Hello everybody,

I am thinking about transforming my current desktop PC in a multimedia device, so that I would be able to replace my home-DVD-player and my satellite receiver. Of course I should be able to connect it to my TV and there should be no differencies in the quallity and function (or there should be only improvements) compared with the stand-alone home devices. Would it be possible to realise this? If yes, could you make some suggestion for the optimal hardware?
I would use this multimedia PC only for this purpose, for normal computer using I would buy another one.

Thanks in advance for your suggestions and comments.
Donnis

You won't be able to replace your Satellite receiver, but the rest can be done. Do you want to record as well? What's your budget and existing hardware? Are you watching 1080i TV and wishing to record this?
James

This post has been edited by james_8970: Jul 29 2008, 02:52 PM

Why are you saying that? I thought it would be possible to buy a dvb-s pci card for my PC...
The current configuration is: Pentium 4 2GHz Intel processor, Nvidia Geforce graphic card, 512MB RAM, 80GB harddisk, SIS soundcard.

Best regards,
Donnis

Which Geforce do you have.

I have a similar system that you are talking about. I don't know other products very well for I only have experience with what I have. So I can let you in on that.

I have a Vizio 37" 780 LCD with HDMI inputs. A Fatal1ty 8500gt video card hooked up digital to HDMI. For DVD i have a Sony DVD burner, and for watching Direct TV or capturing video from a cam-corder I have a TV Tuner 650 PCI card made by ATI or Vision Tech.

My DVD quality is as good as it gets. The Satellite quality looks like I recorded a show on VHS and am rewatching it. But in saying that. I do not have a digital TV tuner card.

If you have a 1080 TV may check into a blu-ray player. This is the cheapest I have found. And it has Good reviews.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16827106225

For a Tv Tuner card ATI makes better cards than what I have. They have digital tuners, and from what I hear
Hauppauge makes good Tuner cards as well. I don't know if there is a card out there that will get flawless reception compared to your current receiver. But I am sure there are tons of reviews and probably video reviews on www.youtube.com.

Last you'll need a pretty decent size hard drive if you plan to record a lot. I have a Seagate barracuda 320 gig.
I really like them and the software for image restoration that came with it. I think a 500 gig is about $125 from walmart.