Building The Perfect HTPC (Media PC), Capable Of Playing 1080P H264
Saturday, November 8th, 2008
Updated: January 4th, 2009
The Idea
For the past month I have been exploring options and building a perfect Home Theater PC for my 50” Vizio plasma. Besides the obvious, it has to play movies, youtube videos, etc, I had a few concrete goals in mind. Here they are:
- it absolutely had to handle 1080P h264, specifically movies encoded using x264. An average movie size for this format is between 8.5 and 13 GB. There were 2 problems to overcome: the CPU had to be able to handle the decoding (my desktop dual core Conroe barely kept up) and the network had to be fast enough to stream in real time from my storage PC a floor away.
- I needed to have the easiest control over the whole thing. VNC wasn’t good enough, because I don’t always have a laptop lying around.
- It had to support 7.1 sound.
- It had to have excellent picture quality on the TV, preferably during both movies and regular browsing/reading, etc. HDMI/DVI was optional, depending on how good the analog quality was.
- It had to be as cheap as possible but still good enough to do the job really well.
- It had to have a serial port (most micro ATX motherboards nowadays do not, which is upsetting).
- It had to look slick and unconventional – unlike a regular PC.
Setup
After lots of research, I used the following components from the following sources (best deals I could find):
- Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2200 Processor, 2.2 GHz, $79.99, no tax, and free shipping. I decided to go for a relatively cheap but still very powerful CPU and the results exceeded my expectations. More below.
- ASUS P5KPL-CM LGA 775 Intel G31 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard, $52.99 + tax + $8.97 shipping. Also available on Amazon. It has on-board 7.1 sound, 2 PCI slots, and a serial port (for my good old Packard Bell serial remote control). No HDMI/DVI and no onboard RAID but I didn’t need those.
- OCZ SLI-Ready 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Memory (OCZ2N800SR2GK). $43.99 + tax, free shippping - $25 rebate. Also available on Amazon.
- Antec New Solution Series NSK2480 Case, $107.99, no tax + $17.82 shipping - $8 coupon (code: TAKER). Even cheaper on Amazon. The case already comes with a 380W power supply, so I didn’t need to buy a separate one. It provides plenty of power for the HTPC. Also, there’s a lot of space inside for ventilation, and I didn’t get a crammed feeling when installing my components. Ventilation is a separate point I’d like to highlight with this case, as it came with 2 120mm fans and 2 extra ones just in case. The lowest of 3 speed settings has worked great for me.
- DSI 2.4GHz Wireless Keyboard with Optical trackball, Black, FK-760, $52.99, no tax, and free shipping. Inspired by the famous mysql geek Jeremy Zawodny here and here.
- the keyboard you can see pictured below can be branded by DSI, Adesso, and other companies but it’s the same thing, so there’s no point trying out the Adesso one if the DSI didn’t work well for you.
- the DSI/whatevercloneofit fit my needs best, after comparing it to Logitech diNovo Mini and the full size diNovo version, Microsoft, and others.
- the price of ~$50 is simply unbeatable.
- the trackball mouse is probably the best for a keyboard of this type. I tried the touchpad on the diNovo and it was crap.
- the left mouse trigger button located on the right side under the keyboard as well as the left/right mouse buttons on the left side of the keyboard are exactly what I wanted from the usability point of view. I can hold the keyboard with either hand and still click like a champ.
However, Charger2000’s suggestion to buy a USB extension cord (I bought this one from monoprice.com) and use it to raise the keyboard receiver to about 5 feet off the ground worked like a charm and I am finally very happy.
- Airlink AWLH6080 300N Wireless-N & G PCI Adapter for Desktops, $44.99 + tax, no shipping as I picked it up at a local Fry’s. I needed to start experimenting with 802.11N because I didn’t want a swarm of network cables laying around. More on this later but I can tell you it’s great. Also available on Amazon.
- Airlink AR680W 300N Wireless-N & G Router, I think about $50 + tax at Fry’s. Also available on Amazon.
- Logitech Z-5500 505W 5.1 Speakers, on sale at Dell for $170 a few months ago. Also available on Amazon.
- Some old 60GB hard drive. I’m planning on streaming most things, so it’s not worth spending any money on this item. You can pick a 1TB Seagate drive on Amazon for about $100.
- Windows XP (for now)
Verdict
The final product exceeded my expectations. Not only did it play 1080P h264 perfectly, it didn’t even need a separate graphics card to take over the load. The CPU usage is about 35-40% when playing 720P and 40-50% when playing 1080P. No need for DVI or HDMI input – the standard VGA connector is very crisp and provides much better fine print and detail than HDMI. I can read and browse small font without any problems. The sound is superb as well, after all the tweaking, so no additional sound or video cards were needed. Using the wireless ultra light keyboard as well as the remote, I am now able to control everything on the screen with ease.
Temperatures, ventilation, cooling. The case provides excellent ventilation, as I already mentioned. The CPU idles at about 30C and goes to 45-48C when playing the highest quality 1080P HD video I could find. In short, the case is cool and quiet.
Wireless (802.11N). After playing around with the 802.11N (or at least Airlink101’s implementation), I have to say I’m quite impressed. I get speeds of between 3 and 5 MB/s (Megabytes per second) and all 720P and most 1080P content streams live. Some really hi-res 1080P movies require to be downloaded first, which confuses me. During streaming, instead of using 4-5 MB/s, VLC (or MPC, or any other player I’ve tried) uses only about 1-2 MB/s and starts lagging. I don’t yet have a workaround for the player to utilize 100% of my bandwidth and stop lagging. Do you?
One thing I really hated about Airlink101 is their software (the firmware seems great so far). It’s the most basic piece of crap software accompanying hardware I’ve ever seen. Absolutely no thought and effort went into it – I believe it’s still on version 1.0 or 1.1. It’s so bad, even the Windows default wireless manager is better. The final straw was the absence of a setting to connect to preferred networks only. After I found my computer randomly connected to some open netgear network one day, I decided to not use Airlink101’s software for a long-long time, maybe ever.
The sound. ASUS’ onboard 7.1 HD audio delivers very decent sound. I’ve installed the latest drivers, enable virtual fill (so that 2 channel sound gets automatically distributed to all speakers), and hooked up the Logitech Z5500 5.1 and another Logitech 2.1 to form a pseudo 8.2 speaker system. This thing has thump!
A note on VNC: I ended up not using it as it was creating sync issues while playing video (vsync?). If I turn on VNC while playing a video (and even if I turn it off), the vsync issues are quite apparent. The wireless keyboard is a better solution anyway, so I am quite happy with it (though it could use larger operational range).
HTPC/Media Center Software. Network file sharing + file manager (Total Commander or any other) + media player classic have worked very well but I still wanted to find the perfect media center program for visually pleasing media experience. It turns out there are a few candidates. Here they are:
- XBMC – free, not bad at all, but it was too buggy and couldn’t find my network drives.
- Mediaportal – also free and also buggy. It couldn’t play a lot of video files.
- SageTV – not free. Worse than the 2 above. Absolutely no reason to pay for something this bad when free alternatives are available.
- MeediOS – free. Testing it out right now.
- Boxee – free, no Windows version yet but supposedly this is the best one of them all, at least looking at all the recommendation on the web. As soon as I get around to putting Linux onto this box, I’ll try boxee.
- Anything else major I’m missing?
So, as of this time, Total Commander and MPC are still my preferred method of watching videos. I don’t feel that any of the programs I’ve tried are ready for prime time yet.
Remaining work. I’d like to figure out how to wake up the machine on keyboard event. I don’t think it’s possible with the wireless keyboard like that, but I’m not 100% on that. I’d like to know how to stream videos utilizing full network capacity.
Here are some pictures of the final system:
And I couldn’t resist:
Artem Russakovskii is a San Francisco programmer, blogger, and future millionaire (that last part is in the works). Follow Artem on Twitter (@ArtemR) or subscribe to the RSS feed.
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Artem loves commenting on other people's blogs and reading comments on his own, so go ahead and leave one.
November 12th, 2008 at 1:00 am
Hey, Your set up looks pretty good! I'm thinking of doing a similar thing - cheap is my main priority and your system seems to fit that! Mine will be used predominantly for my DVD backups, so I'm going to used a TB hard drive and avoid the streaming - did you do this to reduce sound or just to keep the storage pc? This will be my first PC build so I'm a bit nervous!
Anyway, good system you have built here, my only additions will be a blu-ray and a big HD!
All the best,
Mat
November 12th, 2008 at 10:00 am
Have you considered using Linux for a project like this? There are also fanless processor boards by Via that would likely cut back on the size of the unit.
November 12th, 2008 at 10:39 am
I have considered Linux but still looking for THE ONE distribution/media center app. I've seen LinuxMCE which is really nice in theory but I think it's quite ugly and I don't need most of the functionality (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2176025602905109829&hl=en).
WinXP was a quick patch, though I'm shocked to say I'm quite happy with at the moment. It [surprisingly] consistently sees my network shares, plays movies and music fine, and supports all the drivers.
A fanless board wasn't required - the board is already micro-ATX. The case is a bit large but it has just enough space and provides excellent cooling.
Thanks for the suggestion anyway
November 25th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
Have you tried using xbmc its available for pc now.Ive only used it on my old xbox which is what I use for streaming but it does not do HD very well so I was wondering how it works. This is what I want to build to replace my xbox but I would like to retain xbmc.
December 10th, 2008 at 11:58 am
Sweet … I was looking to build a cheap box for exactly this…
I'm currently using HP Pavilion laptop dv2000 series… has a dual core amd processor 2 gigs of memory.. 128 megs on the video ….
I run linux on two partitions… one partition is my desktop where i do my work… the other partition is linux without a desktop enviornment. I have linux setup to launch the xserver and launch XBMC right over it. I can product 720p images onto my 50" plasma from LG.. looks awesome but i drop about a frame or two that i can notice… i'm looking to take my laptop out of the picture… I like this project and will try to build and improvise..
If your interested in XBMC you can goto xbmc.org and check out the live installation cd… you can even install it on a 2GB usb or compact flash drive and have it boot from there… eliminating the harddrive totally. and it can stream data… also what it cannot do … if your good in linux… you can go in to the os and tweak.
December 10th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
I'll be trying out xbmc, as a lot of people are recommending it. Thanks guys.
December 18th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Sweet this is exactly what i was looking for at a really reasonable price
December 18th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
I've tried XBMC and Media Portal and didn't enjoy either. They're both too buggy and slow for me at this point. I'll be sticking with good old media player classic and Total Commander for the time being.
December 20th, 2008 at 9:48 am
Fantastic article!!
I was recently at a friend's house, and my jaw hit the floor with his Media PC set up. So now the bug has me. I think he said he spent about 800-900 on his, but i think that was just for PC. So with my budget being a little tighter, the component you listed sounds like it's going to fit the bill.
Thank you for a awesome piece!!
Michael
December 25th, 2008 at 6:26 am
Nice writeup. I recommend SageTV for a very good, multi-platform HTPC software. XBMC is a good choice if you don't care about TV/PVR functionality as well. Boxee might be a good choice too.
December 25th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I'm with Brent.
Boxee is going to blow you away.
http://www.boxee.tv/
You can get a remote (there's some hacks to get the apple remote working in linux) and you'll never need that wireless keyboard. It does Hulu, YouTube, CBS and best of all Netflix streaming.
I literally cancled my cable TV last week and I'm just using rabbit ears (for HD network tv) and Boxee on an AppleTV.
December 25th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
How is the noise level from the fans when you play 1080p video?
December 25th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
@Brent and @BJ
Thanks guys, I'm downloading Sage TV (having low expectations) and will be definitely checking out Boxee. Will report my findings when I finish.
I do like my keyboard because I like to type in movie names on imdb.com, search google, etc, and I don't mind using it at all. I also have a remote that I could use (the Packard Bell one) but I found that I didn't need it anymore.
Thanks for the suggestions.
December 25th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
@Alin
I hear nothing from the PC at all. Granted, I sit about 12 feet away but let me tell you, I hear the TV screen buzzing, especially on bright backgrounds, a lot more than I hear the PC. The case has 2 or 3 fan settings, I run mine on the lowest and have never experienced overheating or performance issues.
December 26th, 2008 at 3:39 am
Hi,
Nice choice of hardware. May look to do the same think has I already own the case and Sata HDD.
I could not find any mention of your choice of Heatsink/Fan for the processor.
Which one have you used and what is the noise level?
In addition, I'm already a mediaportal user and like the fact the the Ms MCE remote is working out of the box.
Mediaportal can be used without keyboard if you install VNC for installation of software and the remote for operation.
Are you using any remote control?
Regards,
Alain
December 26th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
@Alain
I didn't use an aftermarket heatsink/fan. As I mentioned before, the processor doesn't overheat or have any problems whatsoever, even while playing HD content.
Currently it's idling at 32C and mobo at 28C.
When I play 1080P, it goes to about 48C CPU and mobo stays at 28C.
As far as remotes, I am not using one besides my keyboard. I do have one but I found I didn't care much for it, they keyboard approach is very satisfactory to me.
I did decide against VNC though, at least while playing movies because all the screen grabbing made the video sluggish in certain places.
December 27th, 2008 at 11:04 pm
Nice setup… Am also using the NSK Case (heavily moded though). Am using the Gigabyte mATX AM2 Mobo with onboard HD3200 ATI Graphics with VGA/HDMI/DVI…. Plays 1080P fluidly with a low power Athlon BE2400 dual core and 4GB of RAM. Running Vista Ultimate 64. 2×1.5TB Seagates as Media Center Storage. 2xLG-BD-HD ROM (SATA) and 1 2.5", 7200rpm drive as boot drive.
Media Centre Powerhouse indeed.
The rig is set up with 2xAvermedia PCIe Combo Tuner Cards plus one ATI 650 HD Tuner for a total of 3 ATSC and 2 NTSC Tuners. It is set-up for agressive Power Management (Wake on LAN - so when my 3 Media Extenders need to stream from it - it automatically "wakes up". Of course it also wakes up by itself when about to record.)
Power Usage - 78 watts idle, 94 watts when recording 3 HD Shows, 100 Watts when watching 1080P Content.
Next Add-On:
An external RAID Box to expand my storage — so my DVD Rips (ISOs) and my prized TV Recordings will have extra storage.
December 30th, 2008 at 9:01 am
This setup is exactly what im looking for. Great posting. I have a few questions since I never built a computer before. Aside from the components you purchased, is there anything else I would need? What about a power supply? Is there any place you can link me to that gives a tutorial of assembling the components? How does it connect to your TV, through HDMI? I have tinkered with computers in the past, but never put one together from scratch. Thanks for the help.
December 30th, 2008 at 9:24 am
@Rob
sure, here you go.
The case I picked (actually cheaper on Amazon than where I originally bought it from: NSK2480) specifically already comes with a 380W power supply, so you don't need to buy one.
Assembling components… well heh, I guess I learned over a long period of time, playing around with components, replacing one at a time, so when it was time for a new computer, I already knew what to do. I could recomment googling around for what exactly you're not sure about. Also, avsforum.com is a great place to post anything Audio/Video/HTPC - they even have a dedicated forum. If it's anything Linux related, LinuxQuestions.org is a great forum to read.
As far as connection to TV, I ended up going for the regular 15 pin monitor cable instead of HDMI or DVI. The reason being that it gives me a much clearer and sharper picture while browsing and reading, at least on my TV. DVI->HDMI on the other hand produced very blurry and washed out at places pictures. It was still great for video, but not usable for browsing and reading at all. Your mileage may vary though, as they say. Cables are so cheap nowadays, you can afford to get them all and try for yourself.
My main advice is not to be afraid and try everything. It's quite hard to actually fuck something up - sometimes you might think you have but the components nowadays are quite smart. You won't burn a CPU if you don't put a heatsink on (but it probably will turn off within seconds) as you used to back in the day, you won't lose your data if you disconnect a harddrive and connect it back, etc.
Good luck!
January 1st, 2009 at 9:50 am
Was wondering if you can help me out with another question. How would this wireless setup work with streaming HD video? I am trying to figure out how I can watch my HD home videos, which are stored on another computer, wirelessly. Would this work? Also, would you be able to download from Netflix wirelessly?
Thanks again
January 1st, 2009 at 8:06 pm
1 final question. (I hope!)
I went to purchase the motherboard today and noticed the same brand next to it (more expensive board) and the box indicated HDMI motherboard. The model was P5E-VM HDMI.
Why does this motherboard refer to HDMI and the P5K-PL does not?
January 2nd, 2009 at 12:41 am
@Rob
wireless works exactly the same as it does on a laptop, for example. The sharing is done via Windows network sharing. I'm not exactly sure what you are asking, can you be more specific? Don't see a reason why Netflix streaming wouldn't work, as long as your connection is good enough.
As far as HDMI, the P5KPL-CM has neither HDMI nor DVI outputs, that's why it's not an HDMI board. The P5E-VM does, so you've pretty much answered your own question.
P5KPL-CM also doesn't have onboard RAID but I didn't need any of these things. A $50 motherboard has a low price tag and I didn't need any of those extra bells and whistles. It's entirely up to you which board to get, but one of my goals included a limited budget.
Have a happy PC building!
January 2nd, 2009 at 2:24 pm
I have been trying to set up a D-link media center extender in my system and when I try to connect it to the Airlink device, it never acquires an IP. The Airlink log shows repeated requests followed by an offer, but no joy. Connecting to the Airlink via a cat-5 cable works just fine. Has anyone encountered this issue?