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Choosing the right HTPC case. Advice needed.

post #1 of 28
1/3/10 at 2:46am
Thread Starter 
Happy new year :-)

My first project this year will be builing my first HTPC that fits into our livingroom. It has to be a beautiful, very quiet setup (preferably passive cooled) and powersaving.
I need some help choosing the right case for that purpose. If you could give me some words to help me make that choice easier, I would be very thankful.

The HTPC should of course be able to play HD movies, blu-ray and music. I have an external USB DAC from Pro-Ject (using it together with my Naim amplifier), so I have no soundcard requirements.

The biggest limitation to choosing the case, is the size of the rack it has to fit in, including it's cooling abilities:

Requirement #1 - Rack size: 440x150x330mm (WxHxD). The height is not that important, as I can adjust my rack.

It would be no problem to get a case in that size using a Mini-ITX motherboard (maybe in an "HFX micro" so I also get passive cooling). But I altso need to fit in two TV tuner cards:

Requirement #2 - 2x PCI TV Tuner card. One might be enough, but it would be nice to have two PCI slots anyway for future possible use.

The "Silverstone LC04" case fits into my rack, and according to the specification the number of expansion slots available is: "2 (includes 1 x PCI riser card)". So fitting the two tuner cards should not be a problem.

Theres also the "Silverstone LC02" case, but it only allows for one PCI card (with riser). Theres also only room for a slim Blu-ray drive.

The last case I've been looking at is the "HFX micro". It has one big advantage and thats the passive cooling. However it only fits an Mini-ITX and theres no room for PCI cards. The PCI cards I can live without by using an external TV tuner card (TerraTec H7).

All the above cases should be using a motherboard with integrated graphics (has to have DVI/HDMI out), except for the LC02 which also has a PCI-E raiser cards. The "HFX micro" case should be the last possible solution because it's the most expensive and the hardest case to build in.

So at the moment I'm most hooked on the LC04 case, because it has a nice size that easily fits my rack. I don't think it has a PCI-E raiser card, so onboard graphic chip is a must here.
My biggest concern here is it's cooling abilities. I'm very unsure about what motherboard and CPU to fit in it to get the most quiet HTPC possible. What do you think of the LC04 case? Is it a good HTPC case for a quiet system? And what components (mainly motherboard and cpu) would you pick to the LC04 case? I do not need a power horse. Only one that can play blu-ray and HD movies.

Or can you recommend other cases that would suit me better?

Looking forward to hear your thoughts and suggestions. Thanks in advance :-)
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post #2 of 28
1/3/10 at 4:25am
so 17" wide by 13" deepif my calculations are correct. if you could squeeze in an extra .32 inches in width, I would say hands down the GD04, but I know most racks are 17" wide exactly, so no joy there, is a great case if you can fit it though.

Neither of those cases support more than one PCI card or one AGP card, they're OLD cases.

Quite unfortunately, the stabdard you really want would be mini-DTX, a standard AMD introduced back in 2007, which is essentially mini-itx, but with two expansion slots instead of one. I thought it was a great idea, but it never caught on. The last mini-DTX board I saw was a single core atom N270 desktop board build by ECS, they're pretty cheap in the channel, but very under-powered for your use IMHO.

The first problem you're going to run into is that tiny and silent and powerful have never all been available in one package, especially not in a DIY package. If you're willing to use external tuners, you may want to look into the Dell Zino HD, at the top end around $500 it will do everything you want with no problem, but require external tuners.

If you could add about 3" of depth or didn't care what it looked like, you'd be golden, but adhering strictly to your specs, I don't think anything exists, the closest possibly being the Silverston LC-19 at $200 with an internal power supply, but only one expansion slot.
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post #3 of 28
1/3/10 at 4:43am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by ArtosDracon View Post

so 17" wide by 13" deepif my calculations are correct. if you could squeeze in an extra .32 inches in width, I would say hands down the GD04, but I know most racks are 17" wide exactly, so no joy there, is a great case if you can fit it though.

Neither of those cases support more than one PCI card or one AGP card, they're OLD cases.

Quite unfortunately, the stabdard you really want would be mini-DTX, a standard AMD introduced back in 2007, which is essentially mini-itx, but with two expansion slots instead of one. I thought it was a great idea, but it never caught on. The last mini-DTX board I saw was a single core atom N270 desktop board build by ECS, they're pretty cheap in the channel, but very under-powered for your use IMHO.

The first problem you're going to run into is that tiny and silent and powerful have never all been available in one package, especially not in a DIY package. If you're willing to use external tuners, you may want to look into the Dell Zino HD, at the top end around $500 it will do everything you want with no problem, but require external tuners.

If you could add about 3" of depth or didn't care what it looked like, you'd be golden, but adhering strictly to your specs, I don't think anything exists, the closest possibly being the Silverston LC-19 at $200 with an internal power supply, but only one expansion slot.

Thanks for your reply.

I can actully fit an GD04 inside my rack, but there will be like 2mm free space on each side of the case. Leaving almost no room for air flow because it has air intake fans on each side. I can mod my rack so it has open air intake from behind if that can help on cooling issues.

What do you think about that? Is it going to be a problem?
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post #4 of 28
1/3/10 at 5:25am
You have a closed sided rack? I'm used to the ones with just the vertical bars. 2mm isn't enough for proper airflow unfortunately. if you can fit 17.5" cases though, let me look around a bit, there might be an option or two more. I take it that it is open backed?

Found it, it's not the prettiest thing in the world, but the Cooler Master Elite 360 sounds like it might work out well for you. it has one side 120mm fan and one top 120mm fan, and the psu vents out the front, so it's a full ATX case, but only 17.3" wide and 14.2" deep. You can shift it all the way to one side so the side can exhaust air along with the power supply at the front and you can draw air in through the top directly onto the CPU, you'll need only about .5" above the case for very adequate cooling and that 120mm fan over the cpu means you can use the stock heatsink and it should stay very quiet due to the GREAT airflow it'll be getting. Plus tons of room for expansion with a full ATX motherboard. Oh, and it's only $40.
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post #5 of 28
1/3/10 at 5:46am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by ArtosDracon View Post

You have a closed sided rack? I'm used to the ones with just the vertical bars. 2mm isn't enough for proper airflow unfortunately. if you can fit 17.5" cases though, let me look around a bit, there might be an option or two more. I take it that it is open backed?

Found it, it's not the prettiest thing in the world, but the Cooler Master Elite 360 sounds like it might work out well for you. it has one side 120mm fan and one top 120mm fan, and the psu vents out the front, so it's a full ATX case, but only 17.3" wide and 14.2" deep. You can shift it all the way to one side so the side can exhaust air along with the power supply at the front and you can draw air in through the top directly onto the CPU, you'll need only about .5" above the case for very adequate cooling and that 120mm fan over the cpu means you can use the stock heatsink and it should stay very quiet due to the GREAT airflow it'll be getting. Plus tons of room for expansion with a full ATX motherboard. Oh, and it's only $40.

Yes, it's a closed sided rack. Isn't it possible to get it working with the 2mm, choosing the right hardware?

I've looked at the Cooler Master Elite 360, and it's dimensions are (W) 5.8 x (H) 14.2 x (D) 17.3 inch, which is way too deep. If I understand you right, what you're saying is that I can shift it all the way to one side, so the depth will be 14.2 inches ? How about dvd drives, etc. that are normally on the front then?
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post #6 of 28
1/3/10 at 5:54am
You know what, you're absolultely right, I read the dimensions wrong, I thought is was 14.2" deep and 17" wide, my bad. With the GD04, 2mm just isn't enough, even sliding it to one side and getting 4mm is just so tight, you're not going to get nearly enough airflow through, .5" is considered the minimum for adequate airflow.

Are you using a home made rack, or do you have a link to the model, seeing things can usually help me, even if I have a good understanding of the dimensions.
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post #7 of 28
1/3/10 at 5:59am
Thread Starter 
It's not home made. It's from Montana if you know it - danish design.
I haven't got a picture of my setup, but it's made up of modules like the ones you find here:

http://www.montana.dk/en/Living/Inspiration/
Click on TV/Hi-Fi, and they look like the modules you find on page 1 and 5. Mine does not stand against the wall though.
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post #8 of 28
1/3/10 at 11:14am
Thread Starter 
I'm thinking of taking the Mini-ITX route now, with external TV tuner cards. What do you think about that?
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post #9 of 28
1/3/10 at 1:36pm
Thread Starter 
What do you think of this setup? OrigenAE M10 case with a ZOTAC GeForce 9300-ITX WiFi motherboard and some Intel CPU, maybe E5400.
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post #10 of 28
1/3/10 at 2:00pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by tjakobsen View Post

What do you think of this setup? OrigenAE M10 case with a ZOTAC GeForce 9300-ITX WiFi motherboard and some Intel CPU, maybe E5400.

That's a nice looking case. It will force you into buying a slimline DVD/BD player and you will be limited to a single 2.5" laptop hard drive, though.

I bought this case:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811233060

I'm very happy with the case. It accepts 5.25" and 3.5" drives, so I put a BD/DVD-RW drive in there and a 1TB WD green hard drive. Obviously I didn't put a monitor on it, but it's nice to have just in case I need to convert this htpc into a regular desktop at some point in the future.
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post #11 of 28
1/3/10 at 11:01pm
I just build mine using the nMEDIAPC HTPC 6000B and I'm very happy with it. It's quiet as can be with it's fan's and you have room to add another 120mm should you need it. It looks beautiful next to my Onkyo receive and other components and functions very well. Tons of room should I decided to add a video card or several drives.
As much as I love it, it does have it's faults. Some pieces don't line up perfectly. For instance, when I mounted my PS, only 3 of the 4 screws lined up with the holes. The 4th didn't line up. Perhaps it could have been the PS's screw holes, but I would bet it's the case. In anycase, 3 does the job just fine. It's not like I'll be hauling this thing around like a lan-party box.

Check and see if this will fit your needs:
MEDIAPC HTPC 6000B


*edit* after checking the measurements, it may be too deep for your needs.
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post #12 of 28
1/3/10 at 11:44pm
Thread Starter 
Both suggestions are too deep.
Slim BD drive and 2.5" HDD will be fine. I'm getting an NAS too, to use for storage.

Maybe I'll fit an SSD in the 2.5" bay. Do you think that will speed up browsing a rather large media library in 7MC? Or is it entirely CPU/RAM dependent?

What CPU would you suggest for the Zotac 9300 board? Has to be cool and powersaving :-)
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post #13 of 28
1/3/10 at 11:50pm
If you're getting a NAS and external tuners I HAVE to say wait. Clarksdale dropped today and supports HD audio over the integrated HDMI and there WILL be mini-ITX designs in the channel this quarter. Grab a H55 or H57 board and a core i3 530 and you'll be said and done.

As for Mini-ITX case, I'll always make the same reccomendation. Antec ISK300-65. Two 2.5" bays, slimline optical, external AC-DC inverter brick with internal DC-DC power board, includes a single decent 80mm fan, expandable to two and the internal DC-DC board can handle up to 100W if the included 65W brick isn't powerful enough for your uses.
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post #14 of 28
1/4/10 at 12:34am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by ArtosDracon View Post

If you're getting a NAS and external tuners I HAVE to say wait. Clarksdale dropped today and supports HD audio over the integrated HDMI and there WILL be mini-ITX designs in the channel this quarter. Grab a H55 or H57 board and a core i3 530 and you'll be said and done.

As for Mini-ITX case, I'll always make the same reccomendation. Antec ISK300-65. Two 2.5" bays, slimline optical, external AC-DC inverter brick with internal DC-DC power board, includes a single decent 80mm fan, expandable to two and the internal DC-DC board can handle up to 100W if the included 65W brick isn't powerful enough for your uses.

Are there any release date for the Clarksdale processors, and the H55/H57 boards?

If I'm not going to wait - what processor would you choose then?
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post #15 of 28
1/4/10 at 12:46am
Quote:
Originally Posted by tjakobsen View Post

Are there any release date for the Clarksdale processors, and the H55/H57 boards?

If I'm not going to wait - what processor would you choose then?

NDA lifted today, so release date is technically today, but no one knows for sure when they'll be in channel. processors should be in wide availability by the end of the month, motherboards won't be as quick for mini-itx, but micro-atx and atx should be readily available this month as well.

If not waiting, in mini-itx I would go with a zotac nf9300-775 board with a celeron 3300 or pentium 5200(the only difference being L2 cache) due to their good thermal characteristics and low price. Just keep in mind that you'll only get 8 channel LPCM with it and not bit-streamed HD audio.
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post #16 of 28
1/4/10 at 12:50am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by ArtosDracon View Post

NDA lifted today, so release date is technically today, but no one knows for sure when they'll be in channel. processors should be in wide availability by the end of the month, motherboards won't be as quick for mini-itx, but micro-atx and atx should be readily available this month as well.

If not waiting, in mini-itx I would go with a zotac nf9300-775 board with a celeron 3300 or pentium 5200(the only difference being L2 cache) due to their good thermal characteristics and low price. Just keep in mind that you'll only get 8 channel LPCM with it and not bit-streamed HD audio.

Thanks Artos. What I'm nervous about is the 7MC performance. When browsing large media libraries, I want it to run fluently. I have no idea how big of a system you need for such task. No doubt it will be able to play 1080p HD, but what do you think about browsing? Can you clarify that for me?
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post #17 of 28
1/4/10 at 12:58am
Quote:
Originally Posted by tjakobsen View Post

Thanks Artos. What I'm nervous about is the 7MC performance. When browsing large media libraries, I want it to run fluently. I have no idea how big of a system you need for such task. No doubt it will be able to play 1080p HD, but what do you think about browsing? Can you clarify that for me?

It depends on how you're going to browse it and how big we're talking. I can tell you that my one HTPC/Gaming rig which until recently was a Pentium D 830 with a GeForce 8600GT and it ran 7MC with media browser just fine scrolling through 80+ DVD covers.
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post #18 of 28
1/4/10 at 1:11am
Thread Starter 
Thank you. Will an SSD speed up the browsing?

Guess I'll give it a try, if not waiting for the new Clarksdale.

So:
OrigenAE M10
ZOTAC GeForce 9300 (Model GF9300-I-E)
Intel Pentium Dual Core E5200/E5300

Next step is trying to find a cooler that will be silent and fit in the OrigenAE M10 case... Any ideas? :-)
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post #19 of 28
1/4/10 at 1:28am
I wish I had $400 to drop on a micro-atx case, lol.

Judging by the location of the optical drive and the height of the 60mm fans in the pictures, I'd say you can fit 40-45mm coolers in there, which means you're going to have to use the stock intel HSF, luckily they're really not bad coolers at all for the low wattage of current CPU's.

Speaking of the optical drive, that case limits you to slot load drives, of which I can not find a blu-ray drive on the popular e-tailer sites.

Oh, and yeah, an SSD would be GREAT, but only if the data is stored locally on the SSD, if it's remote, it won't really help measurably, at least no more than a USB drive with the media cache off loaded would, and I don't even use that. I rarely don't have a second or two to burn when I decide to go watch a movie.
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post #20 of 28
1/4/10 at 1:55am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by ArtosDracon View Post

I wish I had $400 to drop on a micro-atx case, lol.

Judging by the location of the optical drive and the height of the 60mm fans in the pictures, I'd say you can fit 40-45mm coolers in there, which means you're going to have to use the stock intel HSF, luckily they're really not bad coolers at all for the low wattage of current CPU's.

Speaking of the optical drive, that case limits you to slot load drives, of which I can not find a blu-ray drive on the popular e-tailer sites.

Oh, and yeah, an SSD would be GREAT, but only if the data is stored locally on the SSD, if it's remote, it won't really help measurably, at least no more than a USB drive with the media cache off loaded would, and I don't even use that. I rarely don't have a second or two to burn when I decide to go watch a movie.

I know it's going to be hard to find a slot load blu-ray drive, but I can wait for that until some manufacture decides to release one.

I will think about the SSD. Music and movies will be stored remotely, and I have no idea if I can store the covers etc. for browsing on the SSD. I'll look into that.

Using the stock HSF, how noisy is that?

Edit: Just found this HSF. What do you think of it?
http://thermolab.co.kr/?mid=nano_eng
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post #21 of 28
1/4/10 at 4:15am
that HSF actually looks quite nice, have you found anywhere to get in in the Con-US yet?

If you do use Media Browswer it does store a cache locally, which you can set to a flash drive with a little bit of tweaking, and it is supposed to speed things up a noticeable amount. I'll likely be trying it on one of my systems that has a much slower hard drive soon, see how well it works.
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post #22 of 28
1/4/10 at 4:19am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by ArtosDracon View Post

that HSF actually looks quite nice, have you found anywhere to get in in the Con-US yet?

If you do use Media Browswer it does store a cache locally, which you can set to a flash drive with a little bit of tweaking, and it is supposed to speed things up a noticeable amount. I'll likely be trying it on one of my systems that has a much slower hard drive soon, see how well it works.

Actually I'm from Denmark, so no. But according to their homepage theres three supplies in the US. I'll probaly be ordering mine from Germany if it turns out to be my choice of an HSF. I'll give the stock HSF a try first.

I just ordered the OrigenAE M10 from Sweden.

Sounds interesting about the local cache in Media Browser. Let me know how it works if you get to try it out.
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post #23 of 28
1/4/10 at 5:31am
Thread Starter 
What do you think of this setup?
Zotac GeForce 9300-ITX WiFi - Socket 775 - GeForce 9300 (GF9300-G-E)
INTEL Pentium Dual Core E5300 2.6 2MB FSB800 Box
OCZ RAM 4GB KIT DDR2 PC2-6400 800MHz CL5 2x2GB - 5-5-5-18 - Gold series (OCZ2G8004GK)
WESTERN DIGITAL WD Scorpio Blue 500GB HDD 5400rpm sATA (WD5000BEVT)

Inside an OrigenAE M10 case.
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post #24 of 28
1/4/10 at 5:33am
Should work.
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post #25 of 28
1/6/10 at 11:51am
Has anyone used this case ?

http://www.vidabox.com/store/index.p...roducts_id=118
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post #26 of 28
1/7/10 at 12:51am
To be quite honest, that case is nothing extraordinary, except that it's big enough to use a standard ATX power supply and has room for 3 full size hard drives, neither of which should be important in a HTPC case. Quiet cooling of as small of components as possible should be the aim of HTPC case manufacturers right now as there is more than enough power and features in a mini-ITX motherboard now to satisfy anyone using a computer for HTPC use. The only time people should really need expansion slots would be for a cable-card tuner or if they want higher-quality analog audio.

I'm not saying it's a bad case, I'm just saying that it's premise and goals seem out-dated.
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post #27 of 28
1/7/10 at 7:45am
I was looking at it for music htpc where I might add a high quality audio card.

The reason I was looking at it is because it looks good/will fit into a standard audio rack/is not too big/not too expensive.
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post #28 of 28
1/10/10 at 10:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by tjakobsen View Post

I know it's going to be hard to find a slot load blu-ray drive, but I can wait for that until some manufacture decides to release one.

There's a few out there..

http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=BC-...ff452cb49de87b

http://www.digistor.com/Panasonic-Sl...lot-Load-Drive
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