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Jaguar-infinity
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Joined: 07 October 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 1437
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| Posted: 05 July 2006 at 6:06pm | IP Logged
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Ok guys, over the past 18 months my computer needs have been changing and im now looking to set up a Media PC on a fairly modest setup. Specs so far are looking like this
- my 1.6 duron which is currently running at 2.2ghz put down to 2ghz with quieter running
-GeForce FX5200 perconal cinema edition (proper audio visual output AND input with inbuilt tv encoder)
- 512mb Ram initially with 1gb+ in befor xmas
- 40gb hdd for windows and all proggies
- 250gb external hdd for mass storage
- old faiful SB LIVE! 5.1 soundcard
- 5.1 creative speaker set
im also looking at a wireless BTC keyboard with built in mouse and planning on getting a digital tv card when funds become avalible as it isnt needed straight away because the area i'll be working when this gets running cant receive digital though i'll only be there till end of october latest.
My questions are these, what software is best (ive been looking at media portal), will this be good enough for basic use (im not looking to record 4 tv programs at once) and does anyone have any experiance with this stuff that can give me any pointers
oh and can anyone recomend a decent case that would suit a full sized media pc? ive been looking at the thermaltake tenor
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Dud.TraP
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Joined: 05 December 2005
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 666
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| Posted: 05 July 2006 at 7:01pm | IP Logged
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bigger hard drive i reackon. dunno about the software
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Mkoll
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Joined: 16 November 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 123
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| Posted: 05 July 2006 at 9:16pm | IP Logged
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I'd have to agree with Dud a bigger HDD would be better but otherwise the setup looks ok.
The only thing I would recommend is buying a seperate TV card rather than relying on a graphics card with a TV Tuner built in.(Puts more stress on the graphics card and if you wanted a Tuner Card can be placed in a different system).
Custom PC did a labs test in this months Issue you can find it here:
Custom PC Test
I personally think the Leadtech is the best of the bunch but you can still read the reviews and its pretty cheap too. That comes bundled with software for using the TV card.
Not sure what 3rd-Party Programs would be good, sorry.
Edited by Mkoll on 05 July 2006 at 9:17pm
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Nhumrod
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Joined: 09 September 2002
Location: Scotland
Posts: 13897
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| Posted: 06 July 2006 at 8:46am | IP Logged
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You could always get XP media center?
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Grizzler
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Location: Norway
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| Posted: 06 July 2006 at 11:03am | IP Logged
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Ooor, you could get another media center for free (open source, which was just as good I have heard, but if your gonna get xp media center for "free" just go get that anyway)
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Nhumrod
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| Posted: 06 July 2006 at 12:49pm | IP Logged
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i looked into a few - i didnt think they were all that great... the xbox media center one looks better than the pc freebie ones!
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Grizzler
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| Posted: 06 July 2006 at 2:28pm | IP Logged
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Well, this is the one I read on a norwegian IT site, here is the homepage for the opensource one
Here
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Jaguar-infinity
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Joined: 07 October 2002
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| Posted: 06 July 2006 at 5:31pm | IP Logged
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well media portal is open source and is a develpoment from the xbox media centre i beleive. You dont think 250gb will be enough? agreed the fact it will be external on usb 2 will slow the whole process down. dont get me wrong i probs will put one in at some point it just wasnt high on the priority list considering my modest (ie low) budget and most of the stuff is coming from reusing parts i already own
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All i do at work is hang around all day, shoot stuff or go swimming... when can i do what everyone else does and sit around instead?
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ChiefPFF
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CheesePFF
Joined: 09 September 2002
Location: Scotland
Posts: 567
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| Posted: 06 July 2006 at 7:24pm | IP Logged
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well, i would bother going over 250-300GB on one disk - over that theres a big price jump.
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Bad Boy Bubby
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Location: United Kingdom
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| Posted: 11 July 2006 at 10:34am | IP Logged
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Ive been running media portal for over a year now for everything except the tv part and it works great for almost everything. I have to use an exernal media player for my avi's cause it is a bit jerky when playing back through media portal I use Media Player Classic for this also open source free software. It launches MPC from MP and returns to MP after so it doesn't look out of place.
I have a nebula electronics digital tv tuner which is a very good card and the software for that is still being developed with very good support. In all ive had my box running for about 3 years.
specs
Asus pundit bare system
intel celeron 2Ghz
768mb memory (use to be 256 upgrade made big difference)
80gb hard drive (TV recording only Films on remote server pc)
Keyboard similar to this but mines smaller but I don't think they make em any more
http://cpc.farnell.com/jsp/endecaSearch/partDetail.jsp?SKU=CS11428&N=0
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Nhumrod
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| Posted: 11 July 2006 at 11:47am | IP Logged
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sweet!
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|SFH| Sent From Hell :: Community Forums : Hardware / Software Bits & Bobs
Topic: media PC (
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