[Fireboy]

Hi,

I'm after a cheap mini itx with 1 PCI slot to house a Hauppauge S2 card.

My idea being, I can have something like MythTV backend running and XBMC frontend on the same system.

I have seen the Intel D510MO which I think may fit the bill. http://www.ebuyer.com/product/191127

I'm fairly confident that both these things will run ok, but I'm not sure how well they will run.

My question is, as this isn't an ION board, I am just wondering if it will run ordinary AVI/DVDs fine (I'm sure it will), and then an extension on this, how well it will cope with HD content.

I have also seen the Broadcom Crystal HD mentioned. My searches on the forums have suggested that these might be needed for 1080p but not 720p, but I can't find anything definitive.

Thanks for your time.

[maxinc]

It may cope with SD videos but I have serious doubts this can handle HD content. No HDMI, not even DVI or S/PDIF output makes this a very poor choice for a HTPC.

[PatrickVogeli]

mythtv backend + xbmc frontend all in one machine?? I wouldn't really look at an Atom machine to do that.

An atom machine will do ordinary AVIs just fine, DVD too but it may struggle with deinterlacing (I'm not sure if you need deinterlacing or not).

As for HD.. forget it. You won't get proper 720p support with only an Atom CPU, forget completely about 1080p. As for the crystal HD card, it doesn't work as good as ION decoding; even if it did, if you are getting an Atom mobo, get a ION one and forget the crystalHD card.

[Fireboy]

Ok! Thanks

Edited!

EDIT 2: I'll have a look at an i3 option. If you can think of anywhere to direct me, that would be great. I was hoping for a mini itx, but I doubt I'd find a i3 board with decent on board graphics and a PCI slot.

I suppose this kind of works out. I ideally wanted 2 x S2 cards to allow me to watch one channel and record another.

[Fireboy]

Sorry to double post, but how about this?

I have a case/hdd/dvd drive spare. Only thing that looks a bit weak is the PSU but I'm hoping 430watt would be enough.

1 x Inno3D GT 430 1GB SDDR3 DVI VGA HDMI Out PCI-E Graphics Card
1 x Intel Celeron E3400 2.6GHz 800Mhz FSB 1MB Cache Retail Box Processor
1 x Asus P5KPL-AM EPU iG31 Socket 775 onboard VGA 6 Channel Audio mATX Motherboard
2 x Corsair 2GB DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 Memory CL5 1.8V
1 x Corsair 430W CX PSU 4x SATA 1x PCI-E