Building a Windows Home Theatre PC

Building a Windows Home Theatre PC is We Got Served's definitive guide to planning, building, installing and using a Windows-based home theatre PC. 

If you're serious about streaming and managing your music and movies collection, then a Home Theatre PC (HTPC) puts you firmly in control. Sure, you can stream media on Connected TVs, Blu-ray players and other receivers but you have limited opportunities to customise and tailor those offerings to your needs, your family’s needs and the needs of your home. Depending on your choice, you get these services, miss out on those services and are reliant on a benevolent manufacturer to continue adding new apps and maintaining existing apps.

But a HTPC with a small footprint - powerful and silent hardware running slick, easy to manage media center software is not a dream. It’s available for you today. Right now. You can build the hardware you want, install the services you prefer and play the media you love.

In this 513 page guide, we walk you step by through creating a first-class, small and mighty HTPC - you'll plan the specifications, components and form factor you need, select the hardware and learn how to assemble a barebones kit (such as our reference build, an Intel NUC HTPC) or build a PC from scratch.

From there, we deep dive into maximising performance of your HTPC through tweaking motherboard settings and installing Intel's Rapid Start and Smart Connect management applications. We'll install the latest release of Windows and configure the operating system for HTPC use, tailoring settings to support DTS and Dolby Digital audio, then enhancing video support for Blu-ray disc.

With support for Blu-ray on board, you'll be guided through advanced topics like region unlocking and DVD/Blu-ray ripping to a choice of formats, including MKV, BDMV and ISO for streaming in your favourite media center software. We install USB and Network TV Tuners for configuring Live and Recorded TV and use DVBLink to integrate our channels and EPG into a variety of popular media applications. 

If you think we're done, then hold on! The guide takes a detailed look at configuring a universal remote control (the Logitech Harmony Hub) for use with our HTPC and look at various ways to download and manage music, video and TV metadata for our media collection. You'll learn the basics of popular file downloaders SABnzbd and uTorrent and we wrap up with a comprehensive review of leading media center packages Plex Media Server and XBMC.

Building a Windows Home Theatre PC is packed with tips, tricks and tutorials to help you build a kick-ass home theatre PC that will last you for years to come!


Chapters

- Chapter 1: Consider the Environment
- Chapter 2: Selecting Your HTPC Hardware
- Chapter 3: Assemble a Barebones HTPC
- Chapter 4: Build Your HTPC From Scratch
- Chapter 5: Configure Your UEFI Motherboard
- Chapter 6: Maximise Responsiveness With Intel Rapid Start and Smart Connect
- Chapter 7: Install Windows 8.1
- Chapter 8: Configure Windows Audio for DTS and Dolby Digital Surround Sound Support
- Chapter 9: Enhancing Windows Video and Blu-ray Support
- Chapter 10: Rip Your DVDs and Blu-rays for Viewing Any Time
- Chapter 11: View Live and Recorded TV on Your HTPC
- Chapter 12: Configure a Logitech Harmony Remote to Control Your HTPC
- Chapter 13: Manage Your Music Metadata
- Chapter 14: Automatically Collate and Manage Movie & TV Metadata
- Chapter 15: Flex Your Media Muscles With Plex
- Chapter 16: Download Files on Your HTPC With SABnzbd
- Chapter 17: Install a BitTorrent Client
- Chapter 18: Using XBMC Step by Step