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I'm ready to join the HTPC (home theater pc) revolution - what to get?

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mouser:
Light Alloy looks neat.

When my 8+ year old 31" tube tv finally dies it will be nice to upgrade to a large pc-friendly flat screen..

Another hardware update: I swapped out a very hot-running 2009 low-profile video card for a new cool-running video card, and the difference in heat and noise has been very noticeable (and even marginally better video performance scores).  I'm much happier with the background noise of the machine at this point.

Renegade:
Going in the opposite direction, a friend has built a A-class stereo system for about $10. He snapped up insanely great deals on 1970s to early 1990s top-end stereo equipment. Turntables. CD players. Amps. Speaker. The works. He could likely flip one of the systems for between $2-3k. He's building another system for me. It's just sick when he describes buying a $1,400 component for $1.50.

A lot of those components have all the inputs you need to connect to a computer with a decent audio card.

Anyways, just a bit of food for thought. If you can pick up a kickin' pair of JBL speakers for a few bucks, why not? The top-end stuff was made to last and can be bought for almost nothing today because people always want new stuff. Interested in new or performance?

wraith808:
^ That's exactly what my friend does, and he's an audiophile and musician.  Even on his normal gaming desktop, he's connected to stereo equipment for the sound.

mouser:
So..

What other gadgets, hardware, software do people set up once they have a working htpc in their living room?

Standard stuff is:

* Play music
* Play videos
* Watch/listen to live streams (so an internet radio tool/plugin, tv watching tool/plugin)
Installing skype with a webcam seems neat.
Some nice full screen weather tools seem like a good idea.
Nice looking screensaver (aquarium).

What else?

superboyac:
mouser, was wondering what your followup thoughts are.  My sister is asking for the same thing now so I'm looking into them.  I don't want to build an HTPC, and her budget is around the same as yours.  So after going through all this, what would you recommend now?

I saw some silent htpc computers on alibaba that look like you can load windows on it.  And they're pretty cheap, like $200.  If they can play 1080p mkv files smoothly...if it can handle an 8GB video file (2 hours), that would be ideal, but not exactly necessary.

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