[Tempted]

Hi,

I'm building an HTPC for a friend. I must admit I've not built a PC since the days of the original AMD Athlons so have been trying to get back into it all. He gave me roughly £500 to spend with a brief of ripping his DVD and music collection to HDD for later enjoyment. Windows is essential as his wife will need to use the PC as well as him. I intend to put XBMC on there to give him the pretty front end for movies/music etc. Crucially, he's also asked that this configuration be capable of playing 3D Bluray's and hence why the A8 processor has been chosen along with what I believe to be a motherboard which sports HDMI 1.4a. Here's the spec:

Silverstone SST-ML04B Milo HTPC Case
Asrock FM2A75 Pro4 A75 Socket FM2
AMD A8-5500 3.20GHz (Socket FM2) APU Trinity Quad Core
Scythe Shuriken Rev. B Quiet CPU Cooler
Kingston HyperX Blu 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz
Western Digital Caviar Green 3TB
Pioneer BDC-207DBK 8x BluRay ROM / DVDRW SATA-II
BeQuiet Pure Power L7 430W '80 Plus'

I have a few queries regarding my choices if anyone would care to comment?

For another £10, I could upgrade the memory to 2133mhz...is this worthwhile?
The Silverstone case I've selected stipulates a maximum PSU 'length' of 140mm...will the PSU I've chosen fit? The specs suggest so, but the measurements aren't really labelled as you'd hope.
My understanding is that the CPU I've selected will display stereoscopic 3D Bluray when coupled with that motherboard (which has HDMI 1.4a)...is this correct?
Are there any other motherboards for around £50-60 that also offer HDMI 1.4a? Some of the spec sheets I've seen don't really seem to specify...which is confusing.

Any other comments about the spec in general?

Many thanks in advance

Tempted

[p750mmx]

Did you maybe take as a lead the BBG from Tweakers.net?

[Tempted]

I'm not sure what you're referring to, so I'll say no!

[p750mmx]

OK, then your hardware-list is wisely chosen referring to the Best Buy Guide (HTPC) 2013 that is on a Dutch website called Tweakers.net

You should indeed consider the length (depth) of the PSU but you should also limit the length (depth) of the optical. Did you read the PDF that is available for the ML04?

For the rest of your questions, I let them be answered by someone that is really in to AMD.

[Tempted]

Oh ok, that's good news. A happy co-incidence! I will refer to the Silverstone PDF as you recommend.

Just for info, I have altered my chosen memory to G.Skill PC-3-14900 as I discovered that my CPU will only run at 1866mhz anyway.

Thanks again.

[nickr]

Amd is to be avoided like the plague. Bad drivers for graphics.


And xbmc will not play mvc 3d videos.

[Tempted]

I had read that AMD had an overall better balance of performance vs cost vs graphics...but I guess drivers are important - will this not be rectified over time?

3D Blurays would be run via a Windows based application, so that should not be an issue.

[nickr]

The best performance will be from an nvidia gpu and then you can use any cpu.

[tboggie]

You would need an external player like PowerDVD or TotalMedia Theatre to play 3D ISO. I use the later with windows 7 and it works well
This Thread explains how to launch an external player in XBMC

AMD A6 supports 3D bluray. No need for an A8 chip
AMD A6 5400K -£43
AsRock FM2A85X-ITX Mini ITX Motherboard - £68

4GB (2x2GB) is more than enough and you do not need 2133mhz

Silverstone Milo ML04B supports ATX power supplies and your PSU is ATX

[Tempted]

Thanks for the advice. I'm a little confused about the A6 spec though, as on the AMD website AMD HD3D is not listed as being on the A6 chip...? I'm also finding that there don't seem to be all that many choices for 4GB pairs for 1866mhz memory...at least not that are cheap enough to warrant downgrading.

[tboggie]

A6-5400K will play 3D ISO
I have used this 4GB 1600Mhz RAM on a few builds and it works