A Faster, Smaller, Cheaper, Greener HTPC
Update: Apparently the groovy NOAH case only has an 80W PSU. This is insufficient for the components specified. However, this is such a nice case I might see if the on-board PSU can be upgraded.
With all the fuss over the recent Intel Atom processors I thought it time to look at what components I could use to build a smaller, more energy efficient machine than my honking huge lump that’s too big to fit under my TV.
I am currently running an old 1.4GHz Athlon XP 1600+ with 512Mb RAM which has been just fine for my needs with a regular CRT telly. My graphics card is a (now ancient) nVidia FX 5200 with a decent S-Video out but incompatible with Vista and while I dearly love my Antec Fusion case it really is too huge to have kicking around my living room floor.
My first thought was whether I could use the cutesy Asus Eeebox for but reading up on it’s video playback performance I quickly realised that it’s no good for content with a resolution above 720p. The Atom just doesn’t cut it.
How about two Atom processors then I thought? The MSI Wind Desktop barebones kit looked much more capable but the case was just plain ugly and there doesn’t seem to be anyone other than Newegg stocking these little boxes – no good for me as I’m UK based.
So I paid a trip to mini-itx.com and wasted an hour or so investigating my options. I was pleasantly surprised to find it’s now possible to put together a spec for a mini-itx box that uses a standard desktop processor for a relatively affordable price. AMD have radically improved the energy efficiency of their processors in the past year and good performance is finally attainable for little power consumption.
So, after a little research to find the best prices from other sites, here’s my current thinking:
List of Components
From mini-itx.com – £101.05 (incl. VAT)
- Silver Noah 3988 Mini-ITX Case £69.33
- Silverstone NT07-AM2 Low Profile Heatsink (space is limited in the Noah case) £22.33
- Delivery to UK Mainland £9.40
From ebuyer.com – £114.20 (incl.VAT)
- Pioneer KD-08 Slimline DVDRW £26.37
- AMD Athlon 64 X2 4850e @2.5GHz, 1MB Cache £39.77
- 2GB DDR2 800MHz SODIMM £24.03
- Free Delivery
From linintx.com – £104.58 (incl.VAT)
- Jetway JNC81-LF AM2+ AMD780G Mainboard £104.58
- Free Delivery
From my spares – £0.00 (incl. VAT)
- 80Gb Hitachi SATA 2 2.5″ laptop drive (small drive needed to use the PCI riser for a TV card in the Noah case)
- PCI Digital TV Tuner Card
So the grand total for my upgrades would be £319.83. I’ll certainly be considering this…. 
ASUS have answered everyones calls with a HD capable box.
http://www.dailytech.com/ASUS+Adds+HD+Capability+to+New+Eee+Box+Models/article13584.htm
I’ve tried that ASUS HD and it’s not that great for playing 1080p mkv files.
Yeah, the single core Atom models are probably a bit underpowered. The Eeebox B208 (dual-core Atom 330) looks pretty tasty though.
http://www.liliputing.com/2009/03/asus-launches-eee-box-b208-with-windows-vista-and-hd-video.html
We’ll have to wait and see the UK pricing though – I suspect it’s likely to be £400+ in which case not such good value.
I wish Asus (and others) would take a leaf out of Apple’s book and ship only a few bits of kit, fully-specced but competitively priced for volume sales instead of trying to hit every price-point with a short-lived model. It gets confusing with all the variations of the same thing and you’re always left waiting for the next model because the current one only does 90% of what you need.
I hear the PCI slot CAN be used with a 3.5″ HDD but its tight. Have you tried and/or could you? Also I wonder if you could sling a 3.5″ HDD under the optical drive? Any views since you have the case and I don’t!!??
Sorry Methanoid, I never actually went ahead with this build for cost reasons. I ended up re-using my Antec case and putting roughly the same bits in that for much less: http://www.stephenbeattie.com/2009/05/24/upgrading-the-core-of-my-htpc/