Building a budget HTPC

[50]

Okay here's my situation. I have a couple of components left over from my old HTPC and want to use them to put together an HTPC for my parents. Here's what I have

C2D E4400 2.0GHz
1TB WD Caviar Blue
2 tuners [PCI]


I'm looking to purchase a case, BD-ROM, 4GB RAM, mATX Motherboard, HSF, PSU, GPU (need to be able to bitstream). I want to keep the price to a minimum and don't mind buying used. The one thing I'm concerned about is overclocking the CPU while keeping the noise to a minimum. When I tried to use the E4400 while playing BD's, I would have lots of issues with stuttering while recording HD and once I upgraded the CPU the problem went away. I'd appreciate any suggestions (esp for the motherboard and hsf). Thanks!

 

[DesiPower]

The clock speed alone may not give you a enough boost to play BDs, if at stock speed you were having issues I am pretty OCing will not solve the problem. When you upgraded the CPU, what did you upgrade it to? it may the architecture that might have helped more than the clock speed.

 

[Spikesoldier]

i would recommend a zacate. i just downgraded my htpc from i3 530 to zacate and can do everything minus 1080p flash.

hard to beat for $100

 

[50]

The clock speed alone may not give you a enough boost to play BDs, if at stock speed you were having issues I am pretty OCing will not solve the problem. When you upgraded the CPU, what did you upgrade it to? it may the architecture that might have helped more than the clock speed.

I upgraded to E8400 and CPU usage dropped from 90% to <30%. Both were 64 bit installs on Win 7.

i would recommend a zacate. i just downgraded my htpc from i3 530 to zacate and can do everything minus 1080p flash.

hard to beat for $100

If anything, I have a microcenter and can get an i3-2100 w/mobo for $120. I was hoping to get a used motherboard for the E4400 for ~$50 that can do decent OC.

 

[DesiPower]

How about this X48 for $49 + shipping ($6 I guess)? I was the high-end chipset in its hay days and its ASUS... good for OCing and supports your CPU, here's an article for your reference...

*EDIT*
I was looking at this detailed specs and found that its ATX though, not mATX but supports DDR3! win!!!

 

[Spikesoldier]

I upgraded to E8400 and CPU usage dropped from 90&#37; to <30%. Both were 64 bit installs on Win 7.



If anything, I have a microcenter and can get an i3-2100 w/mobo for $120. I was hoping to get a used motherboard for the E4400 for ~$50 that can do decent OC.

yeah if you got MC nearby i would do that deal. the SB i3's graphics are better than the 530's right? my board in particular was a p55 so i had to use a radeon 4550.

i went for low power for my HTPC since it will be on 24/7. i got the asrock zacate board, 4gb gskill eco 1333 1.35v, ocz agility 30gb ssd, and lite-on blu ray drive in an antec matx htpc case.

 

[Zargon]

yeah if you got MC nearby i would do that deal. the SB i3's graphics are better than the 530's right? my board in particular was a p55 so i had to use a radeon 4550.

i went for low power for my HTPC since it will be on 24/7. i got the asrock zacate board, 4gb gskill eco 1333 1.35v, ocz agility 30gb ssd, and lite-on blu ray drive in an antec matx htpc case.

yeah SB got a graphics update

whats the zacate system pulling powerwise?

 

[fffblackmage]

My Zacate HTPC pulls 19-20W on idle and up to 31W when I ran Furmark and Prime95.

Specs:
ASRock E350M1
4GB DDR3-1066 @1.3V
120GB Seagate 7200rpm 2.5" HDD
Antec ISK300-65
Wireless N USB adapter
No optical drive

The only problem with using such a CPU is that it doesn't handle 1080p if you can't use hardware acceleration. I've had that problem with some 1080p flash videos. Other than that, DXVA works very well for H.264 encoded .mkv files (using MPC-HC).

 

[mfenn]

Overclocking + Quiet HTPC = Does not compute

But seriously, you're going to have to accept some level of fan noise if you wanted to bring the E4400 up to E8400 spec. Personally, I wouldn't bother.

If you can get an i3 2100 + mobo for $120, I highly suggest you do that. You'll be paying very nearly as much for a 775 mobo + GPU.

Then just grab:
G.Skill DDR3 4GB $33
Seasonic 300W $40
Lite-ON BD-ROM $55