Craig's Build (Revised 12/3/09)

[Craig]

Sony 50" SXRD

LG 37" 37LC7D

GIGABYTE GA-MA790GP-DS4H AM2+/AM2 AMD 790GX HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard

AMD Athlon X2 4850e 2.5GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 45W Dual-Core Processor

A-DATA 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory

250gb WD Blue HDD partitioned into 100GB for OS and 150GB for music and docs.

1x 1 TB WD Black HDD that I use for DVR storage.

5x 1TB WD Green HDD's that I have my movie library on. I don't run a RAID Array I just make a copy of each HDD on another 1 TB and store them in a safe place.

SeaSonic M12II SS-430GM 430W ATX12V 2.2 /EPS12V 2.91 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply

Scythe SCMNJ-1000 80mm Sleeve "NINJA MINI" CPU Cooler

3x HVR-2250's

Silverstone  LC17B Changed out to the following case.

Silverstone LC10B-E HTPC Case

Damptek Noise isolating foam

120mm Noiseblocker fan which is an exhaust fan that I put into the lid of my Case after making a modifaction (i.e. I put a whole in it)

80mm Noiseblocker fan that acts as intake fan and blows across the fanless "Ninja Mini".

2x 92mm Nexus Fans that mount in the two HDD chassis's and blow across the 6 1TB HDD's. They are modified using the 7 volt Mod. which cuts the RPM's close to half making them much quieter yet still provide ample cooling to the HDD's.

USB-UIRT for an IR receiver/Blaster

Microsoft Intellimouse and Keyboard Elite for Bluetooth

Harmony 670 Remote for the living room.

Harmony 659 Remote for in the bedroom.

D-Link DWA-552 Wireless "N" 32-bit PCI Xtreme Desktop Adapter

D-Link DIR-655 Draft 2 Xtreme N Gigabit Wireless Router  

I am running SageTV 6.6 using the SageMC 6.3.9 STV. I also run a list of pluggins with SageMC which include: Comskip, Toolbar, AMG 2.0, Slimplayer 2.1.1, Jetty 1.6, BMT 3.1, Phoenix API 1.43, TVexplorer 1.0, Sage Movie Wall 4.0, and the iTV theme. I also have a placeshifter account I run on my laptop, and a STX HD100 extender running the 37" LG LCD in my bedroom.  

I added a Surround System which includes a Pioneer VSX-819H, 4 Polk Audio Monitor 50's, a Polk Audio CS-2 Center Channel speaker and a ASW-10 Sub from The Speaker Company. I also bought a APC J10BLK Power Conditioner/Surge Protector/UPS. Finally, I bought a new AV Shelf to put it all on. Oh, and there is a PS3 in there that I barely ever play.

According to the APC J10 my standby power draw from everything in the system and the PC at idle is about 84w. With everything on it is drawing almost 380 watts. The battery on the APC J10 has enough power to run the whole system for 11 minutes. If just at standby and idle on the PC then I will get 64 minutes. I never realized how crappy my power was coming into my home until I got this unit. It is constantly correcting voltages and even jumping to battery for a few seconds at a time when sudden drops in voltage are detected. Apparently it can't tell if the voltage is just dipping extremely fast or the power went out completely, so to be save it just switches to battery. Then a few seconds later it can correct the voltage and go back to utility. The the last week it has gone to batter 11 times for a total of 55 seconds. Just goes to show you that a good UPS/power conditioner is a good i investment to protect your electronics from crappy electricity.





I put some sound dampening foam in it.


Foam inside the Front Face piece


I made a little mod to the cover. I put in it for a 120mm fan.




[ATTACH]129379[/ATTACH]

Front Face piece


Put some silicone down where the base of the PSU sits for some sound/vibration dampening


DVD drive Chassis


View from rear


View from front


I put some silicone in the HDD and DVD chassis to help with sound/vibration dampening


View with just the Mobo


3 HDD's and 92mm fan


View of how 8 HDD's can fit into the case


HDD and DVD chassis in with Mobo


A bit of a tight fit between the PSU and HDD's


8 HDD's, 1 DVD/RW and all the PCI card installed


This is the setup with 6 HDD's and everything in it.


1. What Operating System do you use to run your HTPC?
    Windows Vista Business SP1
2. What software do you use to play movies and music?
    SageTV with PDVD 9 for DVD decoding
3. What do you use to record TV?
    SageTV with 3 HVR-2250's using PDVD 9 codec
4. What software do you use to catalog and organize your movies?
    SageTV with Batch Metadata Tools for automatic download of fanart and  
    metatdata and DVD Profiler
5. What software do you use to catalog and organize your music?
    SageTV with WMP to rip and get the album art

I'm using SageTV 6.6 with a number of addins. I'm using the SageMC STV (Skin) that was started a long time ago as a play off of Windows Media Center. Within this STV there have been a lot of Themes developed. I'm using the "iTV" theme.

EDIT: Sorry, some of the images are cut off slightly on the right. Don't know how that happened.

Main Menu


Netflix Pluggin (A lot of the functions have been disabled due to Frequently changing API's on the netflix end. The developer can't keep it up to date. I can use it to watch my "Watch It Now" queue though.)


Recorded TV Menu


Recorded TV Sub Menu


Recorded TV OSD (Black spots in timeline are where Comskip has marked the commercials. Comskip monitor that is built into SageMC automatically skips the commercials that are marked)


TV Guide


Program Info


Live TV OSD


Videos Menu


Videos Sub Menu


Music Menu


Music Sub Menu


Music Sub Sub Menu


SlimPlayer Plugin


Pictures Menu


Sub Menu


Online Services (Using a pluggin that works with Playon feeds to be able to browse/watch Hulu and Netflix as well as a lot of other on line video feeds)


Weather


Toolbar pluggin (Bar at the top allows for easier navigation if you are using a mouse)

[Miller]

A nice build. I'm assuming it runs pretty quiet looking at your parts?

[Craig]

I was very quiet to begin with. With this upgrade I went from 8 fans total to 5 and it might be a little quieter. I really want to put one of those 250mm fans on the lid though. I just need to figure out how I will cut the hole I have a dremel I just need to go shopping for the right bit. Then I'll pull out the two 80mm fans. I don't know if it will fit over the CPU cooler though. Its a 30mm thick fan. And I don't think I want it to stick that far off the top of the lid.

[The Dude]

The M series PSUs from Seasonic are the Modular ones right? How do you like that? When I built mine I really wanted to go with a modular PSU but I couldn't find one that would work for me. I'd imagine it saves a lot of space.

[Craig]

The fact that it is modular is one of the biggest reasons I went for it. I only use the 20 pin and 8 pin lines and 2 of the accessory lines. Saves a ton of headache and space. I will probably never buy another PSU that isn't modular.

[The Dude]

I really like that idea. There's so many cables just taking up space inside my case that will never be used.

I didn't even notice you've got five digital tuners in that thing too. That's cool. Do you record enough to make that many tuners worth it? I guess that if anyone asks the question of how many they can use in Sage I'll point them in the direction of this thread from now on.

Are you still using the 8800 or did you switch to the onboard video on that mobo? If so how's it hold up to HD content?

[Craig]

I am only using 2 Digital tuners. The 2 on the HVR-2250. One thing that wasn't clear when I bought that card is that each tuner can only be one tuner or the other-digital or analog. There is some kind of work around for that, but I believe it only pertains to the tuner when using the WinTV app that comes with all Hauppauge cards. I hope they can write support into the drivers that allow you to set up 4 tuners for the card and allow it to switch back and forth depending on what you want to record.
The HVR-1800 I only use for analog right now. It was a very good OTA tuner but it sucks for QAM. As did the HVR-1600, which is currently on ebay. I used to have an AverTV combo PCIe, but I sold that as well. That too sucked for QAM. I moved and I no longer have the ability to utilize my antenna for OTA.

I pulled out the 8800GT and I am using the onboard HD3300. Works perfectly. CPU never goes higher than 20% and usually bounces between that and 10%.

[The Dude]

Oh I saw the two theater 550s on their too. Are those not digital tuners? Or are you just not using them? Either way that's a pretty cool setup. I like that mobo. I thinking of a new build with some of the parts I have laying around here and a mobo with a decent onboard video would really help reduce costs.

[Craig]

The 550's are single analog only. I've had those guys for over 2 years now. I think they are two of the best tuners I've owned.

[The Dude]

Nice. We don't get a lot of information on the ATI cards around here it's good to hear some experience on those.

[Miller]

I used the 550s in a build for my dad and when he reformatted he was never able to find the drivers for them. By the time I came over to help they had switched cable providers and not have a 4 tuner dvr. So he gave me the tuners. I haven't installed them yet, but do you know what drivers you used?

[Craig]

I Just download them directly from the ATI/AMD website.  If you don't want the whole package you can click on previous drivers and go back to the first entry and get Just the driver.

[Miller]

Thanks! I figured it was something easy, I just haven't tried it yet.

[castawaygator]

well since you have had some time to play with your new set up is there anything you would change???

i am about to update m system too. i have almost the same OLD setup that you had, and i will be purchasing just about everything you bought and was hoping for your opinion before i purchase the same MB/ CPU.

have you honestly seen any big jump in performance from your old setup?
i tried looking up the onboard sound and could not find the answer, does it have DDL and DTS encoding? or just DD

thanks

[Backlash]

What did you do with the old parts? I am about to update an old PC that I turned into a PVR that is four years old. Socket 754 2.0ghz amd, 1gb of ram, and a 6800gt agp card. I am just debating what I should do with the older parts that I take out...