New Build - What do you think?

Drop your PSU to a 400 or 500 watt is the first obvious thing you should do.

Second thing would be swap from the Sanforce based intel SSD to a 256GB variant with improved performance and track record for the controller like a Samsung 840/840pro, or VERTEX4. Both drives should have a good boost in performance over the Intel. In the case of the VERTEX4 it also has a 5 year warranty and sometimes sells cheaper.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/595?vs=628

Third would be consider a 3570k over the 3770k cpu because for your intended use it's much more appropriate. Your not going to notice any benefit in PQ. And you would need DUAL video cards and higher than a single 7950 to notice any difference in gaming performance.

Save your cash.

(NOTE I OWN BOTH AN i5 and i7 and both are overkill for a HTPC)

If your near microcenter you can get a 3570k for $169 (great deal) and get another $40 off an Asrock Motherboard.

4th thing I would do is abandon the overpriced ASRock Z77 OC Formula in favor of a basic 3/4 PRO/EXTREME Asrock Z77 saving another $100.

Unless your going for an overclock world record or running multi GPU's it's way overkill and overpriced.

If you wanted to go for a strong overclock you would get a Sandy 2600k i7 instead as it overclocks better than the IVY 3770k and costs less.

I doubt you will do either so get the cheaper Asrock board and 3570k I reccomended- save $200. You can still overclock the 3570k on that cheaper board to a 3770k level performance with $200 in your pocket.

But I would run it stock because it will be cooler and quieter and use less energy and be more reliable as the 3570k is still more than you need.

What RAM are you looking at ??

Link ?

You could step up to a faster speed (1866/2200/2800) if you wanted with the cost your saving on the board/CPU

I would do the microcenter deal on the 3570k + Asrock Z77 of you choice with $40 off. You should be looking around $50-$100 after discount on the board. (normally $90-140)

THen consider the Trident X Gskill with your saved cash. MKIII is a nice PSU but I would get the smaller size. or a Rosewill 80+ gold or another Seasonic Variant like the MKIII (ANTEC NEO 400watt)

A 7950 is not a power hog. Your build needs less than 400 watts.

Well... I did not mean to sound harsh. I reads that way when I just re-read it. Sorry about that. I meant to be helpful.

Your original build was fine and good. I just think my suggestions might save you some cash without any sacrifice in performance.

As far as software, Are you talking about windows 7 ultimate??

yeah that is a waste of money.

Get x64 home premium or x64 W7 PRO. Both under $99

I would not bother with AnyDVD at all. What do you need that for ?

I don't use it.

Spend the really small cost on Assassin guides. The ease of set up and walk through on setting up software is invaluable IMO.

It's this part that is the hardest to get it right- and it is this part most make mistakes. Your experience and happiness will be greatly maximized and you will squeeze every drop of value from your investment if you do the software set up properly.

It's near impossible for a rookie to get it right without hours of trial and error and learning curve IMO.

it's a really small and really good investment.

http://assassinhtpcblog.com/

I think both XBMC and MEDIABROWSER are a good choice. Assassin has walk through guides for setting both up perfectly. As well a Jriver which would be the 3rd option and good for audiophiles and audio people.

You can bitsteam HD audio with alll of them.

For software I like:

MAKEMKV
MediaCenterMaster
VLC sometimes (it's simple)

You can buy a software solution for playing blurays but you mentioned you had a server so why not use MAKEMKV for free ???? It's way slicker IMO once you get it up and running.

Browsing the album art and metadata with a slick interface is half the fun of HPTC. Why spend $150 on a bluray software program when you can buy a blu ray hardware standalone player for half that ???

personally I don't want to suffer the menu system or get off the couch to change a disc thus I love my HTPC and media server.

I don't think I have enough experience with software for bluray playback to make an intelligent comment or recommendation. I differ in philosophy on that issue. Perhaps someone else can help you out more on that one.

If your set up and running now- and steaming HD audio, and have codec configured properly it might be true.

At my level (I am not a beginner) I still find some value so you might have to make your own call on that one.

A real beginner it is a must have. I did not realize your so advanced.

I think most people just push mediabrowser or XBMC as far as they can in search of the ultimate software solution. I don't think there is a better option.

The XBMC or MEDIABROWSER FORUMS are good place to find tricks and stuff... plugins and what nots.

Do you have HD audio now?
Do you playback ISO ?
Do you copy and play from HDD? Or do you play from the actual disc ?

You sound like you can find your way on the software.

Nothing short of a software guide is going to help you further IMO. I don't know how to post a "ultimate software solution" for you.

Most of what I do is things I pick up here and there. You would probably have to ask specific questions with specific titles to get cutting edge advanced answers and information.

many of us have done this already- and amassed the knowledge on small part at a time but just throwing it out there seems impossible unless your asking something specific.

If you are going to be playing back Blu-ray from the disc AnyDVD HD is a must have IMO and without it HTPC wouldn't have been where it is now.
If you use its speed menus feature along with XBMC Frodo, it automatically finds the main movie track for you, even when fake playlists are present, no trailers/warnings to sit through.
I haven't found anything else that does this correctly, XBMC/VLC/MPC/MakeMKV or similar have no clue which track is correct in these cases.

As for ultimate HTPC software, I haven't found anything that I think is perfect for everything yet.
Edited by acejh1987 - 12/13/12 at 3:52pm

The only main downside is its expensive (They usually have a 20% off each month making it $120ish) but its worth it if you are going to be playing back the actual disc, there is no standalone player can play back discs from any region and get you straight to the movie in a few seconds.