Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with barebones

Building a living room media pc

natabat — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 22:46:17 -0800

I'm contemplating building a media PC for the living room. Here's my Newegg Wishlist. Thoughts? Here's the plan for this PC:

Ubuntu (with Elisa for a media front end)

Video output (over DVI/HDMI) to my 1080i plasma.

Wireless networking -- I don't want to run any more cables around my apartment.

Should be reasonably quiet. I don't want a helicopter in my living room!

Mostly, I plan on using this for bittorrent and playing those files directly to my TV. And to score some geek cred. :) I won't be recording TV, so I don't need a tuner. My main concern is HD files -- I'm assuming they won't be a problem, but I'd like to know for sure.

Can I cut costs anywhere without sacrificing Linux compatibility or performance? Are there any gotchas I'm overlooking or anything else I'm missing? Does anyone have any experience with the case?

I was going to sit on this for a while and decide on my own, but Newegg just dropped the price of the processor by $30, and I'd like to get in on that asap.

Help me build and buy a (gaming capable) Shuttle barebones machine in Australia

kandinski — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 03:27:17 -0800

I am trying to buy a barebones machine for everyday use with a side of gaming. Small case plus huge graphics card cooler/fan don't mix well. Also, Australia seems expensive. Think you can help? I have been looking at the G2 motherboards with an Asus Nvidia 8600 graphics card, but it is a double-wide card (with a humongous cooler) and doesn't fit! It's also rather dear.

The neighbourhood shop has a passively-cooled Nvidia 8500-based card for Au $160 , but I don't know how well that will hold with the likes of Episode 2 and Bioshock. Where is the reasonable price/performance PCI-E gaming cards that take up only one slot of width? Will mine be ok (not too noisy, not too hot) considering it will be right against the case wall?

Some of you may have a suggestion along the lines of a Shuttle barebones competitor. I am picking barebones because they are small and (reasonably) silent, but if there is another option I will happily consider it.

Also I am new to Australia, rather shocked with the prices (everything seems to be 15% over euro prices), and confused about the online merchants. Which is the online retailer of choice for computing parts? Also, is there a generally-considered-cheapest bricks-and-mortar one? I live in Melbourne, for what it's worth.

I realise there is a lot of "building a gaming PC" talk in AskMeFi, but I haven't seen these questions addressed in the latest 10 posts about the subject.

Online, customizable barebones PC vendors other than Monarch?

Jase — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 16:10:15 -0800

Can any mefites suggest some alternative barebones PC builders other than Monarch? Looks like they've fallen on hard times just as I'm gearing up for a new machine. I used Monarch for my last two machines because I am happy to put most of the rig together, I just dislike dealing with putting together the mobo/processor and installing the mobo in the case.

Any other online vendors that will let you choose your parts without having to build an entire working system? I've got plenty of hard drives, optical drives, video card, etc that I don't need or want to buy with a new machine.

Thanks!

Top tips and advice for building a Shuttle barebones system?

mr_silver — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 08:09:42 -0800

Over the weekend, I shall be building a Shuttle SK21G Barebone PC system. Given that I've only built about 4 computers (all of which worked fine) and never a Shuttle, is there anything you can tell me or websites I should read which will make the building process go smoothly? I've bought the following items:

- Shuttle SK21G Barebone PC system.
- AMD Sempron 2800+
- 1GB DDR 400MHz/PC3200 RAM
- Seagate ST3160812A 160GB Hard Drive

and will use other items (keyboard, mouse, monitor, CD-ROM, floppy etc.etc.) from an already working, but ageing, computer (a P2-400 in case you are wondering).

Given that I've never built a Shuttle before, I'm wondering if there are any hints, tricks and/or tips that people can give me (or point me to sites containing them) that will make the build process far easier.

To be fair, I'm reasonably technically au-fait (as in, I'm not a complete dunce) and don't believe that it'll be too hard to do (given that the motherboard is already screwed in and I've built a couple of PC's before) - but anything additional would be appreciated - especially if it is stuff that you wished you'd known before you started.

Help me choose a barebones SFF computer.

Kwantsar — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 20:59:21 -0800

Thinking about building my own PC. Looking for smallest possible form factor barebones system with Socket 479 (Pentium M). Big pluses are: room for at least one 3.5" HD, at least one PCI slot, either onboard DVI or or an AGP slot, firewire, PS/2 mouse and keyboard jacks. I'm considering this AOpen XC Cube, but I am completely open to other suggestions or naysaying. I'll be running XP Pro. Cheaper is better, within reason. Don't care about much other than crunching numbers.