502P) which are getting a little bit noisy as the fan etc gets tired and they bug me, especially in the bedroom.. I'd love a silent setup but then you start talking serious money

[TheBoy]

Thanks for that lot TB 
Just found this on egay

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Elonex-Artisan-LX-Media-Centre-PC-windows-bargain-/321770527622?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item4aeb049b86

Would this be a good starting point for the build ?

Had a dig around this morning and found a few hard drives which i've dropped in a caddy and are checking them for bad sectors as I type and a couple of DVD burners off old pc's which have been stuffed in various cubby holes in the house for years 

Also found a couple of disc's with windows XP pro on which I have acquired over the years 
Would these be better then stuffing Win 7 Ultimate on ?

Cheers 

I bought one of those, for spares should any part of mine fail.  Doesn't come with the proprietry drive holder, so will need a bit of meccano mounting.

Bin the mobo, its shit. Or to try if you get on with media center, get a cpu (I paid £1.75 delivered (but note that mobo is fussy on cpu)) and use old ddr. It will run, but not great.

[TheBoy]

TB - how quiet is that case with a modern low power CPU etc in it?  I have a couple of (now quiet aged Atom based) Asus EEE PCs (EB1502P) which are getting a little bit noisy as the fan etc gets tired and they bug me, especially in the bedroom.. I'd love a silent setup but then you start talking serious money

Only 2 fans are in psu.  Mine must be 8yrs old, and fans still fairly quite.  The HDD spinning up when it wakes from s3 is noisier

[deviator]

TB - how quiet is that case with a modern low power CPU etc in it?  I have a couple of (now quiet aged Atom based) Asus EEE PCs (EB1502P) which are getting a little bit noisy as the fan etc gets tired and they bug me, especially in the bedroom.. I'd love a silent setup but then you start talking serious money

Only 2 fans are in psu.  Mine must be 8yrs old, and fans still fairly quite.  The HDD spinning up when it wakes from s3 is noisier

From what I've read, you seem quite techie so try this. Most HDD makers have a firmware settings tool you can play with. When I ran a PC as a media centre, I ran the drives at either 3800 or 4200rpm instead of the 5400rpm my storage drives were normally. This extends the life of the drive, reduces heat and makes you AV PC a lot quieter for no cost. The downside is data transfer is slower, but you never really thrash a media centre PC anyway.

PLEASE NOTE - These tools are not for the faint hearted. Only do this if you know the implications, I accept no responsibility, ever!

[omega2018]

i've got a similar problem - my compro e700 twin tuner is about to expire.  can anyone recommend a twin tuner - has to be pci express and has to be twin terrestrial tuner preferably hdtv?

this one 361155942947 on ebay looks possible, a TBS 6281.

i vaguely recall there is a catch with some tuners but can't remember what it is.  no hd tv in the uk or not compatible with mce perhaps?

[tigers_gonads]

Thanks for that lot TB 
Just found this on egay

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Elonex-Artisan-LX-Media-Centre-PC-windows-bargain-/321770527622?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item4aeb049b86

Would this be a good starting point for the build ?

Had a dig around this morning and found a few hard drives which i've dropped in a caddy and are checking them for bad sectors as I type and a couple of DVD burners off old pc's which have been stuffed in various cubby holes in the house for years 

Also found a couple of disc's with windows XP pro on which I have acquired over the years 
Would these be better then stuffing Win 7 Ultimate on ?

Cheers 

I bought one of those, for spares should any part of mine fail.  Doesn't come with the proprietry drive holder, so will need a bit of meccano mounting.

Bin the mobo, its shit. Or to try if you get on with media center, get a cpu (I paid £1.75 delivered (but note that mobo is fussy on cpu)) and use old ddr. It will run, but not great.

Thanks for that lot TB 

Just a couple of more questions from one of the leading OOF techno numpty's 

You mention the motherboard is shite. Are you saying that in the future, I can basically rip the old board out / cpu out and replace it with something from the 21 century complete with new tv / sound cards and it will mate up to the case controls with no problems ?

Also am I right in thinking that I would be better using Windows XP as the operating system ?


Deviator

I know what you mean about burning out hard drives and i'll look into that if and when 
I once left a 160 gig one in a caddy spinning for 10 days when I pished off on holidays 
It worked okay for about 5 minutes then went tits up so ended up wrapping it in a poly bag and sandwiching it between 3 ice packs to get it to run. I got most of the pictures off it but that took me a good 3 weeks 

[Kevin Wood]

I've just retired a hard drive that's been spinning since 2009, excluding the odd power cut. Still perfectly healthy. I think they survive better if they are just left running.

[tigers_gonads]

I've just retired a hard drive that's been spinning since 2009, excluding the odd power cut. Still perfectly healthy. I think they survive better if they are just left running.

Fair point that.
Constant spin up / down / wear on the bering.
Mine was bolted into a caddy at the time so had no cooling whatsoever and it must have been a few years old 

Is it fair to say it is best to leave these things running, say from morning to bedtime (if the cooling is decent) ?

Also to add .............. Just been looking at I3 /I5 motherboard bundles.
Noticed that most of these bundles have 6gb or more of RAM.
Iirc, 32bit windows can only actually recognise about 4gig so is it a waste of time having more or is does media player see something different ?

Apologies if i'm talking 'dangle berries' here, I might have bolted PC's together to make a few quid may years ago but I never claimed to understand what the fick I was doing so be gentle with me