Show Your HTPC Setup - Page 3

Yes the Harmony 880 communicates with IMON. Yes the LC14m comes with IMON built in. Yes I can program it to do all that. Currently it controls launching any program, powering on and off the pc, Meedio, PowerDVD, and MPC. Took some fiddling but it works like a champ. You just have to map the buttons in IMON to correspond with the programs commands.

So the other day, I walk in to my house and find that Santa has dropped off a few gifts for me:





He leaves a note that says, "Don't wait for Christmas"... So I get started on putting one of my new toys together:





Specs of my new HTPC:

MonCaso 932 Case with the 7" Pixel Perfect Touch Screen LCD
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz
GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS4 Rev. 2.0 LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard
Kingston HyperX 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Ram
POWERCOLOR 26XT512M/D3HDMI Radeon HD 2600XT 512MB HDCP Ready Video Card (dedicated to the Big Screen)
POWERCOLOR 2400XT 256MB HDCP Ready Video Card (dedicated to the 7" TS)
HighPoint RocketRAID 2300 PCI Express SATA II Controller Card
4x 500GB Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKS SATA 3.0Gb/s (1.5TB Available)
ENERMAX Liberty ELT500AWT ATX12V 500W Power Supply
XBOX 360 HD-DVD Player Connected via USB
SAMSUNG 20X DVD±R DVD Burner Black PATA Model SH-S202G
Logitech diNovo Edge 2-Tone Bluetooth Wireless Mini Keyboard
Logitech MX Revolution Mouse
Vista Ultimate

All of this connected to 3 Sony VGPXL1B3 200 Disk DVD Changers controlled via MyMovies. I love the fact that you can turn the HTPC on with a remote (via IMON). It has more than enough power to play my HD-DVD's as well as my x264 encoded Blue-Ray and HD-DVD movies...





Nothing like browsing the net, playing games, and watching movies at 1080P... BTW, don't worry about the missing movie jackets, I was rebuilding my "MyMovies" Database when I took this pic...





The rest of the components aren't high end (I wish they were McIntosh or Sunfire), but they are good enough for now until I get around to building my Theater Room... They include 2 SONY DVP-CX995V 400 Disk Changers, an Onkyo TX-SR803-B THX Certified 7.1 Receiver, and a Scientific Atlanta 8300HD High Def DVR with a 500GB eSATA drive attached to it. Speakers are a 7.1 setup and are Polk Audio. The video is displayed by a Toshiba 56MX195 Cinema Series DLP. My remote is a Sony AX4000. Also, the HTPC and the TV are connected via Gigabit LAN to my 3 Media Servers (a little over 8 TB's of storage between them) and my WHS (2TB).





Don't mind the washed out colors... It's hard to get a good pic in the dark.





Thanks for looking.

very nice! love the case though I question the practicality of the touchscreen. Do you find yourself using it often?

might have blurred out the "live free..." part... ahem... *wink*wink*

my bad, theyre "trailers" , ok.

LOL! Uh, yah, trailers...

And my Blue-Ray player is in the master bedroom... I just encode them and save them to hard disk as back ups...

Why would he need to do that, as the dvd was released 5 days ago.

ah, oops, my bad

WOW!! Im so excited........ I'm so looking forward to getting a HTPC. These systems look amazing!! Looking good guys, keepem commin!!

Here's mine..
47" Westinghouse LCD 1080i
Q6600 processor
500gb hd
8800gts 640mb GPU
Samsung 1000w surround sound system w/ upconverting dvd player

Sorry no pictures at the moment, will hopefully post them later,but here are the specs:

Intel QX9650 (OEM) at 4004 (10/404)
Asus Maximus Formula SE (Modified)
Removed all stock heatsinks
SB: is a tall pure copper heatsink, with pins removed as needed to fit in car ds
NB: Danger Den NB Cooler
Voltage regulators: Mosfet ASUS 3 x2 (modified to fit between capacitors)
CPU: Danger Den CPU block
Pump: DD12V-D5 (on max #5)
Radiator: Black Ice GTX240
Water Loop: CPU -> NB -> Mosfet -> Mosfet
CPU Temp under full load: 63c
Memory: Crucial Ballistix 1GB PC8500 x 4 = 4GB
Video: ATI 3870 at 825/1251
RAID: Promise EX8350: 5x400GB = 2TB
Boot: 2x Raptor 150MB in RAID0 = 289MB
Audio: X-Plosion 7.1 (DTS out)
HD Tunner: HD Homerun
OS: Vista x64 Ultimate, Windows XP x64 SP2
DVD-R: Samsung x16
Blue-Ray Burner/HD Player: LD GGW-H10
Case pri: Thermaltake Mozart (painted all black)
Case secondary: SILVERSTONE ML01B-R (connected by 1 E-SATA and 2 USB Hubs to Pri)

I use it only when I want to control the HTPC when the big screen is off. I just switch screens via Powerstrip hot key and go from there. But truthfully, it is more for the "ooh and ahh" effect than anything else. I have yet to try out Ultramon, but may do so in the near future to see if I can get it to clone at different resolutions (hopefully the dual video card setup will help with this).

Argh. Why didn't I think of that. Will do and post the results.

/politby

Drift King, could I ask about the equipment rack you have next to your TV? Would you tell me the model name and where you got it. I was thinking about asking a family member to build something like your but with casters. I sure would like to know about your equipment rack.

Thanks.
Tuckergeek, Palestine TX.

Freaking amazing setups....I think I found a new hobby...lolz

It is made by a company called Xera and was simply labeled "Xera Component Rack". I checked online and I have not been able to find any links to thier website. It was purchased it at Costco.com but it may have been a limited run item... Hope this helps.

Thanks, alot of the Audio Racks I've looked at cost almost as much as the HTPC I just built. Think I'll ask that family member to build one.

Here goes..... (Pics comming soon)

MSI P35 Platinum
Intel Core 2 Duo 3.0Ghz (1333Mhz)
Corsair 2Gig DDR2 800
ATI Radeon X1950 PRO 512Mb DDR3 PCI-E
WD 500Gig 7200Rpm Sata
DVDRW (for now)
Xbox 360 HDDVD player
Old school server tower (3HDD's)
TV Wonder 650 PCI HDTV Tuner
Windows Vista Ultimate
Samsung 56" 1080p DLP
Kenwood 5.1 system

Will all be here by Saturday I hope, I wanna play too!!

I'm loving my new hobby already!!!!

So true... So true...

It is getting to the point that my wife is worried that I'll be one of those guys who go out and build a $200K Theater like she's seen in Home Theater Mag. I tell her that I would never do that while secretly planning a way to finance my obsession...

This stuff is awesome, i can see how it turns addicting really fast.... i have had a decent "home theater" for a while but a i am just getting into the HTPC, i will post pictures as soon as santa gets here.

Ive got mine up and running. But just started the whole process of making it a full blown HTPC

COOLER MASTER Stacker RC-832-KKN1-GP Black Aluminum ATX Full Tower
Asus P5B Duluxe Motherboard
Intel Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz
G Skill 2GB DDR2 800(PC2 6400)
ATI Raedon HD 2900XT (Need it for my games :P)
1 500 Gig Seagate HD
2 320 Gig Seagate Barracuda HD (Dual-booting XP + Vista Ultimate 32bit)
1 400 Gig WD HD
Samsung DVDRW
ZALMAN CNPS9700 110mm CPU Cooler
Thermaltake 500W Power Supply
- ALL HOOKED UP TO A 24" SAMSUNG (245BW) AND MY 50" SONY SXRD via DVI/HDMI

I'm having a blast setting it up right now. I'm using VMC w/ My Movies. Great program even though its a lil slow. I'm still in the process of ripping my movies. Pics coming soon

So how does everyone like MyMovies? It seems like a great program and all. But is it me, or does Microsoft's Media Center seem.......like an afterthought? I've never seen it run on a beast machine, does it run smoother on a bad arse machine? Or should I try something else (BeyondTV, Sage, etc..)???

Here's mine:

Custom Built, with the following components:
* Antec NSK-2480 case, with included 380W PSU (with stealthed drive cover)
* Gigabyte GA-MA69GM-S2H motherboard, using on-board graphics
* AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+ Brisbane 2.6GHz 65W Black Edition CPU
* A-Data 2GB (1GB sticks x 2) DDR2 800 RAM
* Scythe Ninja Mini CPU cooler
* Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 320GB Hard Drive
* Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB Hard Drive
* Samsung SH-203B 20X DVD burner
* Microsoft Media Center Remote Control and Receiver
Running Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 with MyMovies plugin
(old) Sony 17" LCD monitor, mounted on a Sanus swivel arm
Logitech Cordless Desktop S510 (wireless keyboard and mouse)

HTPC sits on a shelf in my custom-built, 18" deep, built-in bookcase. I can sit in my recliner, swivel the LCD monitor out to hover in front of my face, and go to work.

Everything is hooked up to my projector for 92" wide movie and TV watching.

Picture #1, showing the recliner, bookcase, monitor, side surround speaker, HTPC, other components:


Picture #2, another shot of the theater to show the HTPC's location, off to the left of main seating:


ND

Here is my hide away, my mainbox and htpc share a room while I live with my parents...

Now that is a sweet setup you got there ND23. Its something to look forward to when I get the space for something like that. Is the 17" touchscreen?

Thank you. No, it's a plain ol' 17" Sony LCD, circa 2001. Maybe I'll replace it with a nice-size widescreen LCD soon (Christmas deal, perhaps?). I don't always like to fire up the projector when it's just me down there... I'm content to watch on the LCD in front of my face.

ND

These are outdated pics. I'll post new ones later!
PC is an AMD X2 4400, 2gb OCZ RAM, 7800GT on Asus A8N-E. X-Fi in audio creation mode, coax S/PDIF kernel streaming output to HK AVR140. Cheap Westinghouse 1080p monitor, cheap speaker stands, and the cheapest of all is the center channel speaker--its called a 'phantom' model

what rack is that?

Me? It's a Z-line SLR44S
http://www.z-linedesigns.com/

Wow very nice home theatre ND23.