HTPC idea (1 Viewer)

I am toying with this idea for building an HTPC.

I want to take a PC and put it away in a cabinet where it will be silent and hidden. From this PC, I want to run a USB2 cable through a wall to a remote unit in my HT rack which I will build out of an old gutted DVD player shell. Inside this shell, I will install a USB hub, to which I will connect a USB DVD-ROM drive, a USB wireless keyboard/mouse connector, and a VFD panel. For video and audio I can run a DVI & coax cable through the same wall.

Anybody done anything like this? Are USB2 DVD-ROMs fast enough for good video playback these days? Will I perhaps need to run two USB lines (one for the DVD-ROM, another for the other components)?

Are USB cables limited to a certain distance? I don't think I've ever heard of one, but it's something you should look into. You might also consider firewire if your run is short enough -- while it is theoretically slower than USB2.0, it doesn't share its bandwidth like USB does.

Everything I've read says 5 meters/16 ft. is the max for USB cable length. That's more than enough.

Interesting idea. I have a similar space, where I could put an HTPC behind a wall from the TV & receiver. My thought was to rip all my DVDs to the PC and only have a keyboard & mouse interface to control the PC with.

I've seen it done once or twice

USB2 is 480 Mbps and DVD total bitrate including video, audio and subs can be max 10.08 Mbps so the transfer speed should not be a problem, in theory. I will test how well this works with USB 1.1 (~11Mbps) hub sometime soon (external USB HD).