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Hardware Continued...
Hard Drives
The hard drive you choose is also important.
The choice of hard drive is very different than that of a desktop or work
environment. There are two things you'll want in a hard drive...low
noise and high capacity. You'll want the highest capacity drive you
can afford. After all, many will store their entire music and movie
collection on their HTPC so the more space, the better. Drives
currently are available with a massive capacity of up to 750GB and one
terabyte drives will be available by the end of the year. In addition,
you want a drive that will run silently as well. Some drives are noisy and not suited for HTPC use. For those unsure
which drive you purchase, I can recommend some drives that will work well in
an HTPC. The
Samsung SpinPoint T Series drives are an excellent choice. These
SATA II hard drives offer excellent performance and are some of the quietest
drives on the market. They feature a number of technologies to help
eliminate unwanted noise. These highly reliable drives come in
capacities ranging from 80GB up to 500GB. If you're looking for the highest capacity currently available, there are
drives from Seagate that currently feature 750GB capacity. However,
these drives are currently over-priced and you will be better off purchasing
two 500GB SpinPoint drives. It will cost you much less and give you
one terabyte worth of space as opposed to 750GB. Choose your drive
wisely.
**Update May 2008**
There are plenty more Terabyte drives on the market now, some of which keep going
down in price by the day.
**click to enlarge**
A good storage solution for your HTPC are the
new GP (Green Power) drives from Western Digital. Their 1TB model is
shown above and I have fully tested this drive. Featuring a number of power-saving features like IntelliPower, IntelliSeek and IntelliPark, these drives are ideal for
internal or external storage setups. While most of the features and
capabilities are more of a marketing gimmick than anything else, these
drives do indeed run quiet and cool....two very important things to look for
in such a build. They may not be the fastest 1TB drives out there, but
for movie, music and picture storage, these drives will suite you very well.
Besides, you'll be on your way to "going green" just by purchasing one or two of these!
Optical Drives
There are many factors involved when choosing
a DVD drive for your HTPC. You want a fairly quiet drive, but also
want one that doesn't have an excessive rip lock in firmware. Chances
are, you'll be doing lots of movie ripping and you'll want a drive that can
rip both single and double layer discs fairly quickly. As far as some
recommendations go, drives from BenQ, Lite-On and LG are excellent choices.
Unfortunately though, BenQ has opted out of the optical drive market and no
longer manufacturers these products. Avoid drives from NEC and
Pioneer as they have rip locks in place that will significantly impact
ripping performance.
**Update May 2008**
Now that the format war is over, it is time to finally jump into the world of Blu-ray. However, what if you were one of those who jumped in a bit
too early and have a bunch of HD-DVD's lying around? Since the initial
release of this article, plenty of other options are now available and after
being on the market for some time now, won't put a whole in your wallet either!
**click to enlarge**
Looking for the ultimate optical drive for
your HTPC? Look no further than the LG GGC-H20L. While there are
other Blu-ray drives that cost considerably less, there are many reasons to
consider this particular model. For one, unlike a number of other
options, this amazing drive supports just about everything you can think of.
It not only supports both Blu-ray and HD-DVD playback, but has CD and DVD
burning capabilities as well. Heck it is even a LightScribe drive as
well! However, the main reason to consider this drive other than its
slew of features is its performance. LG drives don't have an excessive
riplock in firmware and considering you'll be doing plenty of ripping, this is
very important. In fact, only with these drives can you actually load
third-party firmware to actually remove the riplock. Fast
ripping, quiet operation, excellent playback and all the features you can
possibly ask for. This is the ultimate optical drive for your HTPC and
I strongly recommend this drive to anyone able to spend this much on an
optical drive and looking to set up a new full-featured HTPC.
Networking
When building any HTPC, you'll definitely want
it to feature some wireless networking capabilities. This is
essential, as I will show you in the software section which will feature
some excellent software that relies heavily on some kind of internet
connection. The products you chose for networking will also play a
role in performance, and you'll want to choose them wisely.
Interoperability happens to be one of the main issues. Wireless
networking, despite how long its been available, brings many issues that
many still fail to grasp until they actually purchase the wrong products.
Every wireless connection will drop the signal at some point. Not a
single product out there is as reliable as a wired network. With that
said, it is the products you choose for your home network that make a
difference in performance and can indeed eliminate many of the issues most
will face with a wireless network.
Wireless B, G or Draft N? Which is the
best option? Well, faster is not always better and is why you'll want
to do some research on some of the issues many are encountering with some of
the very latest products available on the market. In my honest
opinion, I would seriously avoid any draft N product currently on the
market. I've used a number of them, including the impressive Belkin N1
Wireless Router. While the download speeds were a step
above a wireless G setup, it simply was unable to maintain a reliable
connection and the technology brings many other disadvantages as well.
If you want the most reliable wireless connection, you'll want to stick with
wireless G products at this time. Save yourself the headache and avoid
Draft N products. They are all a gimmick and you'll only encounter a
number of connectivity problems that simply do not exist with a decent Wireless G
setup.
Another important thing worth mentioning is
the wireless adapters themselves. For an HTPC setup, I would strongly
recommend you avoid USB adapters. While they may seem to be the most
practical option, mostly all are highly unreliable.
If you're on a very tight budget and
absolutely must have a USB network adapter, there is only one product I can
recommend. The Zonet ZEW2500P is, by far, the best USB networking
adapter I've found. Considering you can pick one of these up for under
$25, its a steal considering how well it manages to work. However, in
order to achieve the highest performance, you must load some third-party
drivers designed to increase its overall reliability. Do not load the
included drivers with the product.
The ZEW2500P supports Wireless G and will work
well with a number of routers on the market.
D-Link has some of the most reliable routers
I've ever used. If you have the money to spend, a good recommendation
is to purchase their gaming router and adapter. Like me, even if
you're not much of a gamer, these products do provide high reliability and
the signal will not drop as frequently if configured correctly. We did take a look
at this gear a while back as well. You can find that article
here. Also, no USB here! The
gaming adapter actually hooks up via a network cable and you do have full
control of it via your web browser just like you would with the router
itself.
No need to load annoying connection software and drivers that only interfere
in an HTPC environment. It is much more reliable than your standard
USB adapter. Both provide very fast Wireless G connectivity.
Highly recommended for HTPC use!
Input Devices
**click to enlarge**
You'll want more than just an MCE Remote in
order to have full control of your HTPC. You'll want a wireless
keyboard with a built-in mouse as well for software installs and internet
browsing. I'd recommend an RF keyboard over an IR model. You'll
get much better range and responsiveness. While I have yet to find the
perfect HTPC keyboard, one excellent choice is a keyboard manufactured by
BTC, model number 9019URF. No green button, but you have a joystick
which functions as your mouse and you have both scroll buttons and
left/right mouse buttons as well. This keyboard is designed well.
There are handles on each side for maximum comfort and it is very light and compact with laptop
style keys that do have decent tactile feedback.
You do not need to spend a fortune on input
devices either. The original Microsoft MCE remote can be purchased for
just over $35 and the keyboard I showed you here can be purchased for only
$40.
**Update May 2008**
While I still personally use the excellent keyboard from BTC above, there is
one new product every HTPC user should know about...
**click to enlarge**
Forget that standard MCE remote and check out
the Gyration In-Air Remote Control that I reviewed
here. This excellent product is more than just your average
remote, thanks to the unique technology built-in to it. In short, this
remote features motion-sensing capabilities that will allow you control the
cursor by simply waving it in the air. It works extremely well and a
very suitable mouse replacement. Add to that its full Vista support and
excellent driver-less compatibility with a variety of software out of the box, and you
you have yourself the ultimate MCE remote. This product normally sells
for $99 but you can head on over to
my
review for a tip to get one for less than half this price.
Highly recommended!
Cooling
Last but not least, is the area of cooling.
This is a key area to focus on because you do want to choose your components
wisely and try to keep your HTPC running as silent as possible.
Starting with your video card, you may want to
opt for passive cooling. The MSI HDMI card I showed you previously is
a perfect choice. The problem with a lot of the heatsink/fans that
ship with video cards is that they are quite loud. If you choose a
video card with active cooling, you may want to slap on a third-party
cooling kit to reduce noise levels. Some of the VGA coolers from
Zalman are a good choice.
Cooling your CPU efficiently while keeping
noise levels down can be quite a challenge. Watercooling an HTPC is
more of a luxury than a necessity, and many may not want to shell out a substantial amount of
money in one. If you opt for air-cooling, choose a quality copper
cooler featuring a low RPM fan. Again, Some of the Zalman coolers are
an excellent choice.
If you do have the money to spend and looking
for a quiet water-cooling option that will blend in nicely with your Home
Theater, there are a select few companies that do offer some decent options.
However, there is one company that has designed an exceptional, high quality water
cooling kit specifically with the HTPC enthusiast in mind. The
Silvertone
Tundra TD01 (reviewed here) is an exceptionally
built product that provides excellent cooling performance and runs
practically silent. It's expensive, but this product will certainly
impress and will look great in your home theater setup. This product
is highly recommended.
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