recommended mini itx case with 3.5" hard drive

[andylinux]

I'm thinking of building an Nvidai Ion system Mythtv Frontend /backend. I already have a 3.5" hard drive I want to reuse. I want to buy an HD Homerun to get over the air hd. Can anyone recommend an inexpensive quiet mini ITX case that will take a 3.5" hard drive? So many of them only take 2.5".

Thanks,
Andy

[marc]

Man, too bad the m350 case is just a wee bit too small to fit this in.

I'd look for a case first to see if it comes with a power supply to determine which mini-itx board to get.

90% of the cases I found for mini-itx already had power supplies and were also too big for what I needed since my board had it's own power brick.

You know, I found a very good 2.5" HD 5400 rpm on newegg for 79 bucks with 650gigs.
You might be tempted to save that existing 3.5 to add to a lvm partition group on the back-end / server.

Back to your envisioned set-up. Go for it. The ion atom combo is nigh impossible to beat.

Marc

[andylinux]

Marc,
Thanks for the reply. I'm currently thinking of this barebones Nvidia Ion. All I need to do is add my 3.5" hard drive and RAM.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6856501002
http://www.ecs.com.tw/ECSWebSite/Produc ... 40&LanID=0

Thanks,
Andy

[lobosolo]

i cant speak for this particular ECS machine, but from a few things i read, ESC boards have a problem with DMA in linux. i researched this after my first ECS mobo would not record shows because of the DMA issues.

[marc]

Nice, very nice. With the rebate it's only 250 and has an optical drive.
Earlier this week there was a nice Zotac with ram and hd for the same price but no dvd/rw drive and no accommodations for a 3.5 drive.

If your drive is not too tall (reading the reviews one stated some troubles), and your footprint allows for 8 1/2" x 11", get it.

I can't speak for others but I can say I make heavy use of my ion based front end. Running myth RC .23 and the arclight theme is fantastic.

You will be very happy. Just make sure you have at least 2 gigs of ram to give as much to the video in BIOS as possible.

Marc

[marc]

i cant speak for this particular ECS machine, but from a few things i read, ESC boards have a problem with DMA in linux. i researched this after my first ECS mobo would not record shows because of the DMA issues.

Would not the board inside also use the same chipset as the reference boards from nvidia? I thought all the IONs were about the same in that respect.

I'm probably very wrong.

[wsuetholz]

I'm thinking of building an Nvidai Ion system Mythtv Frontend /backend. I already have a 3.5" hard drive I want to reuse. I want to buy an HD Homerun to get over the air hd. Can anyone recommend an inexpensive quiet mini ITX case that will take a 3.5" hard drive? So many of them only take 2.5".

Thanks,
Andy

I got the HEC 8K 8K01BBA12 from Newegg a while back, It fits the Zotac ION boards, a slim 5.25 DVD, and a 3.5 HD.. Actually I'm selling that system right now, since I got the Foxconn barebones special that Newegg ran last week. That system is just a little bigger then a paperback book.

Good luck

[Patrick]

I just put a 30 gig SSD in my Ion box. Holy cow it's fast compared to the usb stick I had in there

[lobosolo]

if anyone finds a deal on some small SSD drives, be sure to post it. i would love to find 8-32GB SSD drive , i would think they would be getting pretty cheap as the new drives are getting much bigger.

[marc]

I just put a 30 gig SSD in my Ion box. Holy cow it's fast compared to the usb stick I had in there

Pat do you ever power it down for example,at the end of the day? Hibernate?

Please post boot times, thanks.

[pla]

if anyone finds a deal on some small SSD drives, be sure to post it. i would love to find 8-32GB SSD drive , i would think they would be getting pretty cheap as the new drives are getting much bigger.

I've got two of these - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820609330. They are no longer available from NewEgg. Looks like Amazon has them in stock. They are not high end but I've been using them for a while now in my two frontends without any issues. I paid NewEgg $73.99 for the last one.

I just installed a higher end SSD in my backend today. The Intel X25-M. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820167016 I paid NewEgg $219.95 for the X25-M.

Rock on, PLA

[Patrick]

I just put a 30 gig SSD in my Ion box. Holy cow it's fast compared to the usb stick I had in there

Pat do you ever power it down for example,at the end of the day? Hibernate?

Please post boot times, thanks.

I power it down whenever it's not in use. 5 seconds to come up. 3 seconds to turn off. This is what I bought:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820227393

[marc]

Wow, truly amazing.

Front power switch or is your remote being used?

It's still a little too expensive for me but it's obviously where my box is heading eventually.