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A Truly Silent Home Theater PC Built for Linux

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the fun-toys-to-play-with dept.

slimrabbit writes "LinuxDevices is reporting on a truly silent home theater PC that comes with its own Fedora 5 based quick install Linux DVD capable of installing a fully-configured FC5 system with LIRC, KDETV, TV-Time and Kradio in about 15 minutes. The most notable features are its "church mouse quiet" 14dba power supply, TV-Out (SVideo and composite), component video, DVI and VGA out, and hardware MPEG support(XvMC). The company also supports and engages the Linux community through its sponsorship program. It is sponsoring knoppmyth and the Debian User Project and makes the mechanical drawings of its face plates available under the GPL."

8 of 178 comments (clear)

  1. Replacement for XBOX by slidersv · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Finally I will be able to replace my XBOX, which is used solely for home theater purposes, with this HD-DVD capable system.
    There is no HDMI, but component and DVI should suffice for most.

    --
    there is no issue with my network
  2. Truly silent? by venicebeach · · Score: 5, Funny

    A truly silent home theatre system? Hope it comes with closed captioning...

  3. Should be great by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    for watching silent movies

  4. Good price tag too by growse · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is interesting - for $300 they've created something that beats me spending my own time and money on building myself. Previously when I've seen "silent" under-the-tv boxes, they've been closer to $800. This is enough to make the average geek think "I'll just build one myself". That, however, takes time and effort, and there's no guarantee that it'll work properly at the end of it.

    To get a barebones, including a nice case and decent psu for this price makes it worthwhile getting over a diy system. Only question is, does it suck because it's cheap?

    --
    There is nothing interesting going on at my blog
  5. Three fans + HD + DVD won't be silent by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The submitter seems to have confused quiet with "truly silent." In addition to the power supply's 14db fan, there are two more case fans. The CPU lacks a fan, relying on nearby vent holes on the top of the case for air intake - don't set anything on top! It also uses a hard drive, apparently not in an acoustic enclosure, and lacks any noticable means of acoustically muffling the DVD-ROM drive. And in general, fan quietness often comes at a cost of unsufficient cooling. If it's reliable, at $550 for the loaded system, I could still see it being kinda cool. But not silent, and maybe not even all that quiet when the DVD fires up.

  6. Truly silent? by sparrowjk · · Score: 5, Informative

    1. The power supply is 14dbA? Yea right. The reviewers didn't even test it. That number is highly unlikely, especially from an unbranded PSU.

    2. What about case fans? What's the dBA on those? What about the CPU fan, which isn't even included? Both of these will have a big impact on the total overall noise of the system.

    3. Not to mention the hard drive! But enough.

    This is not a "silent" HTPC. It's a quickstart HTPC. It should be judged on those grounds. Calling it truly silent is just going to confuse people.

    See http://www.silentpcreview.com/ for real silent computing.

  7. Re:FeForce? by cciRRus · · Score: 5, Funny
    I smell the blood of a grammer nazi...
    It's grammar.
    --
    w00t
  8. This has already been done and for a cheap. by peeon · · Score: 5, Informative

    By following this guide, http://www.silentpcreview.com/article16-page1.html , I have built two machines identical to their setup and modded my power supply cpu with a low rpm fan. These machines have run solid for almost 4 years, until one of my motherboards crapped out. They are quietest piece of hardware I have owned since I sleep right next to them.