Building a MediaBox

admin — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:00:53 +0000

I’ve had this issue for a long time, I always want to play videos in xvid, ogg, mpeg, mkv, whatever on my TV without having to convert them to anything. I would also like to have a DVR. How about also being able to play any kind of emulator on my TV with a PC game pad? Full Internet access & connected to the LAN so I can grab files from my main PC. Could this be possible? You bet. My answer to the issue is building a mediabox.

So far this is what I’ve come up with. I’m using a mini-pc design, I just hope everything is actually able to fit in the box. The reason why I need the cheap video card is for s-video and overall better quality.

The total cost for everything with shipping would be around $400 or so. Randomly going over the specifications, CPU: Intel Atom Dual Core Ram: 2GB HD: 500GB Video Card: Radeon 7000 PCI, TV Capture Card: WinTV USB2.0, KB/Mouse: Wireless Logitech.

I’ll install Windows/Linux through a USB cd-rw drive that I have already. As far as DVD playback goes, I might be able to use the drive on my PC to stream the DVD over the LAN to the box, or I could just use my PS2 for DVD playback. (Another option would be to just buy an external USB DVD drive.)

According to the specs on the JetWay box, it should be able to fit one 3.5″ hard drive and fit the PCI video card. However, I’m not really sure that everything will fit. Anyway, that’s the current plan, but I’m still tweaking it a bit, and I’m not sure whether I will run windows or Linux on it. I believe either one would be capable. However, it might just be “easier” to go with Windows in case there is some compatibility issues with the hardware.

If you’re curious about the TV this will be connecting to, it’s a 42″ Plasma EDTV.

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Building a MediaBox