[chives123]

Hi I am looking to get a HTPC for the living room and am having trouble deciding.
The main problem I am having is Budget as 5 days ago we welcomed a little baby girl into our home so naturally my funds are a little strained.

I am already using xbmc on my main pc and love it so I am looking for a way to play my movies downstairs and also simple enough that the Mrs can just switch it on and use with ease.

I have been looking at a few differnt ways to go such as Acer Revo, Raspberry PI, and building my own(which I would prefer but would be the most expensive option)

The Raspberry PI price is good but am worried about performance/lag issues.

1080P movie playback and smooth navigation is a must.

any experience/ recommendations would be awesome and greatfully received.

I would be looking at getting a remote so suggestions for these would also be appreciated.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and a special thanks for any help you can provide.

[MXIIA]

Do you have a number budget in mind?

[chives123]

as cheap as possible but if I cant afford something to suit my needs straightaway I will have to wait so I dont really have a specific number in mind,

I will more than likely upgrade at a later date anyway but want something cheap and cheerful for now under £100 would be nice but if needed I will have to stretch to a higher price.

I also am unsure what specs would be needed for smooth navigation and 1080P playback if I were to try build a budget htpc.

[nokdim]

It is hard to get everything you want i.e. wife acceptance, high quality and low price but here are some suggestions in my preference order.

ATV1 with Broadcom Cyrstal HD card - this will play 1080p and if you run Eden over the apple OS you can teach it any remote you have.
I love this setup because even my kids can use it, it is silent and is priced well.

ATV2 - this will play 1080p but will down convert to 720p so you will not get the 1080p you are looking for and you cant install a Broadcom card so that is its limitation. I dont have one but it has IR built in so a remote should be somewhat easy to integrate and is priced in the same range as the ATV1

Raspberry PI - I have 1 of these and I use it but I do find it sluggish but for the price I cant complain. I have an RF remote connected to it which I like better than an IR remote all said and done I think I spent under $100 on this setup but I had an old SD card laying around already and I have it hardwired so no need for a wifi dongle.

And if $ was not an issue I would suggest you build a HTPC so you can get the best quality but I understand I have 2 young ones running around I had purchased a neuros link years back and still use it but I think it set me back $350 at the time but it has 4gig of ram a dual core cpu and intel HDMI chipset and I use that as my main HTPC and the ATV's in the bedrooms.

Good luck!

[mayoman]

Check if your TV supports CEC, if so keep in mind that your TV remote could be used to control the Pi.

I predict will also be looking for a cheap player & TV soon enough (unless you don't mind watching her favorioute Peppa Pig video for the 27th time). At that time you can relegate the cheap player you get now to that purpose & buy a decent HTPC. Assuming savings improve between now and then of course.. (They never did for me!)

[chives123]

Ok thanks Guys will look into the options you've recommended nokdim
and thanks never thought of that mayoman.

I have just had possibly a good idea but possibly a ridiculous one but I have an old Dell XPS 710 without OS and was wondering if I could install the OpenELEC onto it for sole use with XBMC. i started a new thread especially for this as i guess you may not have knowledge of this.

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=175937