Time for a new HTPC

[woodsman]

Hi All,

Hard to believe 5 years have gone by since I last posted here!

I plan to revamp my home network. I built my original HTPC as a stand alone system. Much has changed six years later. I now am going to build a NAS to provide central storage. So much easier to share files that way throughout the house. I will store all videos and TV recordings on the NAS.

That relegates the HTPC to the roll of merely streaming videos from the NAS or online. That means a smaller footprint in the living room.

Sadly, I have ignored the HTPC/media center market for too long. I have lots of reading to get back up to speed. In the mean time I would appreciate some links and pointers to get my mind right.

Points of concern:

* With my original HTPC I never had the ability to power on the system with the remote control. I could only power off with the remote control. What are most folks doing these days to support powering on with the remote?

* I use a Logitech S220 Speaker System. Better sound quality than using HDMI and the TV speakers. The caveat is I have to manually power on/off the speakers. Any cute tricks to have the speakers automatically power on/off with the HTPC?

* As the new media center will stream videos and music from the NAS and online, suggestions for a new motherboard and case are much appreciated. (Case needs to house one DVD player.)

* An exception to streaming is when playing DVDs directly. I copy all of my DVD ISOs to hard drive. Playing DVDs occurs only when guests visit and they bring DVDs. Suggestions for a quiet DVD player are appreciated.

* I do not own any blu-ray disks, but I suppose I should plan ahead for that.

* I am hardly filthy rich, but no budget restraints at this time.

Notes:

* I have 1 Gbps connections in the house.

* The new media center will use an SSD for a system disk.

* I use Linux in all of my computers.

* I have been using XBMC all of these years. I see the software is now rebranded to Kodi.

* HTPC uses a Hauppauge HVR-1600 MCE-Kit TV capture card.

* My current remote control is a Media Center RRS9002-86XXF RC6.

* As is the theme for this forum, a silent or quiet living room system is desired. Does not have to be utterly silent, although a nice goal. My observation through the years with my current system is once the audio kicks in with the system, either videos or music, I can't hear anything from the case anyway.

* While I have the skills to tinker at the Raspberry Pi level, I do not want to do that and I don't have the time. Standard hardware suggestions is good enough.

Funny, when I built my HTPC the system truly was a Home Theater PC. Now the box is a media center.

Thank you much for your time and expertise.

[CA_Steve]

Until I read down to the PCI tuner, I would have suggested getting something tiny/cheap like the Zbox and an external ODD. You still could if you wanted to invest in a networked tuner like the Silicon Dust HDHomerun's.

I have the Zbox Nano CI320. Here's my build/review thread. I like it, but I do notice occasional sluggishness with web streaming. Stepping up to a Celeron based BI320 with dual channel memory would probably fix my issues. Both use similar power at idle and streaming (6 / 11W).

My cheap Logitech K400 keyboard has a dedicated button to put the PC to sleep.

For your speakers....some of the APC ES series UPS have a master/slave set up. I have my gaming PC plugged into the master outlet. When the UPS senses the PC has gone into a low power state (sleep, hibernate, off), it turns off the slave outlets - where my external audio amp is plugged in.

[woodsman]

For your speakers....some of the APC ES series UPS have a master/slave set up.

Ah, I never thought about that. A quick search reveals there are some "smart" power strips that do the same thing. Expensive and they draw their own wattage when idle, but a potential solution.

[Vicotnik]

I use Nexa power switches. Remote controlled and idle for one switch is 0.24W. Switch one powers up the rest of the Nexa switches, TOSLink switch and DAC. Switch two powers up the amplifier. Switch tree the TV. Switch four the HTPC.

[boost]

* With my original HTPC I never had the ability to power on the system with the remote control. I could only power off with the remote control. What are most folks doing these days to support powering on with the remote?

HDMI CEC Adapter from PulseEight. TVs can send remote control signals over HDMI. This plugs into HDMI and USB ports and starts the computer if "Wake on USB" is enabled.

[woodsman]

Great ideas for controlling the speakers. Thanks!

How are you folks powering on your HTPC with the remote control?

[Vicotnik]

In the BIOS/UEFI settings there's usually an option what the system should do in case of a power loss. The options are to stay powered down when the power comes back or power on automatically.

[woodsman]

The options are to stay powered down when the power comes back or power on automatically.

The HTPC is never fully off. The system remains in standby so the RTC can awaken the system for recording movies.

While programming the remote control to power down to standby is straightforward, there is no way to power on the system. The current motherboard does not recognize signals from the IRC device the same as a keyboard or mouse wake-on-lan signal. That is what I am seeking.

[Vicotnik]

I think you need an external solution for that.



You hide the cord under a rug or something, it will be practically invisible.

Seriously, something like this perhaps
- http://www.missingremote.com/review/sim ... itch-pcs-2

[xan_user]

http://simerec.com/PCS-1a.html

[flyingsherpa]

I use a FLIRC + my old Tivo remote to control my HTPC (I use xbmc too). I believe FLIRC looks just like a keyboard to the PC, so it should be able to do Ctrl+F1 (or whatever key combo your mobo uses) to wake from sleep. I have not tried this on my system, though. Some say FLIRC is pricey, but I have been very impressed with it and it was well worth the $35 or so I paid for it, especially since it allows me use my Tivo remote, which is so much nicer than any of the poor MCE remotes or smartphone airmouse apps I tried.

Edit: Since you're now relegating the HTPC to streaming content and not storing, have you considered using a Roku3 and Plex? It's a pretty popular combo, I use it occasionally on my setup when xbmc won't scrape certain files and I get tired of futzing with it. The interface isn't as pretty as xbmc, but Plex just released a new version (only to premium subscribers for now, but it will trickle down sometime this year) that is supposed to look better. Already has good functionality, though.

[woodsman]

I am surprised manufacturers do not make htpc-specific motherboards that include support for htpc unique options. Supporting power on with a remote control would add little to the price.

The FLIRC and Simerec seem close to what I might be seeking. Thanks for the tips.

With respect to something like a Roku or Plex, I have been looking at NUC systems. A drawback is no built-in DVD player, but an external model might suffice.

I am not excited about devices like Roku/Plex because I am one of the oddballs in this world who values privacy and security more than convenience. I do not like the trend of the past few years to treat consumers as the product with excessive data mining. I won't rule out such devices, just not fond of them.