mini server idea

[jrmillerUT]

Hey guys,

I was wondering if anyone could give me some advice. I'm thinking about building a dream system pretty soon based off of the athlonxp 2100 when it comes out. Anyways i haven't built a PC from bare bones before and i was thinking a smaller older pc to build from scratch would be a good way to break myself in.

I'm thinking I want to base this comp on storage/TV out capabilities.

I'm not interested in capture.

I basically want about 200gb of storage and a CPU/vid card combo that gives me high quality when viewed on a regular TV. Do i need a certain sound card to watch my divx encodes? Is one of the radeons looking to be my best bet? No encoding will be taking place, just storage and TV viewing. With that in mind... can anyone give me a sample setup or some suggestions? Or problems they've run into? I already have a p4 1.8ghz as my primary pc but i'm a nvidia freak who doesn't have a tv out when it comes to gaming.

Any help is appreciated
JAmes

[AbuNidal]

ok...

you intend to build a PC for storage and TV-Output as "practice".

So our main goal is to keep this thing quiet and not to spend too much money.

CPU: Intel Celeron: offers good performance at realatively low prices and low power consumption. This is important as it enables your heatsink with regulated fan to run at low speeds and thus quiet.

GfX: Go for an ATI Radeon, e.g. 7500. It comes with an heatsink only (no fan) and offers good TV-Out capabilites.

Harddisk(s): IDE with no more than 5400upm. Enable accustic management.

DVD-ROM: Don't know which are quiet, but there are some programs which slow your drive down in order to avoid noise

Sound card: if you have an appropiate sound-system, get a Creative 5.1

For your case, get a power supply with regulated fan(s).


That should do it...

[jrmillerUT]

ok i'm modifying my idea slightly....

i think i'll need a little bit more processing power than a celeron... i think one of my friends has 1.2g tbird sitting in his room somewhere. And if this works the noisefactor won't matter. I was thinking of an ATI aiw 7500 with the remote that doesn't need LOS to the receiver... which means i can have the bare bones comp in my room (which is near the living room tv... i'd only need an extra 5-10ft of RCA's to hook up to receiver) and run the system off of the remote. I just remember that my gf's celeron even at no post processing has trouble playing alot of my rips on her comp at fullscreen. What do ya'll think of that idea as opposed to the trying to keep it all quiet? Remember i'd be going with the ati aiw 7500 due to cost purposes and because i'm not interested in capture.

Thanks again

[AbuNidal]

hmmm, if your friend's Celeron 1.2 is not able to properly play your rips, this indicates to me that it is bad configured, you know, drivers, DMA-mode, that sort of stuff.

Any CPU with about 600-700 MHz should be able to play rips (well, except if your movies are 1900x1200 or so...)

Performance: Tualatin-Celerons now have a L2-Cache of 256kb, but in case the noise-factor is not that important, as you indicated, you'd be better off with a Duron, of course.

[jrmillerUT]

oh her comp is a pos... i've tried everything with it... a little "e-machines joke built by fry's"

I think i'm going with a duron, an ati aiw 7500
u think 128mb ram good for this simple comp? or more?
2 100gb 5400 rpm IDE hdd's
cheapy network card
i've got an atx case with 300w ps sitting in the corner too

am i leaving anything out? i've got software so thats not an issue

[AbuNidal]

sounds reasonable...

but since it's going to be a fileserver as well, you're best off with nt4/w2k - and those systems appreciate any additional memory!

[jrmillerUT]

i've got a win2kpro sitting in my room... one of the advantages of being a student... $5 for a copy of win2kpro with liscense!

well thanks a bunch for help!

[theReal]

Take 256MB RAM, that should be better.
I also can't imagine a Celeron 1.2 Gig won't be able to play Divx smoothly...however there are so many bad boards and memory and stuff available that it's probably the fault of some other parts in that system (that's why you should always build your own custom system)

An ATI Radeon VE will be enough for playing DivX very nicely - a friend of mine has such a setup, and videos look great on a hdtv tv screen.
I have a Radeon 7500 and even it's not loud, there is a fan on it! It's definitely more expensive than the VE (or the 7200) - the tv out of the VE version seems to be the same quality though. As long as you're not gaming, go with the less expensive and buy more RAM!