Which way would you go, for purposes of playback quality? I would spend up to $900.00 on a standalone, and $1,500.00 on a HTCP. Sorry if this has been covered already, I did a (lazy) scan to see if this has already been discussed. Thanks for your input guys! Also, I so do not care about the new features being enabled with 2.0, if that helps at all.
First, where do you live? I just want to establish budget a little clearer. Also, your decision should be also based on other things like this... Do you currently have a set top box (for digital TV signals)? Are you thinking of getting one? Do you currently own a DVR (Digital Video Recorder) of any kind? Would you like to have that? Is your current PC in need of an upgrade? If you are saying yes to most of the above then a HTPC is probably the way to go as buying those things individually (including blu-ray stand alone player) will cost a lot more. Also, a HTPC is much easier to upgrade. If you live in Australia, I have the perfect solution for you... http://www.medion.com/au/ Click on the Medion Akoya MD8828 picture on that page. It retails for $1499 (AUD) in Aldi stores and it is one hell of a package. That blu-ray/HD-DVD combo drive alone is worth at least $500. Not to mention the dual core processor, 500gb hard drive, 2gb of RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GS graphics card... Oh! I almost recited the entire spec list... Nah! There's planty more to see on the above link. I get carried away sometimes... ;-)
Thx Ryu yes I have all those items but they are dated and were promo at the time, looks like HTPC for me also could an average AMD chip (say, 5000+) and 2 gigs standard ram give me the playback quality of, say, a $500.00 or more BDP? Given that I have video card with HDMI output, of course.
If you are putting together a HTPC rather then a gaming rig, I would go for a graphics card that is more designed towards that. As you can see the card mentioned in the above set-up (NVIDIA GeForce 8600GS) is not the ultimate card for gaming but is great for media playback and can also play most new games quite fine. It decodes most media formats onboard the GPU. It also has every output imaginable (HDMI, DVI, VGA, Scart, Component, S-Video and Composite). Another important specification is that this card cools passively, which means there is no noisy fan while watching movies... A definite plus! I've actually seen this machine in action on my 1080p LCD and the playback is superb. So the short answer is that a HTPC with the RIGHT hardware can give playback just as good as any stand alone... But with more versatility. I have never had an AMD processor but I would go for at least a dual core if possible. 2gb of RAM should be fine, along with 250gb or more hard disk space.
