Hi all,
Stumbled on this forum looking for information on Media Center and found new term HTPC, lol. Been a techie professionally since 1993 and had dabbled in film studies in college-- I love my movies. I'm also a long-time recovering gamer who has cut down to two. I don't get a new PC too often but the last one I built in 1999 is a bit long in the tooth these days.
She'll run MW4 but not Civ4. It's got a Matrox card with the Rainbow Runner daughter for RCA in/out and encoding. It worked but I had a TV in my office and used it with a camcorder. The last PC still runs W98 beautifully for email, web, and office stuff. Now, however, I find myself with a new TV for my living room that is an excellent candidate for an HTPC display and I want to experience Civ4 at as close to 1920x1080 as I can get.
I have DirecTV and OTA HDTV from local stations I am picking up with my old rabbit ears. The display can handle DB15, component, or HDMI connections so I am not sure how best to go from a PC to the display. From what I've read a vid card with HDMI out is needed if you get a Blueray or HD-DVD drive, but that is for down the road once I see whether VHS or Betamax wins, lol. I didn't shell out $200+ for the DirecTV HD DVR so I am looking to initially make this a workaround PVR with a DVD-R/RW to begin that can also do my games.
There are some nice cases nowadays that blend well with home entertainment stuff but at this point it ain't pretty. I still need to get a shelf or short table when I removed my old 32" max 4:3 entertainment center and wall mounted the LCD flatscreen. I do have a closet right next to the screen that could house a more traditional looking PC if the sleek HTPC look proves cost prohibitive. Anyway snapped a quick pic with a webcam of screen with closet edge and top of my motley AV pile.
So anyway hello to all-- hope to get some good ideas here...