Hiya Bit. I'm considering an HTPC/Emulation box build and I'm trying to make it as inexpensive as possible while also making it as quiet/low power as I can. I basically need it to be able to play 1080p video seamlessly, and I want it to be able to play up to PS2 era emulators at 1920x1080. I'm wondering if maybe my specs are overkill here? AMD A8-3850 $140 (I'd go for the 3800 but I can't find it. Assuming it goes on sale, I'd get the 3800.) Gigabyte A75M UD2H $99 Silverstone MicroATX HTPC case $60 DiabloTek 380W microATX PSU $30 -Can't really find many micro ATX PSUs. This has the best user reviews. 4GB Corsair XMS DDR3 1600 RAM $40 Western Digital 500GB 6.0Gb/s HDD $45 Total cost is running me about 400 bucks. Should I go for a cheaper CPU? I really want a decent integrated graphics solution. I don't want another card in the case because I want to cut down both on noise and power consumption. Additionally, the graphics power of the A8 is mighty impressive, especially if I can get an A8-3800 for around $120 bucks. Other than that, is there any other essential HTPC hardware I'm missing? Remote? Bluetooth Keyboard/Mouse? At the moment I'm leaving out the optical drive. I plan on most of my stuff to be digital and/or streaming so it's not top priority right now. Thanks for any advice!
Which Silverstone case? The only htpc case I know of by Silverstone in that price range is the Milo and it uses a regular atx psu. Everything asides from the psu looks good to me, I wouldn't trust diablotek. I don't think it's overkill. You'll just get more life out of it that way. You'll also want a bit of power as emus for the most recent systems have fairly high overhead. Remotes or bluetooth keyboard / trackpad combo is up to you. I use my ipod touch as a remote for my htpc.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163174 This is the case I was thinking of. I like the simplistic look of it. Maybe I can get an android app to use for a remote. Thanks for the idea! As for a PSU, I'm looking around Newegg and I can't really find any decent microATX PSUs. If I can fit a regular ATX sized PSU in there I will. Maybe I can find a decent, low cost/power one to fit.
Yeah you can do full size ATX in that case. If it was me I'd get this FSP psu. edit: Actually i would probably get this one. Seasonic passive. Power supplies are something I never like to shave corners on.
I'm not sure this setup can handle a PS2 emulator ... but anything else is good. You'll need a real arcade stick for ol' games.
I'd definitely say the A8-3850 seems to be the way to go if you want strong integrated graphics and can afford to drop a bit of CPU grunt. It will easily handle 1080p playback without breaking a sweat. I'd also agree with lysol on the PSU front. That fanless Seasonic unit is fantastic and would be the perfect HTPC solution, although the price puts it quite a bit over many people's budget including my own. That FSP unit looks very good though and is a fair bit cheaper. The only other issue I can see is your lack of HDD space. For a HTPC/emulator you may want to invest in a 1TB drive - the Samsung F3 that fdbh96 suggested fits the bill well.
Do you mean "up to and including PS2" or "Everything prior to PS2"? Because that rig as it is won't run the majority of games very well under PCSX2. Trying to play PS2 games under emulation on a low-power system will in most circumstances deliver a worse experience than simply playing the games on a real PS2. PCSX2 has made some massive strides lately in performance and compatibility, but there are pletnty of PS2 games that still chug or exhibit sporadic performance problems even on a rig like mine, nevermind a low-power/HTPC build. That is, unless, you mean to play primarily 2D PS2 games; which tend to handle alright on lower-power systems. Anyting prior to PS2 emulation should be fine with that CPU, but I'm not very familiar with how the integrated GPU performs yet.
Thanks for the advice everybody. As much as I'd love that passive PSU, it's way over my budget. Even the FSP one is a little too price for what I'm aiming. Gonna have to keep looking. The hard drive size right now is more or less a stand in to get me started. Like I said, I intend mostly to use this for streaming media and playing emulators. I don't plan on storing massive amounts of movies or TV shows, and if I do it'll only be long enough for my GF and I to watch then delete. Zurechial, the GPU in this CPU actually performs extremely well. Far and away better than the integrated graphics you're used to. For example, it can play L4D2 at 1680x1050 on high settings with 16xAF at almost 40fps on average. How that will work on PCSX2 I don't know. Gonna find out though. If I need to, I can just lower the resolution or turn off all filters. If it doesn't work, no big loss. I'll just stick to the 16 bit era and down.
Take a look at the Corsair 430CX v2. It's got some good reviews on JonnyGuru and HardwareSecrets and is often the go-to PSU for a low power, lower budget system. Obviously it's not in the same class as the Seasonic unit, but it's a solid and reliable PSU with a three year warranty (I think) and will easily power your system. I've used one in a build for my younger brother and it's a very nice little PSU. It's easy to work with and is a steal for the price. We often see it go for around £30 here in the UK but I'm not sure how much it will be for you in the US. Worth looking into though!
Yeah, I saw the benchmarks and reviews; just haven't used one yet myself. The problem with this build and PCSX2 is that the emulator is massively CPU-dependent and performance will bottleneck on the CPU long before the GPU's power comes into play. This build will handle emulation of anything up to (including) PSX/N64-era consoles excellently though, I'd wager. +1 I have a CX430 in a low-power, low-noise rig here and I find it great. Practically inaudible and as moody89 says, it got good reviews. I'm not certain about this specific model, but many of Corsair's PSUs are rebranded Seasonics if my memory serves correctly.
I don't know for sure either but off the top of my head I think the old CX400 was a Seasonic unit. I have a feeling the newer ones are FSP but don't count me on it!
