2012-03-13, 20:54
Hi. I used to run xbmc on my xbox up until I got an HDTV, then I bought a Popcorn Hour A-110 which I've used for a few years. It's been good, but not great; there are few too many movies that it stutters on and it's become a problem. So, now I'm looking to build or buy an HTPC to run xbmc on to eliminate these problems. There are a lot of tutorials on building an HTPC, but I'm not exactly sure I'll need to do that; I figured it couldn't hurt to ask.
Basically, here's what I need it to do:
Playback any kind of media I can throw at it, with no hiccups; most of my videos are 1080p, with a variety of video and audio codecs/containers/formats.
It needs to be quiet/small
It needs to be controlled mostly by remote.
I'd like it to start directly into xbmc
Things I don't need:
It doesn't need to play 3D videos.
It doesn't need to play anything from optical media.
It doesn't need to store any media; everything is streamed from an SMB share on another PC.
It doesn't need to play any games.
It doesn't need wi-fi.
It doesn't need to view or record TV (maybe Netflix, but I've got other means of viewing Netflix, so it's not important)
So I'm looking for the cheapest/easiest way to do all of that, whether it be build my own or buy an existing HTPC. If you can offer me any hardware suggestions (or software, I know there are a lot of different routes I could take), I'd really appreciate it.
Thanks in advance for your help; there's a lot of information to sift through, so hopefully you can help me narrow down my search.
Basically, here's what I need it to do:
Playback any kind of media I can throw at it, with no hiccups; most of my videos are 1080p, with a variety of video and audio codecs/containers/formats.
It needs to be quiet/small
It needs to be controlled mostly by remote.
I'd like it to start directly into xbmc
Things I don't need:
It doesn't need to play 3D videos.
It doesn't need to play anything from optical media.
It doesn't need to store any media; everything is streamed from an SMB share on another PC.
It doesn't need to play any games.
It doesn't need wi-fi.
It doesn't need to view or record TV (maybe Netflix, but I've got other means of viewing Netflix, so it's not important)
So I'm looking for the cheapest/easiest way to do all of that, whether it be build my own or buy an existing HTPC. If you can offer me any hardware suggestions (or software, I know there are a lot of different routes I could take), I'd really appreciate it.
Thanks in advance for your help; there's a lot of information to sift through, so hopefully you can help me narrow down my search.
