Please help me make up my mind about HTPC :@ (1 Viewer)

[Mikey_G]

Well I am going to build a HTPC for my PJ InFocus LP330. I have been using the S-Video input and at first it was breath taking. Then it wore off and now must look better. You know what I mean. Well a local computer outfit is selling a barebones system with an AMD XP 1800 and motherboard for a great deal and I am going to get it. It is a great deal at only $190 with 266 FSB, 32 MB on board Video, Sound, ATX Case, 300W Power supply, and 10/100 on board. Everything a normal person would want is on the board. But this is not a normal computer to be built. The bad part is the motherboard only has 2 PCI slots, and an AGP. Also it has 2 drive bays. Well any help would be GREATLY appreciated. I will be using this for MP3's hooked up to my reciever and to watch movies, with some light video editing with firewire on my DV cam. I will have it hooked up to the PJ and an LCD screen most likely, using the PJ for movies only. I was thinking of getting a Big, 60 or 80G, hardrive, running 512 or more PC133 SDRAM, 1 DVDRom Drive, and 1 CDRW Drive, ATI 8500DV All In Wonder to handle the Video with the firewaire already built in and get a Santa Cruz Sound Card with Optical Output. OR run the optical out from the 8500DV, but I havent heard any reports on the sound from that card using it that way. Also getting a Media Card Reader hooked up through USB. I will be running Windows XP. This leaves me with one or 2 more slots. I already got the TV card part handled throught the 8500DV. I dont care about HDTV. The only TV I watch is the news and thats rarely. Is there any other cards I should use to get the best picture out of my DLP PJ when watching a movie. I am sure anything will look better than using just S-Vdeo from a DVD Player. Again thanks for any help and reading this LONG post.

 

[Mikey_G]

Also what software should I look at getting. I have been using PowerDVD 4.0 XP on my computer at home hooked up to the monitor and it worked out well. Thanks

 

[Gabriel_Lam]

The 8500 card is a good choice. The 9000 card will give you slightly better colors if you have a projector like the JVC G150CL, since both the JVC and the 9000 have 10 bit color processing, but with the LP330, it shouldn't really matter.

Try a Seagate Barracuda ATA IV (or V when it comes out in a month or two) hard drive. They're fast and very very quiet. Make sure you get quiet cooling for your cpu. That means a very large heatsink, and a large, slow moving fan. The Santa Cruz card is reasonably good, but not nearly as good as something like the m-audio 2496 cards.