Media pc vs Roku + Diamond HD Media Wonder Mini Media Player

[MrPogi]

Media pc vs Roku + Diamond HD Media Wonder Mini Media Player

I have a media PC that I've been using for a few years now, but I just got a great media center fireplace Burnished Pecan Electric Fireplace and Media Mantel and since it's a Dell tower, it won't fit on the shelf. (the dell is about 50% wasted space on the inside, but I can't just put it in another case, because it's proprietary Dell)

So, I either have to build a new media PC, or I can just buy a Roku and a Diamond HD Media Wonder Mini Media Player.

Any opinions, and what are my options for a media PC for cheap? I would need 3 ghz processor, 2 PCIe slots for my video card and tuner, and a pci slot for my firewire card if there is no on-board firewire.

It would be a plus if I could re-purpose a desktop, since it would have windows 7 already, I don't want to spring for a copy, and Linux would just confuse the family.

 

[scajjr2]

What parts, if any, would you be reusing from the Dell? HD, vid card, tuner, memory? Motherboards with plenty of features can be had for $50 or less and decent HTPC cases the same (or a LOT more if you want to).
I built this one almost 2 years ago:

Living Room HTPC-
Biostar MCP6PB-M2+ motherboard
AMD Athlon II X2 240 Regor@2.8Ghz
4Gb DDR2-800
Sapphire Radeon HD6850 1Gb PCIe
WD 640Gb SATA2 HDD
LiteOn 22X SATA DVDrw
Allied 500W PSU
Antec Fusion Remote case
Samsung PN42C450 42" plasma
Windows 7 Ultimate x86

I had the memory, HD, DVD-RW and power supply. Got the mobo/cpu as a combo deal from newegg for $50, got the 6850 on sale when it first came out and the Antec case (though expensive $169 when I bought it) looks like a piece of high end audio equipment.

Our bedroom has a Foxconn R30-D4 mini I got for for $120 w/4Gb of ram as a newegg combo special.

You can also browse Craigs List for a slightly older system you can update. I've done this with a few I've picked up to build systems for my grandson's over the past year.

Sam