[gooner]

I have finally orderd my NAS today so it's just the htpc front end I need sorting!

I was originally thinking of using the htpc to rip my disks on but it has mean that the build has become more expensive. Am currently basing my htpc on this spec;

http://forum.xbmc.org/showpost.php?p=721011&postcount=1

I have added a SSD and 2tb hard drive, bluray drive, windows7, 4gig ram and different case and has pushed the price upto around £650.

Now was thinking the above is probably ott and if i removed the ripping fuction from my htpc i could go with a nettop like the revo 3610, 3700 or another? for say around £200 and could install XBMC live on it. The revos are also very descrete and quiet so will fit in nicely. Would then buy an extra 2tb to go in my NAS and a USB bluray drive and use my MacBook to rip using make mkv. With this option even if I buy windiws7 as well you are looking at a total cost of £380 a saving over £270!!!

Obviously both options are not identical but what am I losing by going the second route? The nettops will still play full bluray rips (30gb files) in XBMC won't they? Will they bitstream the hd audio (not supported by XBMC at the moment)?

What will ripping blurays over USB core2 duo MacBook be like? painful?

Option one is the simplest solution all in one box and a good spec pc to boot!

Option two is a big saving in a discrete box. the only downsides i can see might be hd audio issues and having to use a USB bluray drive

Any comments or pros or cons especially for option 2.

Thanks guys

[eskro]

i know your in Europe, but still,
i would go with the AMD QUAD core!!

[cpu] Athlon X4 640 Propus 3.0GHz AM3 95W ($100 + $0)
[mobo] GIGABYTE GA-MA78LMT-S2 AM3 Micro-ATX ($60 + $0)
[gpu] ASUS GeForce GT430 1GB DDR3 128-bit Low Profile ($70 + $0)
[case] SILVERSTONE ML03B Micro-ATX ($60 + $0)
[psu] CORSAIR Builder Series 430W ATX12V ($40 + $0)
TOTAL: ($330)

you just need a 30GB or 32GB SSD if your going with windows of course
and 4GB (2 x 2GB) of RAM...

are you in the UK?

[gooner]

Yes I am in the uk.

That's pretty much the spec I have gone for with the SSD size but was just wondering if I was getting carried away! I think I might reduce the gpu to gt210 or hd5450 (for bitstreaming).

the case I changed to a silverstone gdo5b as thought it might be quieter as has larger fans and probably better quality. but the case bigger!

If I do the above changes that's about £50 saved I guess.

At least I now think I am on the right course getting a htpc with an athlon x4 640 so its (more) capable of ripping. rather than a USB drive and much lower spec Mac for ripping and lower spec nettop.

Just wanted to make wasn't really wasting the extra few hundred £££

Thanks Eskro your reply and threads/builds have been very useful

[T800]

Ripping Blu-rays with MakeMKV on a MacBook Core2Duo via SATA-USB is fine.
IIRC a full disc was about 45-60 mins. Main movie about 20-30 mins.

I try to keep away from using my HTPC for functions other than XBMC/watching content.
It will do loads more but the less I "play" with it the less can go wrong/freeze/annoy the wife/etc.

[gooner]

Ripping Blu-rays with MakeMKV on a MacBook Core2Duo via SATA-USB is fine.
IIRC a full disc was about 45-60 mins. Main movie about 20-30 mins.

I try to keep away from using my HTPC for functions other than XBMC/watching content.
It will do loads more but the less I "play" with it the less can go wrong/freeze/annoy the wife/etc.

Yeah I thought it would be ok not as quick obviously as the higher spec htpc but nothing major would obviously notice this a lot more if I was encoding but I won't be doing that just straight rips.

I can understand the benefit of keeping the ripping on a separate machine.

Which is why I have gone round in circles!!

The only thing with the revos is there seems to have been quite a few issues with them in terms of stuttering and audio over hdmi!

Think I will read up on the revos and maybe go for the usb Plextor B120U and see how well I get on with ripping on my mac and if its ok then maybe the revo is the way to go and have saved a bit of cash and a nice media player

[Mallet21]

X4 is overkill for ripping blu-rays.....encoding though is a whole other issue. Sounds like you just want to rip a 1:1 copy in which any dual core should be more than enough.

[eskro]

the SILVERSTONE ML03B is quiet
its got no Fans inside
cant be quieter than that!
you would save on abit of money too because the GD05B case is pricier...
£55.04 inc VAT

As usual, if you dont need 3D playback,
the hd5450 will at least give you Hd-Audio Bitstreaming capabilities!!
so yes, you would save on that too!
£28.99 inc VAT

i agree with Mallet21 too,
for ripping blurays, a Dual-Core E5700 would be enough!
£46.67 inc VAT

but for Encoding, its another story....
the more processors you have,
the less time it'll take to encode a movie to another format...

so this could be it!

[mobo] MSI G41M-P25 LGA-775 Micro-ATX (£38.17)
[cpu] Intel Pentium E5700 3.0GHz Dual-Core LGA-775 65W (£46.67)
[gpu] Saphire HD5450 512MB DDR3 64-bit Low Profile (£28.99 inc VAT)
[case] SILVERSTONE ML03B Micro-ATX (£55.04)
[psu] CORSAIR Builder Series 430W ATX12V (£31.03)
[ram] 4GB (2x2GB) ddr3 CL7 1333Mhz (£36.56)
[ssd] Ocz Vertex 30GB (£51.04)
[optical] Samsung SHB123L 12x Bluray DVD Combo (£48.36)
TOTAL: £335,86

£335,86!!!

[gooner]

the SILVERSTONE ML03B is quiet
its got no Fans inside
cant be quieter than that!
you would save on abit of money too because the GD05B case is pricier...
£55.04 inc VAT

As usual, if you dont need 3D playback,
the hd5450 will at least give you Hd-Audio Bitstreaming capabilities!!
so yes, you would save on that too!
£28.99 inc VAT

i agree with Mallet21 too,
for ripping blurays, a Dual-Core E5700 would be enough!
£46.67 inc VAT

but for Encoding, its another story....
the more processors you have,
the less time it'll take to encode a movie to another format...

so this could be it!

[mobo] MSI G41M-P25 LGA-775 Micro-ATX (£38.17)
[cpu] Intel Pentium E5700 3.0GHz Dual-Core LGA-775 65W (£46.67)
[gpu] Saphire HD5450 512MB DDR3 64-bit Low Profile (£28.99 inc VAT)
[case] SILVERSTONE ML03B Micro-ATX (£55.04)
[psu] CORSAIR Builder Series 430W ATX12V (£31.03)
[ram] 4GB (2x2GB) ddr3 CL7 1333Mhz (£36.56)
[ssd] Ocz Vertex 30GB (£51.04)
[optical] Samsung SHB123L 12x Bluray DVD Combo (£48.36)
TOTAL: £335,86

£335,86!!!

Wow that's a great price!!

My USB bluray drive has just arrived so will test today to see how I get on ripping on my MacBook. Then I can decide wether I need a bluray drive in the htpc.

would the above spec run xbmc in Linux? would get 1080p and hd audio (when xbmc support it) ok? as would save me buying a windows licence

[eskro]

Linux doesnt play nice with an ATI GPU...
so for Linux, you need to use an Nvidia GPU...
and to bitstream HD-Audio, you'll need a GeForce GT430 GPU --> http://ow.ly/1s0asw
but under linux, bitstream HD-Audio is not fully supported....
under windows, yes!

[gooner]

Linux doesnt play nice with an ATI GPU...
so for Linux, you need to use an Nvidia GPU...
and to bitstream HD-Audio, you'll need a GeForce GT430 GPU --> http://ow.ly/1s0asw
but under linux, bitstream HD-Audio is not fully supported....
under windows, yes!

Ok thought I had read something about problems with linux and audio.



I have just ripped Avatar on my USB drive took an hour and ended up with 40gig file so hopefully any other film will take between 30 and 45mins which I don't think is too bad. The funny thing is my 4 year old MacBook core2duo struggles to play it quite a bit of stutter. It's therefore quite funny that some of these low spec machines can play 1080p files guess it's cause of the gpu in these builds rather than the processor.

Will give the bluray drive some more testing but think at this rate I won't bother with a bluray drive in the htpc so it's just dedicated to watching.

Still tempted by the revo because it's so small I can hide it as if my toddler daughter can find it she and keep turning it on and off!! my xbox knows this all too well!!! Is the revo able to bitsream hd audio?

[P.Kosunen]

The funny thing is my 4 year old MacBook core2duo struggles to play it quite a bit of stutter.

Multi threaded player shouldn't have problems.

http://www.mplayerosx.ch/

[hick]

Are you ripping or encoding? 1:1 I dont notice a difference between my quad and duals cores when I just use makemkv.