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I just thought I would share my experiences with my recent HTPC builld in case anyone is interested or finds it useful.
Components I used:
LIAN LI PC-Q09B Black Aluminum Mini-ITX Tower Computer Case 110W Adapter Power Supply
ASUS E35M1-I DELUXE AMD Zacate E-350 AMD Hudson M1 Mini ITX Motherboard/CPU Combo
G.SKILL Value Series 4GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model F3-10666CL9S-4GBNT
LG Black Super-Multi Combo Drive SATA Model CT21N - OEM
OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE60G 2.5" 60GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
Logitech diNovo Mini Black Bluetooth Wireless Mini Keyboard
Windows 7 Pro 64-bit
Resources and issues I have run into so far:
Here are some of the resources I referred to in order to get up and running and resolve some of the issues that I ran into with video playback:
Asus support site driver downloads page
I planned to get drivers online anyhow to make sure I was grabbing the most up to date drivers. Unfortunately they do not provide the WIFI adapter drivers here for some reason and the support CD I received with my board was defective and could not be read. I haven't looked into this further just yet since I'm not using the onboard WIFI in my setup.
Windows 7 Media Center Setup Guide over at AVS Forum
Hulu Desktop Windows 7 Media Center Integration 2.0
Using this utility in combination with the Hulu Desktop application, I can easily launch Hulu from the Media Centre interface, it seems to work pretty well. The transition between the two is a little clunky but once you get there it's pretty cool.
ATI Catalyst 11.2 drivers
The drivers provided by ASUS didn't seem to accelerate the video, playback improved after installing these drivers direct from AMD.
Arcsoft Total Media Theatre 5 (still evaluating right now)
Playback was an issue with the Asus provided graphics drivers but after installing the Cat 11.2 drivers, it seems to work fine for Blu-Ray playback but HD DVD playback (using an XBOX 360 HDDVD drive connected via USB) seems to have issues like sound not working until you drag the playback bar to another part of the movie, then only Stereo sound (not passing DTS, DD etc. though like it should) and the odd frame drop if something else uses the CPU (even moving the mouse and causing the media center interface to come up can interfere with playback). Hardware acceleration is at least working a bit because turning it off makes it totally unwatchable.
Network Throttling Settings Microsoft KB
Official Asus E35M1-M Pro AMD Zacate motherboard thread over at AVS Forum - special thanks to post #186 from Chomper87
I was having random stuttering during playback (especially higher bitrate videos, but still noticeable for other content). I'm not exactly sure at the moment if disabling Green Ethernet was really necessary to resolve the issue but I did disable it as others seem to indicate compatibility issues in general based on the Realtek implementation. After disabling the network throttling using the microsoft KB article as a guide, things seem to be smooth now.
Switching audio playback devices via shortcut
Using the provided script and a tool called AutoIT I was able to create a couple of shortcuts to switch the audio between the onboard Realtek analog audio and the HDMI audio quickly. This is neccessary because my receiver will only output audio from digital sources in Zone 1 which means I need analog audio output if I want to play music etc. in Zones 2 and 3. I can easily RDP into the machine and change this setting now.
Mocha RDP Lite iPhone/iPad/iPOD Touch app (not sure how to make a link to iTunes store).
This app seems to have everything I need and it's free. The main limitation with the free version is that you can't right click but that's not an issue now that I have shortcuts to change my Audio Output device quickly. This app also supports Wake on Lan via magic packet which works very well on both my iPod Touch and my iPad. I can also quickly launch iTunes if need to as well.
iTunes Remote works great from both the iPad and iPod Touch to control music playback when i'm running music to my secondary zones...
Comments on the hardware:
The motherboard:
Overall I like the motherboard. The BIOS seems to be quite well laid out and I was easily able to Overclock to 1.8 Ghz on default voltage which did seem to improve overall system performance noticeably and seems to be without much penalty as it relates to heat. As an aside, the automatic OC features gave an 80mhz OC. I tried both the Tubo Key II switch and the auto overclock feature in the BIOS and they both seem to give the same result. The Bluetooth works great with my Logitech DiNovo Mini, I just can't wake the machine with it, I haven't looked into this yet but it's minor for me since wake on lan works well. One issue I did have was on first boot, I had to use the MemOK button to get it to boot with the memory module I bought. The module I have isn't on the QVL, so OK, but this is a handy feature and seemed to work as intended.
The Case:
The LIAN LI PC-Q09B case seems to be a nice case to work with. It fit the form factor I was looking for and with a bit of planning and tinkering I was able to get everything to fit in nice and neat (well ok, as neat as I could manage haha).
The wiring was a bit tight but honestly, for this setup was pretty much the perfect length and I wouldn't say I had a major issue with this. It's all about cable routing. It's too bad that the cable for the front panel USB 3.0 connections was terminated with actual USB 3.0 plugs internally. I ended up using the supplied USB 3.0 to USB 2.0 header connection cable provided because I wanted to keep everything internal. For now this is OK because I don't have any USB 3.0 devices but I wish they shipped with a USB 3.0 header connection and then just provided a couple adapters, one to plugin to the USB 3.0 ports on the back if your mobo doesn't have the 3.0 header and a USB 3.0 to 2.0 header connection.
The darn blue power light on this case is way to bright though so I have disconnected it for now. I have considered that it may be possible to wire a resistor into this to reduce the brightness but truthfully, I don't think I'm going to bother. I was going for as silent a solution as possible so I tried running the machine without the included case fan but I found CPU temps got too high (~65-70 degrees C). I removed the included molex adapter and plugged the fan into the CPU fan header on the motherboard. The motherboard can control the speed of the CPU fan via software in Windows or also settings in the BIOS. It has configurable cooling profiles but I found the default profile keeps the fan at < 1000 RPMs and it's virtually silent. This keeps temps mostly < 50 degrees C and the case is cool to the touch.
The Keyboard:
So far the Logitech DiNovo seems pretty decent (I wouldn't say it was worth the full price but the sale price was OK). Right now I'm kind of wondering how I can quickly pull up the magnifier application and adjust zoom level without having to do that manually with the mouse, I still haven't found much on this yet. Usually on a normal keyboard you can hit ctrl and then tap + 2x to open and then ctrl + the - or + key but since these are buried under an FN function key, I was unable to get this combo to work. For now I used the Setpoint software to assign one of the 3 assignable shortcut keys to launch the magnifier application so I can actually see what the heck i'm looking at when I'm outside Media center
.
Anyhow, pictures always help tell the story, so here are some pics of the build.
Components I used:
LIAN LI PC-Q09B Black Aluminum Mini-ITX Tower Computer Case 110W Adapter Power Supply
ASUS E35M1-I DELUXE AMD Zacate E-350 AMD Hudson M1 Mini ITX Motherboard/CPU Combo
G.SKILL Value Series 4GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model F3-10666CL9S-4GBNT
LG Black Super-Multi Combo Drive SATA Model CT21N - OEM
OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE60G 2.5" 60GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
Logitech diNovo Mini Black Bluetooth Wireless Mini Keyboard
Windows 7 Pro 64-bit
Resources and issues I have run into so far:
Here are some of the resources I referred to in order to get up and running and resolve some of the issues that I ran into with video playback:
Asus support site driver downloads page
I planned to get drivers online anyhow to make sure I was grabbing the most up to date drivers. Unfortunately they do not provide the WIFI adapter drivers here for some reason and the support CD I received with my board was defective and could not be read. I haven't looked into this further just yet since I'm not using the onboard WIFI in my setup.
Windows 7 Media Center Setup Guide over at AVS Forum
Hulu Desktop Windows 7 Media Center Integration 2.0
Using this utility in combination with the Hulu Desktop application, I can easily launch Hulu from the Media Centre interface, it seems to work pretty well. The transition between the two is a little clunky but once you get there it's pretty cool.
ATI Catalyst 11.2 drivers
The drivers provided by ASUS didn't seem to accelerate the video, playback improved after installing these drivers direct from AMD.
Arcsoft Total Media Theatre 5 (still evaluating right now)
Playback was an issue with the Asus provided graphics drivers but after installing the Cat 11.2 drivers, it seems to work fine for Blu-Ray playback but HD DVD playback (using an XBOX 360 HDDVD drive connected via USB) seems to have issues like sound not working until you drag the playback bar to another part of the movie, then only Stereo sound (not passing DTS, DD etc. though like it should) and the odd frame drop if something else uses the CPU (even moving the mouse and causing the media center interface to come up can interfere with playback). Hardware acceleration is at least working a bit because turning it off makes it totally unwatchable.
Network Throttling Settings Microsoft KB
Official Asus E35M1-M Pro AMD Zacate motherboard thread over at AVS Forum - special thanks to post #186 from Chomper87
I was having random stuttering during playback (especially higher bitrate videos, but still noticeable for other content). I'm not exactly sure at the moment if disabling Green Ethernet was really necessary to resolve the issue but I did disable it as others seem to indicate compatibility issues in general based on the Realtek implementation. After disabling the network throttling using the microsoft KB article as a guide, things seem to be smooth now.
Switching audio playback devices via shortcut
Using the provided script and a tool called AutoIT I was able to create a couple of shortcuts to switch the audio between the onboard Realtek analog audio and the HDMI audio quickly. This is neccessary because my receiver will only output audio from digital sources in Zone 1 which means I need analog audio output if I want to play music etc. in Zones 2 and 3. I can easily RDP into the machine and change this setting now.
Mocha RDP Lite iPhone/iPad/iPOD Touch app (not sure how to make a link to iTunes store).
This app seems to have everything I need and it's free. The main limitation with the free version is that you can't right click but that's not an issue now that I have shortcuts to change my Audio Output device quickly. This app also supports Wake on Lan via magic packet which works very well on both my iPod Touch and my iPad. I can also quickly launch iTunes if need to as well.
iTunes Remote works great from both the iPad and iPod Touch to control music playback when i'm running music to my secondary zones...
Comments on the hardware:
The motherboard:
Overall I like the motherboard. The BIOS seems to be quite well laid out and I was easily able to Overclock to 1.8 Ghz on default voltage which did seem to improve overall system performance noticeably and seems to be without much penalty as it relates to heat. As an aside, the automatic OC features gave an 80mhz OC. I tried both the Tubo Key II switch and the auto overclock feature in the BIOS and they both seem to give the same result. The Bluetooth works great with my Logitech DiNovo Mini, I just can't wake the machine with it, I haven't looked into this yet but it's minor for me since wake on lan works well. One issue I did have was on first boot, I had to use the MemOK button to get it to boot with the memory module I bought. The module I have isn't on the QVL, so OK, but this is a handy feature and seemed to work as intended.
The Case:
The LIAN LI PC-Q09B case seems to be a nice case to work with. It fit the form factor I was looking for and with a bit of planning and tinkering I was able to get everything to fit in nice and neat (well ok, as neat as I could manage haha).
The wiring was a bit tight but honestly, for this setup was pretty much the perfect length and I wouldn't say I had a major issue with this. It's all about cable routing. It's too bad that the cable for the front panel USB 3.0 connections was terminated with actual USB 3.0 plugs internally. I ended up using the supplied USB 3.0 to USB 2.0 header connection cable provided because I wanted to keep everything internal. For now this is OK because I don't have any USB 3.0 devices but I wish they shipped with a USB 3.0 header connection and then just provided a couple adapters, one to plugin to the USB 3.0 ports on the back if your mobo doesn't have the 3.0 header and a USB 3.0 to 2.0 header connection.
The darn blue power light on this case is way to bright though so I have disconnected it for now. I have considered that it may be possible to wire a resistor into this to reduce the brightness but truthfully, I don't think I'm going to bother. I was going for as silent a solution as possible so I tried running the machine without the included case fan but I found CPU temps got too high (~65-70 degrees C). I removed the included molex adapter and plugged the fan into the CPU fan header on the motherboard. The motherboard can control the speed of the CPU fan via software in Windows or also settings in the BIOS. It has configurable cooling profiles but I found the default profile keeps the fan at < 1000 RPMs and it's virtually silent. This keeps temps mostly < 50 degrees C and the case is cool to the touch.
The Keyboard:
So far the Logitech DiNovo seems pretty decent (I wouldn't say it was worth the full price but the sale price was OK). Right now I'm kind of wondering how I can quickly pull up the magnifier application and adjust zoom level without having to do that manually with the mouse, I still haven't found much on this yet. Usually on a normal keyboard you can hit ctrl and then tap + 2x to open and then ctrl + the - or + key but since these are buried under an FN function key, I was unable to get this combo to work. For now I used the Setpoint software to assign one of the 3 assignable shortcut keys to launch the magnifier application so I can actually see what the heck i'm looking at when I'm outside Media center
.Anyhow, pictures always help tell the story, so here are some pics of the build.
