What kind a costs am I looking at?

[Recon]

For a HD home theater PC? Im sick of renting a DVR from my provider, and I dont want to pay tivo 12 bucks a month.

I dont even know where to start with this thing...

[wh666-666]

in my sig I've got a 2.8ghz p4 HT, 2gb ram, dvr PC that also acts as a cctv recorder, copying station, etc etc and blisters along with all tasks.

It doesnt have HD, but all it would need is a video card upgrade. You shouldnt need anything above 3gb of ram or too excessive cpu. Just make sure you get a really good GPU card. I would advise really scrutinising those as that will deliver the best graphics.

Im sure many other sharkies with top end GPU cards will be able to help if you have troubles narrowing down the choice.

Dont forget to budget for a good soundcard as well as good quality cabling, etc etc. Using onboard sound with surround sound speakers will just suck!

[Recon]

I had planned on using a soundcard with optical out and punch that into my reciever...

is dual core a bonus or not?

[wh666-666]

Dual core may be a bonus for encoding HD tv to avi's without jerking/missing frames ... Really depends how much you'll be hammering this rig and what quality you want .... Above moderate use on HD, yes. Occasional or light use then it might not be worth the extra money.

Unfortunately HD isnt readily or available cheaply in the UK, thats why my rig wouldnt benefit from a dual core at the mo. Records fine on normal digital TV but might struggle on HD

Id recommend as for operating system linux or win2k/xp. Something that runs low on resources so most of your processing power can be utilised purely for recording.

[ua549]

I use an Avermedia HC80 54mm ExpressCard that works everywhere in the world for over the air HDTV, analog TV and non-encrypted analog cable TV plus FM radio. I use it in my C2D notebook when traveling and on my dual Xeon workstation at home. It cost ~$100 and came with a small travel antenna for the TV function, an FM antenna and remote control. It comes with an adequate software package that works with www.TitanTV.com free program schedules.

There are portable USB card slots it will work in as well as ExpressCard slots in many notebooks.

Just add the 5.1 sound that you want and the disk storage.

[tweakerpc2002]

I use an Avermedia HC80 54mm ExpressCard that works everywhere in the world for over the air HDTV, analog TV and non-encrypted analog cable TV plus FM radio. I use it in my C2D notebook when traveling and on my dual Xeon workstation at home. It cost ~$100 and came with a small travel antenna for the TV function, an FM antenna and remote control. It comes with an adequate software package that works with www.TitanTV.com free program schedules.

There are portable USB card slots it will work in as well as ExpressCard slots in many notebooks.

Just add the 5.1 sound that you want and the disk storage.

you don;t need the best or fastest pc, since all you basicly do with a HTPC, is watch movies, storage movies, watch Tv on it, so basviy lots of storage, a somewhat good video card, good sound card and TV turner

[ua549]

A fast PC with adequate memory resources is essential when you consider that you may be recording two presentations to a hard drive while viewing a third on the display.

My large screen HDTV combined with the Avermedia HC80 and Cisco Explorer 8300HD handles 7 HD channels concurrently. That takes computing power to get that stuff on disk though I rarely use those capabilities except for recording news programs that all seem to be on at the same time. I don't do movies.

[Recon]

I would ideally be able to record 2 shows at once.


And HD is a big deal to me as most of the shows I watch are presented in HD.

The sole purpose of this box would be as a HTPC, with the possibility of running some bit torrents....though thats doubtfull

[wh666-666]

To be honest i have my DVR isolated and not connected to any network and torrent/etc etc through other systems. Having the machine networked and leaving it vunerable to malware can cause alot of problems especially on a high performance system where you'll need the OS installation in optimum condition for recording HD

[ua549]

Most of my equipment is in a comm closet rather than in the media presentation area. The only equipment in the media area is HDTV, the sound amp, 7.1 speaker system and fiber optic remote control repeaters. It all sits on a LAN subnet without access to the internet, though it can get stuff from my servers.

[tweakerpc2002]

I would ideally be able to record 2 shows at once.


And HD is a big deal to me as most of the shows I watch are presented in HD.

The sole purpose of this box would be as a HTPC, with the possibility of running some bit torrents....though thats doubtfull

ok then you want like dual or quad core then, basicly build a second gaming rig but with the extra things you need

[Recon]

What about HD space? What is a relistic size requirement? 500g? 2 sets of 500g?

Is it possible to use a network storage location? or am i introducing un-needed complications?

[Recon]

So

Processor - 1 x Intel Pentium Dual Core E2180 / 2 GHz ( 800 MHz

MSI 945GCM5-F V2 - Motherboard - micro ATX - i945GC - LGA775 Socket - UDMA100, Serial ATA-300 - Gigabit Ethernet - video - HD Audio

4 1 gb sticks of ram


Maxtor Basics SATA II 300 Hard Drive Kit - Hard drive - 500 GB - internal - 3.5" - SATA-300 - 7200 rpm

Ill do some research on HD reciever cards, but that should do for a budget core correct?

[tweakerpc2002]

What about HD space? What is a relistic size requirement? 500g? 2 sets of 500g?

Is it possible to use a network storage location? or am i introducing un-needed complications?

just for the hack of just get 1tera

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820145034 ram

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148278 harddrive

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827106072 dvd burner x2 since you would want 2

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129018 case ? all depends on what you want it to look like

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131013 motherboard, also depends what brand fixs your fancy

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115017 cpu, i know you guys are going to say quad core anyways

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817341002 power supply again all depends which brand toy like

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814127311 video card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16815129007 tv turner

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16829102016 sound cards with optical in and out


anything i miss

[tweakerpc2002]

So

Processor - 1 x Intel Pentium Dual Core E2180 / 2 GHz ( 800 MHz

MSI 945GCM5-F V2 - Motherboard - micro ATX - i945GC - LGA775 Socket - UDMA100, Serial ATA-300 - Gigabit Ethernet - video - HD Audio

4 1 gb sticks of ram


Maxtor Basics SATA II 300 Hard Drive Kit - Hard drive - 500 GB - internal - 3.5" - SATA-300 - 7200 rpm

Ill do some research on HD reciever cards, but that should do for a budget core correct?

2gig should be fine unless you want to spend the money for 4gig, and you don't want micro atx since you wll need the GPU, sound card, tv turner and all of those things