Build Information

I did a lot of research on an htpc build. What I was mostly looking for was low power consumption. It is going to be on 24/7, so I don't want to push my electric bill too high. You need to start with the case. I chose a Cooler Master Elite RC-330 ($35). It has 4x5.25" drive bays and 7x3.5" drive bays, plenty of space to add more storage down the line if you need it. I chose a 400w power supply, which didn't come with the case. Plenty of power, brand doesn't really matter. ($18) Motherboard is very important. I chose the Asus M3A78-CM ($100). They are hard to find now, but the Asus brand is known for low power consumption. 11w when in use, 1w idle. It has has 6 SATA ports for plenty of add-ons. 4 gb of ram, don't know a whole lot about it, so went with suggestions from a build I found online. You need an optical drive, if for nothing more than loading your operating system software. Processor was the AMD Athlon X2 4850e. Not much to write home about here, but the key is heat. At only 45w this baby will not put off much. With the server being on all day and night, this is key. Finally, hard drive. I chose the Western Digital Caviar Green series. 2 1tb drives that provide plenty of storage. Since there are multiply drive bays, you can always add on later. I have also bought an external 1tb hard drive to back everything up.

When I finally got it all together and turned on the power, nothing happened. I freaked. All this work and nothing! I checked out all the wiring again to the motherboard. Low and behold, I missed 1 pin on a connection. Presto! The computer came to life! I installed Windows 7 for the operating system and haven't looked back. I love it!

All in all I was very proud of myself for building this computer. I honestly didn't think I would be able to succeed. It has ended up being the beginning of a 6 month, ongoing, never ending process.

I you choose to do this, be prepared for what's to come. It only gets more time consuming. My next few posts will show you how I was able to use this computer to have all my entertainment in one place.