This is my wishlist for the HTPC. I'm sure you could lessen some of the parts to lower the cost, but imho under $600 for an HTPC is not bad at all:

Athenatech Black Steel A100BB.270 Micro ATX Media Center / HTPC Case - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811190057 - $49.99

BIOSTAR TA790GX XE AM2+/AM3 AMD 790GX HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138140 - $89.99

AMD Athlon II X3 435 2.9GHz Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Processor Model ADX435WFGIBOX
- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103724 - $89.99

Kingston HyperX 2GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 Desktop Memory Model KHX8500D2/2G - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104072 - $60.99

SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152185 - $84.99

LG Black 8X BD-ROM 16X DVD-ROM 40X CD-ROM SATA Internal Combo LG Blu-ray Reader & 16X LightScribe DVD±R DVD Burner - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136162 - $129.99

GIGABYTE GN-WP01GS PCI Wireless Adapter - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16839121008 - $16.99

SeaSonic SS-500ET Bronze 500W ATX12V v2.31 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151080 - $65.99

Total - $588.92

EDIT: The most expensive item there is the Blu-ray/DVDRW, and you could get a straight-up Blu-ray with no burning capability and shave off quite a bit.

[Edited on November 25, 2009 at 1:15 PM. Reason : ]

11/25/2009 1:14:37 PM

thanks, are there any sites out there that walk you through the choosing of components/allow you to compare, etc? similar to dell's customization tool.

11/25/2009 1:25:30 PM

Doubtful. The best thing you could find is something like a "guide to building an HTPC" or something that someone has written on the internet, but it's really a niche product.

From what I've found the motherboard is going to be the most important component. You want to keep extraneous features to a minimum, but you also need to get what you want out of it while keeping the size small. I just got on newegg and filtered for "Has HDMI out" and "Micro ATX" and went from there.

11/25/2009 1:31:23 PM

good enough

11/25/2009 4:39:27 PM

Black Friday special

http://promotions.newegg.com/NEemail/Nov-0-2009/BlackFriday25/index-landing.html?nm_mc=EMC-IGNEFL112509&cm_mmc=EMC-IGNEFL112509-_-email-_-top-_-Moredeals


Mobo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131595

11/25/2009 5:25:58 PM

I think Newegg has crashed or something. I couldn't access the site at work and I can't access it now from home.

11/25/2009 6:28:54 PM

http://bit.ly/8fqI4e - page 1, you can click on page 2

you should see both pages fine as they are on the promotions server, the secure server is up and fine too, it's just the main site that's slow

11/25/2009 7:29:10 PM

^^ it was pokey last night too. I'da thunk they were selling Woot's bags of crap!

11/26/2009 9:44:29 AM

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=15899668

Does that link work? HTPC i'm building for a friend.

11/27/2009 8:30:58 PM

yeh, it works

[Edited on November 27, 2009 at 8:52 PM. Reason : SOME OF YO SHIT IS OUT OF STOCK, DOG.]

11/27/2009 8:52:01 PM

Damn you're right. Can't believe they're out of the Hauppauge 2250.

11/28/2009 2:46:25 PM

While integrated graphics for a HTPC are fine, there is an article at Tom's Hardware that shows it is worth it to get a cheap (HD4650) GPU for better HD playback. If you really care about image quality, its worth spending $30-50 on a low power GPU.

11/30/2009 9:56:01 AM

Quote :

"thanks, are there any sites out there that walk you through the choosing of components/allow you to compare, etc? similar to dell's customization tool."

Yes, there is actually.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972

November 2009 hardware recommendations: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=2cb47cbdb3afd3885ed9cb2b45ecdc37&p=17591247#post17591247

11/30/2009 12:27:28 PM