New HTPC Build Specs - Comments Appreciated!

[pahunt]

I am looking to build a new HTPC for as little money as I can get away with but which will be powerful enough for Blu-ray playback. My plan is for it to be connected to my Samsung plasma via HDMI and to output the sound through my Onkyo 505 amp. I also intend to run an XBox 360 as a Media Center extender from this PC.

After doing some research on this forum I have come up with the following list of components:

Case: Antec NSK2400
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H 780G
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4050e
Memory: Corsair 2GB Kit DDR2 800Mhz
Optical Drive: LG GGC-H20L
Hard Disk: Samsung Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ
Other: Microsoft Remote Control + IR

I have a spare licence for Vista Home Premium and a Hauppauge Nova-T 500 freeview tuner card already, so those will be used as well.

My main concern is whether this PC will be powerful enough to play HD content whilst possibly also recording 2 programs and streaming content to the XBox.

Any comments or suggestions gratefully received

[Stephen Neal]

Recording 2 SD streams should use minimal system resources - the max SD rate is 5Mbs (i.e. around 0.625MB/s) per stream on Freeview - and most are lower. Streaming to a 360 shouldn't take much either?

[devo]

Looks good. The 4850e cpu is under £40 on ebuyer so probably worth the upgrade. Only things possibly missing are a wireless keyboard and a replacement cpu cooler

[pahunt]

Originally Posted by devo

...Only things possibly missing are a wireless keyboard and a replacement cpu cooler

I had thought about a wireless keyboard but I decided that as this machine is going to be used exclusively for Media Center stuff that it was a bit of a waste of time. I've got plenty of USB keyboards kicking around that I can plug in temporarily when the need arises!

As for the CPU cooler, is the noise that is produced from the one that comes with the processor going to be noticeablely louder than one of the "silent" ones? ANy recommendations on a quieter one?

And as an aside, is the LG Blu-Ray drive particulary noisy? Anyone have any good or bad experiences?

[Stephen Neal]

In a Fusion 430 case the LG is pretty quiet, and I can't say the stock cooler is that noisy. I may not be used to "silent" PCs - so it may be possible to make it quieter still. My case fans are on the lowest speed setting and are 120mm models - so they run quite quietly too (but are still probably the noisiest component?)

[pahunt]

Well I'm certainly not used to silent PCs either, in fact I'm used to my Xbox 360 which sounds like a jet engine taking off, so anything on that will be an improvement! I think I'll probably stick with the stock fan to start with and I can always swap it out later if the noise does start to bother me.