HTPC Build - Stage 5 - New parts

I ordered and received some new parts for my HTPC today. They are:


1) A small 2 row LCD screen from Sure Electronics. Don't get fooled by the fact that this is a chinese company, because the display arrived in one of the most coolest boxes i ever seen: black, with silver text, everything properly packed. At first i taught it is an iPhone :)
Here is the thingy :) (sorry but no pic with the box - throw it away)

The LCD Screen plugged in with a MicroUSB cable and LCD Smartie running

The LCD Screen with size measures on sides

There is a software called LCD Smartie you can download from their website what will help you edit the infos displayed here. It has lots of pre-built stages like number of mail, cpu temperature, HDD free space or Winamp status.

2) I ordered a Card Reader - the same i saw at one of my friends. Why this big? Because only the box is big (like a floppy drive). The electonics inside are like 2cm in width only, and would perfectly fit in my casing :) Here are the pics:

It reads 6 types, plus has an USB connector so i can plug in a small drive anytime :)

3) A Bluetooth dongle. I think this is pretty straightforward but i do one comment: will have this inside the box, connected to an internal USB connector. Not visible, but my HTPC will have Bluetooth connection. Awesome!

Bluetooth dongle for internal use

4) I want the HTPC to be a fast booter in the end, so aquired a 40-pin dual compact flash to ide adapter. I had an 8GB CF card from an old digital camera, where the OS will fit nicely.

Compact flash to IDE adapter.
Your CF will be visible as a HDD by the PC and will be fast as hell!

How to achieve this as it is known that CF does not support too many write cycles? Simple: install and configure your system with a normal hard drive, than clone the drive to the CF, and use a program that restricts Windows to write temp files. Actually you freeze Windows. Learn more on this by reading small car PC builds - they all run on CF cards :)


Final words: at the end these all cost around 1 or  2 bucks each if ordered from Hong Kong, so a real bargain for a real piece of multimedia!

HTPC Build – Stage 4 – Pre assembly

I did a test assembly of the HTPC, and here is the result (i will leave the pictures to do the talk here).

No power-on yet, but all looks ok for a start.

HTPC pre-assembled

HTPC Build – Stage 3 – The Piéce de résistance

I called this little piece of metal “Piéce de résistance”, because it saved my project – really. Supports both the HDD and the DVD drive!

I had a small holder for the HDD, but i did not know how to secure it to the case, because it overlapped the mainboard, and without a “leg” the chance existed to drop on it in the middle of a nice movie, and ruining the whole thing.

The other part was the DVD drive: the external part of the case was ready for it, but i needed something to secure it to inside the case also. First i was thinking to fit it on the top cover of the case, but that would have made the HTPC “take apart” proces to be a nightmare.

I had an old PC case lying around, and somehow i had the ideea to cut it in parts, and take out one top support rim, what in lenght was exactly the same as my HTPC (wide). And slowly, instead of just inserting it horizontally, i modified it, and created the “thing” what you can see in the pics. It holds the HDD, very strongly, and both the optical drive. It is mounted to the HTPC with a screw (both of them had a whole exactly where i needed it – 3rd and 4th image, the right side), so it is very stable.

The piéce de résistance  – a custom made HTPC part

The next part of the building is the assembly and first poweron – so be close!!

HTPC Build – Stage 2 – First bumps

Hi folks.

Sorry for the delay, but i got into some problems.

See the 2 bumps i told you about in the bottom part of the casing (pic in the earlier post)? Those needs to be cut out, and i had 2 versions: the nicer and the uglier. Well the nicer did not work So now i will try the harder. I will try to take pics with the process

UPDATE – Preparing the HTPC case:

As a first step, i've cut the top of the bumps and now i have 2 big holes:

Next i flattened the bump margins, and now i have a flat surface – with two big holes :)

Installing the PSU – small enough to fit a HTPC

I have this BTW from a small and damaged DELL desktop computer i got for free. My friend wanted to throw it out.

How do i mounted the PSU: lifted back a margin of the ex-bump (left), made a little cut at the back of the case (right) for the power connector and the PSU fits there like a charm (bottom).

Stay close as the next step will be a very important one!

HTPC Build – Stage 1 – Parts and case

Back!

The HTPC case – don’t think that Samsung ever taught about this  

Recently i got a Samsung DVD player from a friend – perfect condition BTW, but as a first generation player, it did play only DVD’s – so not much of a use. It was the perfect box for my HTPC, so i ripped it all apart, and i was ready to go. Here is the case:

Samsung DVD 709 - As new

The HTPC case - ready for action

The HTPC parts – or some atleast

 

I have since a while a MiniATX P3 motherboard with a 1ghz CPU (yes one), 512 SDRAM, what just sits and gathers dust. I have a few HDD’s, and a spare Laptop DVD drive. What do i need? A PSU, some cables, the project, software and a lot of thinking and wireing Here’s a picture:

HTPC parts

BTW, do not worry, it will have a dualcore at the end. Read all :)

Explanations of the pictures and HTPC parts from above

 

1) probably you wonder, why the mouse is there in the above image? Well the DVD player had 5 action buttons on the front panel (you can see in the 1st image) and i wanted to keep them somehow. Initially i wanted to buy a cheap gaming pad, but i remembered i had a mouse with 5 buttons with a cracked case (that is why top is removed). So my plan is to direct-link the DVD front button electronic board to the mouse buttons, and reconfigure thoose with some mouse editor software later.

2) I want to position the mainboard in the middle, PSU in the right, HDD and mouse on elft, DVD in the middle. Here i encountered another problem with the case: you see the 2 bumps in the sides on the second image? Those lift the bottom with 1cm, and the cooler of the PSU does not have enough space for proper airflow – so i need to cut thoose out and replace the created whole with something.

3) If you check the front panel of the case, you can see, that the DVD tray is in the bottom. Well, my laptop dvd player cannot be there, becase the battery and the memory on the mainboard does not allow it to go in Here my plan is to take out the black plexiglass (above the hole), move it down a bit, cut the case again, and in the created whole to insert the optical drive. Simple no?

4) The power button on the right had only 2 wires, so i cut it, and linked it directly with the power wire what leads to the mainboard. Plus connected the powerled the same way. That should not make any problems.

5) Bottom-right: VGA to s-video cable (2 bucks)

6) Bottom-middle (between the DVD and the cable): laptop drive to PATA cable converter, with floppy drive type power connector. Smart huh? 2 bucks

7) For software i have several options:
a) LinuxMCE as standalone OS
B) WinMCE + MOOVIDA (http://www.moovida.com/)
c) WinMCE + Mediaportal
d) several others, not deceided yet, and probably i will try out a few

That’s it for now. Let’s start the building process!

HTPC Build – Stage 0 – Introduction

Hi there folks

I will begin with stating, that i started to write down the steps of this project on a dedicated HTPC forum, but as the build is not finished, and i took some pauses between certain stages of the build, my account was deleted so i discontinued to document the process. This means that the first few entries will be more like a looking back rewrites of the original posts.

So let’s get on with it! Following is the original introduction post from the other forum!

—————————————
Hello everybody.

I do not like big introductions and hassles, so let’s get on with it. Actually i would like to say, that my native language is not english, so i will make mistakes.

About my HTPC project: i was always a PC user in the sense of multimedia. I watched movies on TV via the sVideo connector of my VideoCard, and listened music on PC. Actually i never had a proper DVD or CD player – but i always wanted one. So when i first came across HTPC’s, specially home built ones, i decided i will have my own!

It was no rush in the beginning, because i own a PlayStation2 what plays DVD’s and with a little trick, it does play AVI, MP3, audio and picture files too + it is a gaming station. So all should be OK, but the good old PS2 cannot handle movies bigger than 700MB properly.

What do i expect from my homemade HTPC?

Nothing complicated. I just want an enhanced DVD player, without any plus features like TV + TimeShifting or recording channels (i own a tv card, but i want a box as slim as it can be, and the tuner does not fit).

I have since a while a MiniATX P3 motherboard with a 1ghz CPU (yes one), 512 SDRAM, what i do not use for anything. I have a few HDD-s, and a spare Laptop DVD drive. What do i need? A box, a PSU, some cables, the project and a lot of thinking and wireing


Starting parts and ideas in my next reply, so stay close!