Suggestions for Budget TV system upgrade

[TheInternal]

Howdy all,

I'm looking to upgrade my quite dated TV system (a socket 939 Athlon 64 single core) and could use suggestions. The top priority is to have something for smooth playback of HD video over my network, netflix, and hulu. The secondary goal is to have a backup system that could also do some gaming / be a guest system.

I'm really struggling with the motherboard and CPU decision. I'm reluctant to get anything less than a quad core processor due to all the increased multi-threaded applications, but am open to suggestions. I'm thinking about doing a two card SLI setup, so that further limits my options on motherboard choices. 5.1 audio is a must and the quality is important to me, since I'll be pairing it with my old Klipsch ProMedia 5.1 speakers.

I have two limitations: budget, and the age of my tv. It's best connection options are s-video or component, so I assume I can't use a modern graphics solution (to my knowledge, the Geforce 200 series and Radeon HD4000 series are the most current cards with s-video. Are there any DirectX11 parts with component or s-video out?). Are there inexpensive devices to convert DVI or HDMI outputs to s-video or component outputs that work with an old school analogue TV?

Assuming no inexpensive converters exist, I'll need to at least purchase a CPU, motherboard, and RAM. I'd like to keep the cost near $200, and try to not go much over $300 if it means getting a really good bang for the buck. I've not entirely ruled out the more expensive option of using my existing Core i5 3570k and getting a lower end SLI board for the upgrade, and buying a haswell when it launches for my main system but the cost is of concern.

I plan on cannibalizing parts / pulling from old parts to complete the build.

Parts I have available:
Enermax Modu82+ EMD625AWT SLI/Crossfire capable PSU
Antec Solo case
1 TB WD SATA HD
optical disk drives
2 x XFX Geforce 7950 GT
1 x EVGA Geforce 280 GTX (not sure it will fit in the Antec Solo... it fits in the Antec P180b)
1 x XFX Radeon HD 4670

Additional parts I might purchase:
1 x EVGA Geforce 280 GTX (to make an SLI setup)
A nice Media PC enclosure (suggestions welcome)

Thanks!

 

[Lagittaja]

Just ditch the SLI and sell those GPU's.

Grab a nice HD77x0 with a VGA port (+VGA->component passive adapter ~10-20$), a Sandy or Ivy i3 and H77 or B75 board along with some ram.
I just quickly looked through newegg
CPU 119.99-129.99$
2x4gb CL9 1.5v DDR3-1600 ~60$
Powercolor HD7750 with VGA port 89.99$
B75/H77 MB starting from ~50-70$
~320-350 and I didn't bother looking at MIR's.
Plenty of CPU power and enough GPU power to play some games, don't know even what resolution your TV is but can't be much demanding so for example a HD7750 would be quite fine. Nice and low power.
Sure you can save few dimes on getting a Celeron/Pentium Sandy/Ivy if you wish. Or getting single 4Gb dimm instead of a 2x4 kit.
And since you mentioned you're reluctant on getting anything less than a quad core because of increased number of multithreading programs, care to mention software that you use that know how to really utilize multiple cores? In that regard the i3 is good, not quite as fast as a real quad core but for an i5 the prices start at around 180$..

 

[Mir96TA]

If there is no Hard Media invloved I would suggest to get this Gadget Dongle
You can play NetFlix Hulu and infamous XBMC