danksy Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Guys, Im thinking of replacing my $ky plus box with a Media Centre PC. Any recommendations for about £600? Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 £600 is very low for a HTPC, but Aria have this one for £699 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomk Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 im ust admit i cant see a problem with building one for that , i run Media centre on a atholon 2.6 with a 9500 pro graphics card , with the full remote and ti works fine , Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparky Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Your keyboard however, appears to be having some problems. I agree with Thorburn. That price point is too low for a quality build media machine. You want hard disks built for constant use (Raptors) and silent cooling plus a good amount of proper RAM 1GB min. This all adds up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Yep, a GOOD (quiet, infact near silent) media centre chassis, power supply and cooling should take up the best part of £200. £100 for a copy of media centre. Then you want a pair of TV tuners (one analogue, one digital), a good graphics and sound cards, at least 1GB of ram and maybe even 2GB, big hard drives (preferably in RAID0) and I'd go for a dual core CPU so you don't get any stuttering. I'd budget £1000 minimum, maybe even more. We are supposed to be setting one up in the lab today to try out Juiced while recording a digital TV stream in the background, HP system I think, will be interesting to see how it fares. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chav Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Interestingly chaps, I think media centre PC's (for dvd/other media playback) should be much cheaper than building a top spec game pc. He wants it to replace his sky box. The spec needed for that is pretty low. A PIII can playback a DVD easy enough. Stuttering won't happen as long as the DVD is reasonably fast. Media playback doesn't need that much RAM either, and the graphics card is only important if playing games, so going for an all-in-one type card may be cheapest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 I thought one of the benefits of Sky Plus was you could watch one thing and record another at the same time. To do that your going to need two tuners, and if he was using Windows XP MCE the minimum spec would be automatically pushed above a P3. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparky Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Sky+ lets you record 2 channels while playing back a programme. It's fantastic. If I could put Sky through a media centre PC, I would do so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snail Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 [ QUOTE ] If I could put Sky through a media centre PC, I would do so. [/ QUOTE ] Never happen, the moment it hits the PC it will get hacked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danksy Posted August 2, 2005 Author Report Share Posted August 2, 2005 mmm thanks folks! I have ditched $ky plus, as it was costing me £60 a month!!! We were very rarely watching enough movies /sport to make it all worthwhile hence I want to move to freeview but at the same time consolidate my DVD player etc! Reckon I should stretch to £1k! James (Thorburn) could you let me know how you get on with the one you run in the lab? Cheers Nick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 2, 2005 Report Share Posted August 2, 2005 danksy, come to the bristol balloon festival, gonna be on the stand friday, saturday and sunday demoing some I think Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danksy Posted August 3, 2005 Author Report Share Posted August 3, 2005 Cool :-) What's the best day to go to avoid the crowds? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 3, 2005 Report Share Posted August 3, 2005 Not sure, I'd imagine the Friday as people will be at work. Working the morning shift on Friday I think, but I'll be there all day on all three days so just gimme a call if I'm not about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 3, 2005 Report Share Posted August 3, 2005 3pm - 8pm Friday, Saturday and Sunday Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Posted August 3, 2005 Report Share Posted August 3, 2005 Bristol International Balloon Fiesta Cheers Thorburn! I might just have to go and see this. I keep meaning to go to one, but never got round to it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FiftyPence Posted August 6, 2005 Report Share Posted August 6, 2005 Is it possible to get a media centre type thing which is based around your whole home and you have a groovy mini tablet pc style interaction plate to control everything? I think itd be very expensive Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 7, 2005 Report Share Posted August 7, 2005 FiftyPence, I've seen something similar in the past, a few years back Orange did an entire digital home using wireless and tablets, could control everything for all the rooms, TV, lights, curtains etc. Never seen any commercial version of it but not ever looked, sure someone will do them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FiftyPence Posted August 7, 2005 Report Share Posted August 7, 2005 I saw the girl on the programme Gadgets Gadgets Gadgets visited the same kind of place which had been built by microsoft and it was awesome. Come to think of it, it is similar to what the Osbournss have in their home on tv. You know when the dad is sat there playing with this little mini tablet pc type thing changing channels and its far too big to be just a tv remote. Itd be awesome to have a piece of kit like that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snail Posted August 8, 2005 Report Share Posted August 8, 2005 I have a friend who does that sort of thing. There are plenty of companies around who do that sort of stuff, but it tends to be expensive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorburn Posted August 13, 2005 Report Share Posted August 13, 2005 Done two days on the stand and not seen anyone I recognise, either from here or just people I know. Am fecking knackered now and got another day to do! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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