i wanted to make a media pc for my front room so i can stream movies etc from my soon to be built home server but im not 100% sure what i should be putting inside it as im not sure how much cpu power it takes to stream movies etc how much ram i should and what sort of video card plus anything i should put in it or may need
media pc specs
- Thread starter Pugsport
- Start date
sheroo
New member
Unless you are gaming or you want 23.976 fps playback you don't need a discrete gpu. I'd go with an i3 2105 Sandy Bridge (dual core & has HD 3000 graphics), go 64 bit Windows 7 with 4GB ram and your choice of ssd or hdd depending on how much stuff you want to store locally.
Install MediaBrowser & the Shark007 codecs and you will be able to play just about anything.
You don't need a super high spec system unless you are gaming.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the-sandy-bridge-review-intel-core-i7-2600k-i5-2500k-core-i3-2100-tested/7
Install MediaBrowser & the Shark007 codecs and you will be able to play just about anything.
You don't need a super high spec system unless you are gaming.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the-sandy-bridge-review-intel-core-i7-2600k-i5-2500k-core-i3-2100-tested/7
thanks for that
im not sure i guess it may end up being used for games every now and then but maybe not so much to start off with. i guess i maybe better off not using a card in it or using my old 3850x2 in it for now and see how things go. looks like a good setup and i guess the i3 would be ok for light gaming with a GPU. even tho it will be in the living room i still want to try not to game on it and just use xbox and playstation there as i dont really want to have to have a huge ugly case there as well. well if i can get away with not using it for a gaming pc at all and streaming media from server then i hope i can get away with not having that big of a hard drive in there altho i had been thinking about looking into tv cards so i could record tv programs if im not about to watch them but i guess its depends how good they are aand if they are worth the money?
Zotac do some amazing itx boards you can get some with built in cpus too.
small is good but how good is the intel atom? as that what most of them come with right
If you have a PS3 you can stream movies from your PC. You just need a wired network connection (wireless is too slow) and PS3MediaServer installed on your PC.
http://code.google.com/p/ps3mediaserver/
http://code.google.com/p/ps3mediaserver/
sheroo
New member
If you want to record tv and are using something like Windows Home Server for your storage server, the stuff will record on your media center and then be archived off to you home server. This is the setup that I'm using atm - I only have an 80GB SSD in my HTPC. There is another amazing free product called MediaPortal - that will allow all the recordings to take place on the server & for you to schedule them on any other PC or iPad even - but its more difficult to set up.
Good TV Card, don't bother with the bundled software - its rubbish, best used with Windows Media Center. Its a dual dvb-t card which means you can get all of the freeview channels, can watch one while recording another - I'm using 2 and they are rock solid. If you want to get the HD channels then your best off with a satellite dvb-s2 card. There aren't many dvb-t2 (freeview HD) cards about - and I would avoid BlackGold - as they are quite happy to leave their customers high and dry without driver upgrades (I speak from personal experience).
Any other questions just ask - as you can guess I've been researching and building media centers for quite a while - will be upgrading mine in the new year hopefully.
Good TV Card, don't bother with the bundled software - its rubbish, best used with Windows Media Center. Its a dual dvb-t card which means you can get all of the freeview channels, can watch one while recording another - I'm using 2 and they are rock solid. If you want to get the HD channels then your best off with a satellite dvb-s2 card. There aren't many dvb-t2 (freeview HD) cards about - and I would avoid BlackGold - as they are quite happy to leave their customers high and dry without driver upgrades (I speak from personal experience).
Any other questions just ask - as you can guess I've been researching and building media centers for quite a while - will be upgrading mine in the new year hopefully.
I use my PS3 for streaming from my server, Netflix, and Blu-Ray/DVD. I play maybe a game or two a year on it.
