Hi. I recently went to NewEgg and priced out what I feel is a "nice" Mythbox. It would be used to record one show at a time, and watch TV. Also, stop/pause TV. The hard drive would store most of the shows, and I would compress them more later on (if the are not as compressed as I would like them to be). I would also set up Samba so I could get my shows and watch them on my main desk top. Would this system be alright for a basic Mythbox to sit next to my TV and record? Any suggestions are welcome!

http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/Wis ... V+COMPUTER

My main hope is to create something much more user friendly then Tivo, and in the end cost less. I want to be able to get the files onto my desk top to watch them, but also watch them on my TV. I have the extra Video card in there because it has a TV out (the RCA, which is fine). The plan is to have this box sitting next to my TV much like a DVD player. I also plan to add a DVD ROM, for I have many at home. I want to be able to record, and also do the whole pause/stop thing. I also have a TV Wonder VE TV/Turner Capture card. Would it be possible to use that along with the Hauppauge card?

Again, thank you for suggestions, and just reading my post =D.

I would steer clear of the Radeon 7000 video card. Do a search around the forums AFAIK no one has gotten 7000 to work using Radeon drivers and TV-out. I gave up on my Radeon and installed a GeForce 4 MX. Works so much better than Radeon 7000. If your set on ATI may want to look into Radeon 9000 or 9200 series as cheap cards, do a search around forum I recall seeing posts of ppl getting the 9000 chipsets working.

This is a GeForce FX that looks good around same price range.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814164024

You should consider using the hauppauge pvr-350. It includes the best tv-out you can find. And has mpeg-2 hardware encoding. but it is a full height card so you wouldn't be able to use that case. I would use the antec Aria. Which is taller then the case you have selected. But it can hold three harddrives (four if no cd-rom is used). This would also give you more flexability to expand later.

Thank you for the feed back. I went back to NewEgg and edited my wish list to refelct your suggestions. I wasn't hard set on ATI(I for one am a Nvidia guy) it was just the cheapest card with video out. Anyway, thanx again! Oh, and here is my revised wish list.

http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/Wis ... +Chosenken

Id say go with the PVR-500. You already have a TV out on the Nvideo card, and Dual tuners is REALLY nice. I got it working really easily on mine, and am waiting my Nvideo card to come.

I'd strongly suggest replacing the SATA drive with the equivalent PATA, at least for your boot drive. The SATA might work but the PATA WILL work. A search of the forums for "SATA" will reveal many people with problems trying to install to or boot from a SATA drive.

Also, there have been some problems with Via chipset based motherboards in the past and DMA, you really want your DMA to work since it's important for smooth recording and playback. A search of the forums here for the terms "Via" and "DMA" will provide more details.

You may also want to browse this write up on the Wiki: http://www.knoppmythwiki.org/index.php?page=PickingComponents Pay attention to the advice to browse The Tier 1 and Tier 2 Hardware Recommendation forums here. It's a lot easier and far less frustrating to follow a proven path for a scratch build project like this.

Alright, here's my 2 cents.

1. Nice choice on the Geforce card, you have one that's fanless so that's a little less noise coming from the case.
2. Iffy motherboard. There have got to be discontinued boards like something from Soyo that offer better build quality for the money.
3. PVR350 has a crappy remote compared to the one that came with my 250. As another poster said you may want to consider a 250 or 500 instead. One has a better remote, the other has dual tuners but difficult MythTV setup.
4. Definitely go PATA for your hard drive. SATA is cool and all that, but Debian support still blows. I've seen alot of distros handle SATA better but for reliability just get a normal ATA/133 drive. You can probably save a few bucks by getting a non-SATA drive as well.

Overall it looks like you're headed in the right direction. Here's how my Myth Box looks.

Shuttle XPC SK43G barebones : $199
Athlon XP 2800 processor : left over from older machine
512MB PC3200 : left over
Nvidia GeforceFX 5900LE: left over
Hauppauge PVR250 : $150 (at the time, this was months ago)
Maxtor 120G ATA133 : left over

I'm about to run out of space soon but have a 350G array across the network from it. All I need to do is figure out how to get my Myth box to mount those shares.