On-board S-Video Out

[twistedsymphony]

I've decided to build a Sage TV box for my fiancee as a Christmas gift.

My goals:
-Records fullscreen 480i video
-Plays DVD video.
-Looks like a HT device not a PC
-has S-Video output and stereo sound output
-is essentially silent
-runs relatively cool
-connects to the 10/100 LAN
-can be wide but not too tall.
-can be controlled entirely with an IR remote.

I don't need HD, and I don't need to run any kind of heavy software... just the SageTV stuff and maybe some basic MP3 streaming or youtube browsing.

I've built quite a few PCs in my day and I have quite a few parts laying around as it is.

Mainly I've got an older WinTV capture card and a 400GB IDE hard drive that I can use. as well as a number of other odd parts such as DVD drives, power supplies etc...

My biggest concern is the mainboard/processor combo. Obviously I want something that can run efficiently and preferably I'd like something with onboard audio, video and network capabilities.

Onboard audio and network seems to be fairly simple to come by but I've yet to find an motherboard with onboard video AND S-Video outputs.

Another concern is the case that this will all go in. I'm a big fan of the Ahanix brand cases as I find them to be very stylish and utilitarian. They are however quite expensive... ideally I'd like to spend about $300 on this project making the most of the parts I have. the smaller form factor Silverstone cases are cheaper but I find most of them to be rather ugly.

I do have an old Geforce 2 GTS AGP with S-Video output however where this device will be located wont have that much height and wont be able to accommodate a full height desktop so I'm probably looking at something along the lines of a mini-atx form factor, not to mention I'd rather NOT use the GF2 if I don't have to as there are some other projects I have in mind for it.

Any recommendations on motherboards and cases that will fit my needs would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[Ender]

This motherboard here seems to fit he bill, it has Svideo out, as well as DVI, and HDMI for future upgrades.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128056

For SD only even a single core processor would do, but to be safe I would go with a mid range dual core such as this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819103741

This case looks promising:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811204026

Same case, but with a VFD instead of a card reader:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811204028

[twistedsymphony]

Thanks for the great suggestions... that motherboard and case look spot on.

My only question is with the processor. Where I'm going for low noise and low heat I was under the understanding that the latest line of Intel chips is much better suited for those kinds of applications.

I do like AMD products, the last three computers I built for myself both had AMD chips but seeing as Intel's latest line has been built for cool quite applications would a Core Duo be better suited? Obviously I'd have to find a new motherboard that accepts Intel chip though.

Like the Celeron M, while not as fast produces a measly 25-35W of heat while the Athalon 64 XP produces 65W

Maybe 65W isn't all that much? I really don't know as I've never really given specs like these much mind, every other machine I've built was for performance not low Heat/Noise.

[twistedsymphony]

I've decided to go with the suggested case with the media reader (I figure if I want an LCD/VFD I can mill out another section of the case and put a nice big one in)

Also I decided to go with the suggested motherboard but I'm going to go with the Athlon 64 X2 4000+ Brisbane. It's a little slower but from the reviews I've read it runs substantially cooler and draws substantially less power.

I'm also adding 1GB of DDR2 memory.

I'm also going to grab the mobo+processor+ram from mwave.com since they're a smidge cheaper and for an extra $10 they'll assemble, configure, and test the mobo, processor, and ram... well worth it IMO.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

[Ender]

Excellent, the brisbane looks like a decent processor. The only change I would make is get 2 gigs of ram, but that is my preference these days.

I am glad I could help you.

[stevech]

My server uses an AMD X2 3800. Heat sink stays cool. Loafs along. Low cost.

I found that S-video out from a video cart is much lower quality / res than the MVP due to resampling for the the PC's video buffer. Also, the resampling causes dropped frames in panning scenes, unless you have a gee-wiz video card.

YMMV

[twistedsymphony]

Originally Posted by stevech

My server uses an AMD X2 3800. Heat sink stays cool. Loafs along. Low cost.

I found that S-video out from a video cart is much lower quality / res than the MVP due to resampling for the the PC's video buffer. Also, the resampling causes dropped frames in panning scenes, unless you have a gee-wiz video card.

YMMV

Thanks for the heads up... I wonder if it would still have that problem if you set the VGA output to render to a 640x480 frame? then it wouldn't need to re sample anything just perform interlacing (which is mostly just throwing out data).

I'll be sure to do some testing and if it doesn't work out well I'll throw my GeForce 2 in there since I know it has decent S-Video out.

I have another question...
I see a lot of remotes tie directly to the capture card is this necessary? my capture card doesn't have a remote but the case comes with an "IR Blaster" unit and I've got a serial based unit sitting in my parts box as well as a few JP1 remotes that I could probably build IR receivers for. So again: does the remote need to tie directly to the tuner or will I be ok?

I've heard remote compatibility is the hardest part of the setup, I figured since I have at least 3 different options available to me at least one of them is bound to work