Kodi Community Forum

Hey all, first post here but Ive been using XBMC(Kodi) for awhile on a rpi. Thats been working alright other than everytime the power goes out or flickers the sdcard gets corrupt and I have to reimage the whole thing. That being said I decided to build a more robust and usable HTPC. Ive built them before, years ago but I normally built them with gaming in mind rather than being silent/low power systems. I always thought you needed a pretty powerful system for HD playback, that is until the rpi came out.

Here is my thought process, sorry if its a bit all over the place, im just having my morning coffee as I type this.

Id like to be able to watch live TV through Comcast and DVR it for playback later.
Id like to be able to watch a DVD/BR through the system.
Netflix/Hulu/Youtube
1080 HD playback and 5.1 surround - No need for 4k or 3D
Low power
Quiet
Possibly used as a storage server - more on that below.

My first thought was to build a tiny Mini ITX system for $350-$400 or less if possible but those cases dont allow much room for a tuner card or extra hard drives. I also started looking around and I have a lot of older hardware left over from Bitcoin mining but I dont know how well it will function in an HTPC. If I can use this stuff then Id like to rather than just throwing it away.

The hardware I have is:

ASRock 970 Extreme4 motherboard (no onboard video) and either a Sempron 145 or an FX 4130 + 8GB RAM
EVGA P67 (no onboard video) and I have no CPUs for this board + 8GB RAM

Ive got a handful of 5-1000watt ATX PSUs

Lots of video cards, all ATI - X1950, 5770, 5850, and 7950.


As far as the storage solution goes, my thought is that currently I have DSL and DirecTV but I plan to switch to Comcast cable and internet soon. When I do, I should be able to stream most anything I need rather than needing to rip DVDs to disk so Im not sure how much storage I really need. I also have a USB3.0 3TB external HDD thats Ive had for a year and never taken it out of the packaging. I could always build an HTPC and use that - if I endup filling it then I can add a NAS later and move stuff over, right?


So what are my best options?
Is it worth saving a few bucks to reuse old hardware?
Which video cards/CPU can handle 1080 playback?
Am I over thinking things (probably, I always do!)

Thanks for any advice!

After reading around here some more and finishing my coffee I think the added heat/noise/power draw from the video cards isnt worth the little extra money spent. Plus these boards are all ATX which means I need a pretty good sized case. I can still use the PSU and RAM so save a little.

You could recycle your old stuff, but it will consume more (and produce more heat/noise) than anything new. You could look into the AM1 platform, those CPUs have integrated GPUs like much of Intel's/AMD's mainstream offerings nowadays, and the motherboards are simple and cheap (around 30 €).

Some of them can be used with a picoPSU, some motherboards even come out of the box with a laptop adapter connection.