Description
Introduction
This is a computer that me and a few of my friends built. It is what’s called a media pc, and unlike a lot of computers this one is solely dedicated to serving media to a television set, and with the complement of a official media center remote, it makes the perfect set-top or cabinet style computer, as its thin and small, and quiet.
The computers hardware consists of:
- AMD Athlon 1.4Ghz socket A(462) proccessor
- K7SEM ECS micro atx motherboard
- Nvida GeForce 4 440mx agp 2x/4x/8x card
- Linksys WMP54G v4 wifi 802.11G wifi card
- 2x256mb Compaq server ram w/ heat spreadders
- HP mce infared remote and reciever
- 100watt mini atx psu
- 20gig ibm TravelStar laptop hd
Project
This shows the computer attached to my TV over S-Video which for this tv is the best input possible, with the VGA and S-Video/Composite output of the graphics card the computer can be connected over VGA if the TV/Monitor supports it.
Top view of the internal components of the Media PC the power supply is mounted underneath the black mini shelf and the hard drive is mounted on top. There is also a top exhaust fan to vent heat from the inside of the Media PC.
The large hole in the black mini shelf mates with the location of the fan on the top or lid of the Media PC. Behind the small hole in the front of the computer is where the USB IR Receiver for the Media Center remote and keyboard is mounted.
Overall the computer gets pretty good performance considering the most costly component for me was the case, screws + sheet-metal + dremel blades + metal stripping = 33 dollars at Lowes.
Although the computer only has a 20 gig hd, all the media is pulled via the network from my main computer, this makes things a lot easier, because its hard to manage media archives on the tv set, vs while you are sitting at your main computer 😀
