cheap/small/quiet htpc...

ghostboarder · Post by **ghostboarder** » Mon Nov 08, 2004 8:18 pm

Hey guys, got a little cash set aside right now to build myself a nice little pvr/htpc. Games and uber high performance arent a priority. I have been considering Mini-itx, but at current prices, i could get a much more powerful Athlon or P4 system. I also have an extra cpu lying around doing nothing anyway. My main concerns are going to be noise and size. I want something small, sexy and quiet. The spare parts i have are:

1 Geforce 3 Ti200 128mb
1 AthlonXP 1800+
some ram
an extra hard drive or 2

So, i have almost all of the bases covered. What i need now is a mobo and case. Ideas? Remember, as small as possible, quiet, and cost effective

PPGMD · Post by **PPGMD** » Mon Nov 08, 2004 8:24 pm

Cheap and quiet. Pretty new to this but the SLK3700AMB, may be what you are looking for based on my personal experience with this case, and the reviews on this site.

The question of the day is what OS do you want to run? Windows XP Media Center Edition (2004 or 2005)? Windows XP with Beyond TV, or one of the Linux PVRs?

If you want to go MCE 2005, you are going to need more power, and a better video card. You could probably get 2004 working if you can find a copy (it was Tier 1 distribution only).

ghostboarder · Post by **ghostboarder** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 1:00 am

As for the OS, probably either WinXP with a pvr software (MythTV, Sage, etc), or a Linux pvr. Whichever suits my needs and is faster, really. Probably the *nix one, havent looked into it a whole lot yet.

Good point on MCE needing a fast vid card. I work at Future Shop, and the new HP DEC (Digital Entertainment Center), has an X300 card, and im sure that is JUST enough. MCE2k5 runs like a dream on it tho, i was the one picked to set it up and screw with it

I do have a Radeon 9800 pro i could throw in there, but then it might as well become a gaming machine, and that isnt the application i have in mind for it.

As for the case you mentioned, YUCK!! Dude, that is a huge tower case!! NOT what i want in my living room

There must be another case/barebones that would suit my needs. I have been looking at the Shuttle XPC SK41G, but at about 250 bucks, there must be alternatives. More ideas people?

burcakb · Post by **burcakb** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 1:46 am

3700AMB is NOT small though it's an excellent case.

Stay away from the Sonata. The side holes make a mess with EMI.

burcakb · Post by **burcakb** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 1:55 am

Have a look at the AOpen XCube EZ18. The black version is a beauty. It also has onboard video so you might keep your GF as backup. If that's a Tbred CPU, with a little work, you might get a quietish system running.

City4United1 · Post by **City4United1** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 6:11 am

Small and Quiet seems to be a bit of a holy grail at the moment.

I have a similar project in mind. I would like to use 2 TV cards, so I need 2 PCI slots. I have been going round in circles trying to come up with a solution: build my own case / go for a A64 with cool 'n' quiet / undervolt a mobile XP. MicroATX would probably do except that it restricts choice, especially if you want to diddle with voltages or you're fussy about chipsets. Also, a lot of the nice HTPC microATX cases seems to be harder to keep cool or only take half size PCI cards or whatever.

I'll probably end up going for the smallest (shallowest) ATX case I can find. I suspect that the SFF is a good option if only one tuner is required (I'm tempted to compromise my 2 TV cards requirement and go this way myself).

Another option is to get hold of one of these Pentium-M microATX boards. I would if I could.

bomba · Post by **bomba** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 8:10 am

I recommend you check out thegreenbutton.com Register and you'll have access to a couple additional forums, one entitled show me your MCE machine, or something like that. IMO, going with a HTPC style desktop case will make it harder to keep quiet. For MCE2005, if you want to use all the features, you'll need a modem for callerID display. dual analog tuners and a HDTV tuner. If you plan to use SPDIF to a external 5.1 audio system, you'll need a suitably equipped motherboard or yet another pci card. Thus, you should probably stick with full ATX. I also recommend only cases which take full height cards to avoid limiting your choice of video and expansion cards. Unfortunately, your HTPC is now not very small, but Silverstone and others do make HTPC cases which should fit your needs. Find one with a 80mm exhaust rather than 60mm and go with a system that has adequate power rather than huge overkill. A 35watt Athlon XP-M or undervolted P4 2.4C Northwood will be plenty if you use capture cards with hardware MPEG2 encoding. For video cards, MS recommends only high end cards, but as you pointed out the HP "living room" style HTPC uses only an X300. A passive Radeon 9600-128 should work fine as well. DX9 compatibility is required.

In regards to cube PC's, my only experience is with the Shuttle NForce2. However, even in its latest version with SilentX PSU and with all BIOS options set to quietest mode it's not quiet enough. Hope this helps. Oh, and irt motherboards, take a long look at AOPEN's offerings. They are very much geared toward silent computing with pwm control of all fans and full CPU undervolting options.

BTW, my MCE2k5 HTPC solution will be to stick with a dual 120mm fanned mid-tower and put it behind a (ventilated) door in a cuustom built-in home theater cabinet. The furniture is not yet built, but the PC is.

PPGMD · Post by **PPGMD** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 9:50 am

bomba wrote:BTW, my MCE2k5 HTPC solution will be to stick with a dual 120mm fanned mid-tower and put it behind a (ventilated) door in a cuustom built-in home theater cabinet. The furniture is not yet built, but the PC is.

That's exactly what I did. Though I didn't do any case modding, the SLK3700 worked fine without any modding for me.

tweckstr · Post by **tweckstr** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 1:34 pm

I have faced the same challenges as City4United1 was writing about:

City4United1 wrote:Small and Quiet seems to be a bit of a holy grail at the moment.

I have a similar project in mind. I would like to use 2 TV cards, so I need 2 PCI slots. I have been going round in circles trying to come up with a solution: build my own case / go for a A64 with cool 'n' quiet / undervolt a mobile XP.
...
I'll probably end up going for the smallest (shallowest) ATX case I can find. I suspect that the SFF is a good option if only one tuner is required (I'm tempted to compromise my 2 TV cards requirement and go this way myself).

Another option is to get hold of one of these Pentium-M microATX boards. I would if I could.

I'm going to set up a HTPC with a DVB-T tuner PCI card. I'd like to have 2xPCI slots to have an option for a second DVB-T card. The system will run Linux and VDR. I will also edit my home videos on the same PC and store all digi photos in it.

Many/All HW parts are under consideration. I have found lots of help from the recommended section in SPCR. Thanks for that.

Below are my current thoughts/options, and I would really appreciate some help to get me out of this puzzle. I have a limitation for the size of the PC case. The plan is to put the PC will in a stereo/video cabinet below my TV, and the max dimensions for the PC case are 550x450x370mm (WxDxH), of course there should also be some room for the ventialtion, so I have considered small desktop cases, cube PCs and SFF PCs.

The requirements set for the lack of noise from above (my better half) are very strict, so I've also considered a completely fanless system like HUSH, but those only have one PCI slot and also otherwise suffer from the lack of other options (connectors, mem card readers, etc.)

Please, give my your feedback and experience about the following cases and PCs I'm considering. I wrote some of my own thoughts after each option:

1) Shuttle XPC SB83G5
- How silent is that?
- Can I keep it silent/avoid overheating if I stick 2xDVB-T cards in it?

2) Asus Pundit AB-P2600
- Any experience on this one?
- Which mother boards fit and provide good power/heat/performance combination?

3) Antec Aria
- This is the case of my dreams, but the PSU fan was rated loud.
- Has anyone been able to change the propri sized PSU to a more silent one?
- Any hints for a good micro-ATX mobo + CPU combination?

4) SilverStone Lascala LC03V
- Good looking, enough room, but according to the article in
systemcooling.com, needed quite a lot of modding (which I'm afraid of)

5) MSI MEGA 180 PC
- Also good looking, but only one PCI slot?

As you probably noticed, I'd like to get to the goal with minimal modding, and would like to avoid sawwing the case, installing extra fans, etc. I have the (maybe childish) belief that a silent enough system can be made from the recommended parts without extreme modding, just by plugging them in... Please educate me.

BR, Tom

PPGMD · Post by **PPGMD** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 8:32 am

Aria,

The other problem with the Aria, that it has a very limited space for the HSF combo. The stock Intel and AMD coolers just barely fit during my tests of the system.

I highly doubt that you can deploy an Aria in a quiet configuration without modding the powersupply which is a custom build for the Aria.

City4United1 · Post by **City4United1** » Thu Nov 11, 2004 12:36 pm

It looks like you have the same goal as me tweckstr (I believe a "Welcome to SPCR" is in order).

I have a Nova-T and a Nova-S which I would like to get working with MythTV (I still need to test this out in my existing (noisy) system).

1) Shuttle XPC SB83G5
I think this only has 1 PCI slot. The other is PCI express. I don't know if there's any DVB card for PCI express. Is there? There were some Shuttles with 2 PCI slots, but they had no AGP and I don't think they do them any more.

2) Asus Pundit AB-P2600
I looked at this. It seems to have only one IDE channel which I thought would be a bit limiting for a PVR. Also I'm not sure how 2 DVB cards would behave on a riser card (I've had problems with 2 DVB cards). It could be difficult to modify (non-standard PSU etc). These are the things which put me off. I'm happy to be corrected.

3) Antec Aria
When I first saw this, I thought "Great, a big Shuttle". I was put off by things I read about it. There are quite a few threads in these forums. The impression I get is that it is difficult to keep cool.

Can't comment on the others.

My problem is the depth of the case. I have had a very small TV for years due to lack of space and have recently bought a LCD TV. This fits nicely on a 30cm deep shelf. Not much chance of getting a 30cm deep PC case, but I have a corner unit next to the TV which can accomodate a deeper case. Unless a microATX Pentium-M board becomes available in the UK soon at a sensible price, I will be looking at a XP-M system in an Antec SLK2650-BQE. This is not rated very highly here but it is slightly shallower than the Sonata (16.5""/42cm against the Sonata's 18.25"/46cm).

A final thought: there are USB versions of the DVB cards available (at least in the UK). I'm starting to wonder if I should go with a Shuttle and a USB tuner....

mb2 · Post by **mb2** » Sun Nov 21, 2004 11:10 pm

City4United1, i found a nice *cheap* microATX case at ebuyer a while back.. it has space for 2x80mm exhausts, and (albiet very restricted- but u can change that) a 92mm intake. 3xfull height PCI slots + full AGP, front audio + usb, and it is steel, which is supposedly better than Al for quietness, it might be sounding like a big fat midi tower case, but everything, but its just thinner than a CD drive, and it seems *so* tiny comparped to my old full ATX case and it comes with a (pretty decent) 200w m-ATX PSU. (but if your going powerful i'd recommend changing it for the 270w enermax)
and the best part is that i got it for £10 +vat! ok so it doesn't look like a hi-fi part that would cost u £300, but IMO it could nicely fit under the TV and fit in (well atleast if ur stuff is silver, and u spray the top and sides silver to match the bezel) mine is just over 30cm deep and will fit under my non-lcd tv shelf

it could probably overhang at the back a tiny bit for u? i can also fit a zalman 7000 HSF in there *just*, but it depends on the location of the CPU socket on the motherboard.
its not currently still available at ebuyer, but it may just be out of stock.. they have a couple of other mATX cases cheap right now, u really have to look into them in detail (manufacturers website) as ebuyer doesn't offfer much info.
with that u can put in a biostar M7NCG-400 (@cpucity.co.uk) and XP-m, supporting full voltage controls etc. there may be a viable s754 motherboard, but as of now i dont know of any s939 m-atx boards.

'there are USB versions of the DVB cards available (at least in the UK). I'm starting to wonder if I should go with a Shuttle and a USB tuner....' if u go this route, make sure u get one with hardware encoding, as trying to squeeze uncompressed video through USB may not be pretty.

if u can get the PCI slot, then a Nebula DigiTV PCI would give u nice mpeg-2 digital (freeview) (no encoding required as its broadcast in mpeg 2

) but if u plan to plug in cable or satelite then there are cheaper options.

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Mon Nov 22, 2004 6:23 am

mb2 wrote:City4United1, i found a nice *cheap* microATX case at ebuyer a while back.

Can you post the make/model of this case please?

ghostboarder · Post by **ghostboarder** » Tue Nov 30, 2004 7:09 pm

Ok im back

Been doing some more research, and now my specs have changed (got a little more $$$ now too). Im gonna go with a new system, P4 S478. Now, I have seen on ncix.com, they have a very nice Soltek SFF called the EQ3401M

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=10281

Trouble is, they are 'unavailable' right now, and i am having a hard time tracking down that model from any other supplier here in Canada. Anyone have any ideas? I have seen Soltek SFF's mentioned lots in the forums, and this model has gotten good reviews from THG, etc. If anyone has ANY links or info, please share. This is the one i am going to get, ive made up my mind

. Dont wanna pay huge shipping, etc to get it from the US if i dont have to, and i like this one much better than the readily available silver model

burcakb · Post by **burcakb** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 12:20 am

You'll also have trouble locating a cool running socket 478 P4 chip. Intel is cramming those Presshots down everybodys throat.

GrahamGarside · Post by **GrahamGarside** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 11:38 pm

Hauppage nova-t's don't fit in the pundit I'm afraid, they are slightly too big, less than a mm but they don't fit. I had to bend the side casing and kind of rounden it to get it in which would be a problem unless you plan on laying it flt like i do.