Need some help with the best way to go about doing what I want to do. I have been building computers since I was a kid and have been using XBMC from my main computer for the past two years. We are purchasing a house and I want to setup a server and also two more HTPC's - one for the kids and one in the living room.
I spent time reading here and on the lime forum and decided on this for the Unraid server -
-Trendnet 8port Gigabit Switch
-AsRock A785GM mATX
-AMD Sempron 145
-Kingston Value Ram 2GB 1333MHz DDR3
-Antec Neo Eco 520W 8 Plus
-Case will be my full tower I am repurposing or a mid tower I might still have. I don't see the point of buying a new case at this time since the server will likely hide somewhere in the house.
I also purchased 2 WD Green 2TB drives and have one existing I will toss in for 3 drives total and I recently bought 2 OCZ Vertex 3 120GB SSD's. Unsure where I want to put these yet but it was a good deal and I've been wanting SSD.
What I am not sure about is what to do with the parts I currently have. I wasn't sure until last night what my old PC had in it.
Old PC
-Intel Core Duo E6750 2.67 GHz
-2 GB Ram
-Asus P5N E-SLI (I also have another Asus P5N32 AiLife board)
-Thermaltake 600W Pure Power AP
-Enermax Liberty modular PSU #ELT620AWT (spare)
-Nvidea 7900GT OC x2
I was half tempted to send back the stuff I just bought for the server and turn the Old PC into the Unraid but it also occurred to me that I can just purchase a case and make this one of the HTPC's - likely the living room one. Perhaps using a Silverstone type case? My only concern would be it is a ATX board rather than a mATX board. Also, the mobo doesn't have onboard video so I would have to add a card and I am unsure if the Nvidea card will clear a smaller case. And the CPU has a very large cooler master heatsink on it which would definitely need to be replaced with a smaller cooler.
For the kids room I would like to use an Antec ISK 110 case but am not quite sure yet what to place inside it. All it really needs to do is play videos from the main server but it might be nice to have a blu/dvd type player. For simplicity I think a basic video player would work.
Thoughts?
I spent time reading here and on the lime forum and decided on this for the Unraid server -
-Trendnet 8port Gigabit Switch
-AsRock A785GM mATX
-AMD Sempron 145
-Kingston Value Ram 2GB 1333MHz DDR3
-Antec Neo Eco 520W 8 Plus
-Case will be my full tower I am repurposing or a mid tower I might still have. I don't see the point of buying a new case at this time since the server will likely hide somewhere in the house.
I also purchased 2 WD Green 2TB drives and have one existing I will toss in for 3 drives total and I recently bought 2 OCZ Vertex 3 120GB SSD's. Unsure where I want to put these yet but it was a good deal and I've been wanting SSD.
What I am not sure about is what to do with the parts I currently have. I wasn't sure until last night what my old PC had in it.
Old PC
-Intel Core Duo E6750 2.67 GHz
-2 GB Ram
-Asus P5N E-SLI (I also have another Asus P5N32 AiLife board)
-Thermaltake 600W Pure Power AP
-Enermax Liberty modular PSU #ELT620AWT (spare)
-Nvidea 7900GT OC x2
I was half tempted to send back the stuff I just bought for the server and turn the Old PC into the Unraid but it also occurred to me that I can just purchase a case and make this one of the HTPC's - likely the living room one. Perhaps using a Silverstone type case? My only concern would be it is a ATX board rather than a mATX board. Also, the mobo doesn't have onboard video so I would have to add a card and I am unsure if the Nvidea card will clear a smaller case. And the CPU has a very large cooler master heatsink on it which would definitely need to be replaced with a smaller cooler.
For the kids room I would like to use an Antec ISK 110 case but am not quite sure yet what to place inside it. All it really needs to do is play videos from the main server but it might be nice to have a blu/dvd type player. For simplicity I think a basic video player would work.
Thoughts?