PCFormat Forum Archive

I've had my 360 for 5 years now. It never gave me any issues, and it's been a faithful servant over the years. It's DVD ROM died about a year ago and I had it replaced, and around June it started its issues again. So I decided to hell with this, and lined it up for a cheap sale. Got me an XBOX 360 Slim in the meanwhile and transferred all my content. When the offer came in (very low offer due to the drive not working) I felt reluctant to let it go. I mean it's what got me to love console gaming. It's just part of me... I don't want to sell it.

It was then that I decided to keep the XBOX and rather convert it into a decent home theater PC. After playing around with Google translate, I came up with Foedus. Basically means compact. Even if it doesn't, I like the name.

A (very bad quality cellphone) pic of the XBOX:



I'm still undecided on the hardware for the PC, but I don't want it to be a slouch. This is the list I have so far:

• Gigabyte GA-H67N-USB3-B3
• Intel i7 or i5 CPU << Still undecided on this
• 4GB DDR3 (Budget) RAM
• BluRay drive
• Gigabyte GV-N210OC-512I

I'll probably end up running Windows Media Center as an OS but I'm open to suggestions (so any linux distro which will be great for this will be considered)

That's all for now. Let me know what you guys think.

Nice idea. Going to give it an external makeover as well?

Ron2K wrote:Nice idea. Going to give it an external makeover as well?

Yes. I don't know what yet.

The thing is I don't want to decide on something and then have to rethink it should I cut any part of the XBOX (Which I'll be trying to avoid). So at this moment I'm just playing around with colours and I'm leaning towards a dark coloured theme.

I like the idea. Should turn out rather well. Be sure to post pics whilst you are building it

THE_STIG wrote:I like the idea. Should turn out rather well. Be sure to post pics whilst you are building it

Will do. I also know where DJV stays so should I get stuck I'll go to the pro.

Yea that will help and you can use his collection of epic tools, DJV has done some really awesome stuff

Heat management is going to be your worst enemy. What PSU are you going to use?

THE_STIG wrote:Yea that will help and you can use his collection of epic tools, DJV has done some really awesome stuff

He actually gave me his old Dremmel. I just need to get a screw to keep the discs in. This will help immensely with the mod!

Hman wrote:Heat management is going to be your worst enemy. What PSU are you going to use?

The XBOX has a 201W PSU. I highly doubt that it's going to be enough, so I'm looking at other small PSU's that I can mod into the original XBOX PSU.

I had a word with Ett regarding the heat issue, and I was thinking of a very small watercooling setup. Otherwise it'll have to be ducts and stuff which will be very complex.

You might be able to find a small water cooler, which would be the best option. As for the psu try having a look in some old Dell opti plex pc's(those small ones that sit under the monitor) if you can find them as they use relatively small PSU's. And that Dremmel will help massively, wish I had one

Slight change in hardware config. Going to drop the GFX card and board. And get me this board instead:

ZOTAC H67-ITX WiFi

AFAIK H67 has integrated GFX? So the need for a GFX card falls away.

Opinions?

I scheme it's time I make some effort to do and finish this. Been long enough (1 whole year and no updates. Shame on me.) I'll be looking for some components as time goes by. Going to do as much as I can second hand as new parts just cost too much.

DarkRanger wrote:I scheme it's time I make some effort to do and finish this. Been long enough (1 whole year and no updates. Shame on me.) I'll be looking for some components as time goes by. Going to do as much as I can second hand as new parts just cost too much.

Have a look on www.carbonite.co.za I bought all of my components from forum members. Sure saved me a lot of money.

Well, the new Ivy bridge CPU's eat less power, that combined with the decent on-board graphics you can also get with Ivy now means you MIGHT just be able to pull an i3 build off with the standard XboX PSU...

Maybe check if you can use the 360's fan as well?

Thanks for the link Animal.

So I've heard hamin.

I am going to try use as many parts from the xbox as I possibly can. So that includes the original fans...

OpenELEC is good media center software

DarkRanger wrote:Thanks for the link Animal.

So I've heard hamin.

I am going to try use as many parts from the xbox as I possibly can. So that includes the original fans...

If you take the Alienware X51 as a benchmark, they stuff a Core i3 with 4GB RAM and a GT545 inside with a 150W PSU, a bit higher than what's necessary. The higher-spec one fits in a Core i5-2320, 6GB RAM and a GTX660 with a 240W PSU. So the biggest issue for you will be the PSU, you probably won't be able to use the Xbox one because its wired differently (like those ridiculous designs Dell uses). You'll need to use a SFF PSU around 150W, that has enough headroom for both an Intel-based solution as well as an AMD APU, like the A10-5700.

Instead of making this a pure HTPC, I'd consider changing the project to also be a Steambox as well.

This guy has a decent project log, but unlike him you'd probably have to design a smaller housing for the PSU as well as ground it properly.