TIVO to HTPC Build

Like many of you I have wanted an HTPC for a long time. For those who are new to the nerd lingo, that is a Home Theater PC. I had looked at many different variations of ways to build it. Like using one of the following, old laptop, old desktop, new slim desktop, but the one that kept calling my attention was a custom build. I wanted to use an old TIVO I had laying around because I liked the size of it and its clean look.

 So now I had a box, but what to put inside? It had to be small, play HD in 1080p, have wireless, HDMI out and have plenty of connections for future upgrades. After looking through several combinations I found that I needed a mini-ITX board as it was the only one that would fit with a power supply in this case.

I found several that had integrated graphics (also no room for an extra video card). The Intel Atom boards were small but seemed too slow and had mixed reviews so I moved on. I looked at various combinations of CPU and motherboard using Celeron and AMD E-350 APUs but I found I could get the most bang for my buck out of a the AMD Llano APU and the ASUS F1A75-I DELUXE FM1 motherboard. You might ask what an APU is, it is a low power CPU + GPU, which means it has the graphics processor built into the CPU. You might think, "I hate integrated graphics they aren't as good". Well you would be wrong. The Llano has a 6500 series AMD HD graphics chip. Able to do DirectX 11, stream 1080p and multitask like a champ. Now you know why I chose the APU but why the mobo ( motherboard )? The ASUS mobo I picked has integrated WIFI using a laptop chip with external antennas, integrated Bluetooth and a remote control that gives you mouse funtionality and keyboard.

As you can see below there is not much room in the old tivo case but the ASUS + AMD combo fit just right, including height wise. In fact the new mobo is actually a little smaller.  Also as a side note the HDD mount from the TIVO fit the new drive perfectly so there was no need to change it.

OLD

NEW

I needed a small power supply to fit the case, so for this I used an Athena Power AP-MP4ATX30 300W Micro ATX. A couple problems I ran into was that all of the old hardware was held in by a few screws, plastic clips and metal stamped out of the bottom of the case, none of which will fit the new hardware and there was no hole for the power supply or mobo connections in back. To solve this I had to buy some standoffs from Radio Shack to mount the mobo and use a combination of a Dremel and tin snips to cut the back of the case.

OLD

NEW

Now I built this to be a HTPC without tuner or DVD/BR drive at this point because I already have a blu-ray player. This will let me watch streaming from HULU or Netflix, store video from DVD and use the web browser from my couch.

After completion before paint I found that there was not enough air flow and it caused the temps to go up to the 50's Celsius which is too hot for a low power processor. So I had to improvise and add some ventilation holes. They look pretty ugly here due to a lack of patience for drilling each hole slowly, but after paint look normal-ish. Its not a big deal as this part of the case is not seen.

The last piece was the power button, Hd activity and power LED's. I had an old Compaq Presario case from which I stripped them out and used in this build. I super glued them to the spot in the front of the TIVO case where its light were located. As for the power switch I mounted it in one of the holes to the right of the mobo connection panel using epoxy.

Last but definitely not least I could not leave it looking exactly like a TIVO so I stripped the TIVO emblem added the ASUS one from the mobo and painted the whole case using this paint,

 to end with a final project like this:

Build List:

   AMD Llano 3500 Triple core APU
   ASUS F1A75-I DELUXE Mini-ITX
   4 gb Gskill Ripjaws DDR3 1600
   500 gb Western Digital SATA III HD
   Athena Power AP-MP4ATX30 300W Micro ATX
   Lights and power button from old Compaq
   Radio Shack 10mm Standoffs
   Paint

Total build cost around $300. Sure you could probably buy something cheaper but it would not be you that built it. You would be just like every other schmuck. I have no complaints about this HTPC. HD video is flawless, streaming audio or video flawless, internet games and browsing using Chrome smooth and quick. It stays cool around 35 to 40 Celsius and is pretty quiet. The loudest part is the power supply. If you wanted to pay a little more to get something quieter it would help but currently it is not  loud enough to concern me.