reasonably priced HTPC

[JadedRaverLA]

Originally Posted by davowavo

Hi JadedRaverLA,

Thanks so much for yet another well-thought response. I very much appreciate your help, and I hope that you don’t mind some more questions. After researching, here is what I’ve come up with:

Windows Vista Version:
I don't want the "basic" version, do I? If I remember correctly, it has major limitations….
Is this the right one, then?:
Microsoft Windows Vista 64-Bit Home Premium for System Builders Single Pack DVD – OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16832116204

Yep. That's exactly what you want. Again, I want to stress to others who may be reading... no real advantage to 64-bit vs. 32-bit Vista for most people on an HTPC. But I use 64-bit and there's no real reason not too at this point. It's just a personal preference. But yes, go with Home Premium either way. Ultimate costs a lot more for nothing you'll need, and basic lacks... well pretty much everything.

Originally Posted by davowavo

Is there a free 64-bit Office Suite?
http://www.openoffice.org/dev_docs/s...s_reqs_20.html ?

No. In fact, there's not really much of a paid 64-bit office suite. Office 2007 has some 64-bit .dlls for database access and whatnot, but the overall apps are still 32-bit. Both Office 2007 and OpenOffice work great in Vista-64, though. Either way, doesn't really matter -- OpenOffice is the best suite ever, for the price... and Office 2007 is fantastic if you don't mind spending the money.

Originally Posted by davowavo

Motherboard:
What are the advantages/disadvantages of P35 vs. P965?
Which particular one(s) would you use, and why?
Asus P35 global search results:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...&Order=REVIEWS
Asus P965 global search results:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...&Order=REVIEWS

Well, the P35 is still quite new, and the drivers are still being updated regularly. That's the main downside... if there is one. The P965 has been out quite awhile and is a proven rock-solid stable chipset. The P35 hasn't shown any real signs of being a "problem" chipset, and I think will earn a similar reputation over time. The latest southbridge and other components are also included as it's a newer model. A very nice motherboard at the moment, at an excellent price, is the ASUS P5KE-Wifi, which is available at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131196 at a fantastic price. ASUS build quality, built-in WiFi, built-in Firewire, no legacy serial or parallel ports, plenty of SATA ports, etc -- it's tough to beat.

Originally Posted by davowavo

Video Card
After wracking my brain over this for a while, I just noticed that with some cards, an adapter is included which evidently converts DVI to VGA (obviously important to me), and/or an adapter is included which evidently converts DVI to HDMI. Do you know if each of these converters works well, or are there any issues with them (I would think that converting a digital signal to analog would be quite a chore)?

Do you recommend a 512MB card, or is 256MB indeed abundant; might the relative recommendation for onboard ram differ for 8600GT vs HD2600? What about DDR2 vs DDR3 RAM for video cards? Should I bother looking at video cards with DDR3, or would they be a waste of money, as with system RAM?

I may very well want to play hd-dvds later. Aren't the studios leaning more towards the VC-1 codec now for blu-ray these days? If yes, then (also considering my possible HD-DVD use in the future), would the ATI HD2600 be a better option for me (based upon what you said before), or does it really matter in the end? If so, would I go with the Pro, or XT version, etc.? 256 MB or 512MB?

With the above concerns in mind, which video card do you recommend?

Here are 8600GT global search results on newegg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...&Order=REVIEWS

Here are Amazon HD2600 global search results [though I wouldn’t mind getting it at buy.com, mwave, etc]:
http://amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/102...hd2600&x=0&y=0

Most cards now have dual-DVI outputs. This isn't something to worry about. Usually both of the outputs are DVI-I outputs, which means they are actually analog capable outputs once you connect the included DVI-VGA adapter. The little adapter isn't actually "converting" the digital signal to analog, it is just a port adapter. The video card knows if the adapter is in place and sends the signal as analog instead of digital. I've yet to see a dual-DVI video card that didn't come with at least one adapter for this purpose. Also, the HDMI spec is basically just DVI video (with HDCP compliance) with various support for audio signals depending on HDMI revision. Some video cards come with DVI to HDMI adapters, or you can buy them separately, or get cables with a DVI port on one end and an HDMI port on the other. All work just fine as long as the video card supports HDCP (which all the ones I mentioned earlier do).

Dealing with the audio portion of HDMI is more problematic, however. If you also want to send the audio over HDMI cabling, there are various solutions that allow this, however all at the moment are dealing with passing the coax/optical digital output over HDMI... which means no multichannel PCM, Dolby TrueHD, or DTS-HD. It also means that you can just as easily run an optical cable directly from the soundcard to the receiver, and bypass any potential problems with delays or sound quality that could arise from sending the audio through the video card.

For video playback, 256MB of video RAM is fine... presently any additional RAM doesn't really provide any improvement. Also, while there is definitely a difference in performance between the various types of GDDR RAM found on different cards, unless you're gaming you likely would never come across the difference.

As for AVC vs. VC-1, Sony, Fox, and Lionsgate are all using AVC as their primary codec now. Disney also uses it on most titles, though they have tested VC-1 on a few titles. Warner uses VC-1 on everything. Also, keep in mind that AVC requires more processing power to decode than VC-1. I don't want to proclaim 1 specific graphics card as being the ideal, but you should be very happy with either. Just keep in mind... quiet is essential.

I'm not feel well, at the moment (a cold is definitely coming on and I'm coughing like crazy) so I'm going to crash now. I'll try to provide some input on the rest tomorrow.

Hope that helps.