Building a Cheap Media Centre Computer

Depending on your needs a cheap media centre computer may not cost the earth and can be put together on a tight budget

when we mention media centre we are referring to a computer that connects to your TV, allows you to play DVD’s, Music, Movie files, radio all through a Single Windows media interface. (not including a TV tuner as it makes more sense to use the TV’s built in ability)

So what’s needed?

A quiet laptop or desktop computer with the following (if possible a laptop is a better choice as it’s generally a smaller package and of course it has a built in screen which is a bonus if you encounter problems)
DVD reader
A DVI or VGA output port
Minimum Hardware specs P4 2.8ghz with 1gb ram, 80gb hard drive
Windows Vista or XP Media Edition. ( Having evaluated other media centre front ends, I would only recommend Vista or XP MCE)
A TV with a VGA or DVI input,  either of these will suffice, a 40” LCD TV will give a nice crisp image at around 1300 x 760 resolution, the VGA & DVI connections offer a vastly superior image to S-Video
A compatible remote control for the Media centre interface (these are around $20)

Putting together a cheap media centre computer
Firstly build your computer, there’s no reason why the computer should not be connected to the internet so make sure its protected with firewall, Antivirus and Antispyware software. Read more on security here
Connect to the TV, although VGA/DVI video cables should work over distances in excess of 5 metres, keep the distance a short as possible, some TV’s will only allow a maximum cable length of 3 metres.

Once you can get an image on your TV try your Windows remote control, if you find it very glitchy remove the batteries and short the battery terminals in the remote control to discharge any power, now try again.

Hopefully now you should be able to get Media centre to launch from the remote control, now simply setup your video, image and sounds files.

Once really nice feature of Windows XP MCE is the dancers, it comes with one at standard, but many more can be added from Microsoft.com.

Once you’re all up and running, especially if the computer is connected to the internet make sure you use a password to login, using the remote control you can still use a password.
It’s also worth setting the power saving options so the computer will go into standby if not used for a few hours, the Windows remote control can wake it from this state in seconds. For more information checkout our power saving section

There are of course lots more that can be added to a media centre, but like most things adding blue ray support or ultra fast quad core processors all increases the cost.
The system that I have put together only ended up costing. The following
Dell GX270 small form factor desktop £70
120gb hard drive £25
Windows Media Centre remote control £14
Windows Vista Home Premium £60

Shopping around on sites such as eBay computers suitable for media centre use with little or no modifications can be bought very cheaply

For more on which cheap media centre computer checkout our other hardware pages

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computer adviser setting up a cheap media centre computer article