[mythtv-users] One more request for FE hardware advice

[Terjesen Jens Peder]

Christopher Kerr wrote:
________________________________________
On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 8:26 PM, Nick Rout <nick.rout at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 7:12 PM, Dag Nygren <dag at newtech.fi> wrote:
>>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> How difficult can it be to get the following FE? :
>>
>> - Fanless
>> - Optical out SPDIF
>> - DVD player
>> - FullHD capable
>> - IR reciever would be nice
>>
>> Seems to be a difficult combination...
>> Any advice/experiences appreciated
>
> zotac single core ionitx board in a suitable case?

Seconded. That said, "fanless" is nearly always a bad idea - "low
speed fan" is much safer.

The Asrock Ion barebones packages will give you a nice case, a DVD
drive, optical SPDIF, HDMI and VGA outputs....pretty much everything
you need. It has a single exhaust fan on the rear of the case - you
could probably swap it out for a Scythe Mini Kaze or similar, or mod
it with a series resistor, if it proves too noisy.

I've just set up an Acer Revo 1600 as a frontend - while the fan CAN,
hypothetically, be very noisy, it's temperature controlled. Playing
back MPEG2 or H264 content using VDPAU the fan doesn't spin up at all
from it's idle speed, so it's essentially silent, and gives me great
confidence that using a low speed fan would be safe for a
frontend-only machine.

- Chris
_______________________________________________

I have an ASRock 330 HT with DVD burner/BD drive.

The noise from the stock fans (yes there are two) was not bad, but after viewing a DVD film or HD recording for some time the speed of the fans increased and the noise was noticable.

I exchanged the exhaust fan for one from Fractal Design and mounted rubber washers between the CPU fan and the heatsink. Now I can bearly hear it even after heavy load for considerable time.

Jens