System Buyers Guide: PCs for Under $1000

Intel HTPC

To be honest, if there's one system in this roundup that is likely to get a lot of comments and criticisms, it's going to be the HTPC configuration. That's not to say that our particular configuration is unreasonable, but in the HTPC market we will invariably encounter many differing opinions about what is necessary and what is not. We detailed our assumptions about the HTPC configurations tin the introduction to the AMD HTPC System. You may want to look back at the considerations. We assume the end-user has already selected an HDTV or monitor and a sound system. Very few end-users need a TV tuner anymore so we are not making that recommendation. We also assume the primary use of the HTPC computer is to play, store, and stream Blu-Ray movies and other video entertainment.

As discussed in the Intel Entry PC, the E5200 is an excellent value point in the Intel CPU line. Anything lower-priced is generally a lot lower in performance, but higher priced CPUs do not gain that much in performance. At $83 the dual-core E5200 is also an excellent match for an Intel HTPC. It doesn't hurt that the E5200 is rated at 65W, which will help keep the HTPC as quiet as possible.

The motherboard for the Intel HTPC is the $135 Gigabyte GA-E7AUM-DS2H featuring the NVIDIA GF9400 chipset. Our motherboard reviews found this chipset and the GF9300 a better choice than G45 in HTPC systems due to superior video playback and overall system performance. A review of the GA-E7AUM-DS2H is scheduled for the near future. You can currently find a combo deal of this motherboard with the Intel Core Duo E7300, which was our choice in the Intel Budget system. At a $15 off combo price that reduces the E7300 net price to $105 making it an extremely good value with this Gigabyte board.

Some users have reported that the stock Intel CPU heatsink touches the chipset heatsink and they found the heatsink fit and worked best by rotating the heatsink 90 degrees. For best results check the fit and best positioning before completing the mount of the heatsink/fan.

The rest of the components are the same as those found in the AMD HTPC system, so please refer to the detailed discussion on the AMD HTPC page.

AMD systems have held the lead for some time in HD video and HTPC boxes. The AMD advantage was large enough that AnandTech hasn't really recommended an Intel HTPC build in the last few buyers' guides. This is the first buyers' guides to include both AMD and Intel HTPC system recommendations. The NVIDIA GeForce 9300/9400 chipsets have done a lot to level the HD and HTPC playing field. While we can't tell you HD playback capabilities are completely equal between AMD and Intel today, we can tell you that both HTPC builds provided smooth, stutter-free Blu-Ray playback. Certainly that is a primary concern for most HTPC system builders. However, if you intend to do video encoding in addition to video playback on your HTPC, the tri-core AMD setup does win out over the base E5200 in that area.