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Perhaps Everyone Will Need An HTPC Soon!

by marc klink

This morning, after scouring for more deals on home theater equipment (yes, I was looking yesterday, I did not forget!) I happened across an article in Wired about the coming changes in the state of broadband, which the article calls ‘Broadband 2.0′. The article states that the landscape of broadband will change significantly in the next 2 years.

www.maplegroveraceway.com_Verizon-logo www.techshout.com_images_comcast-logo-big these will be the companies bring most of the digital goodness in the next 2 years

As someone who follows this daily, I was a bit surprised at the time frame, and the claimed increase in speed. I was also surprised by the claimed impetus for the entire change. The next two years, according to largest national purveyors, Verizon and Comcast, will bring us speeds in the vicinity of 60Mb/s average downloads, and uploads in the 15 Mb/s range. And the reason for this almost order of magnitude difference? Why YouTube, of course! The video giant apparently has everyone but the neighbor’s cat excited about the ability to enjoy the embarrassment of anyone caught unaware. The service is taking the form of early television’s ‘Candid Camera’ with its ability for anyone to put interesting content up for the entire connected world to see. Arthur Godfrey is smiling from somewhere right now!

The article states that with the help of FiOS and DOCSIS 3.0, Verizon and Comcast will bring us up to at least these average speeds, up from the paltry 4.8Mb/s we now have as a nation. Currently Verizon is building out the fiber in 17 states, and Comcast seems to be preparing its upcoming claimed 200 Mb/s  ( the top speed of the DOCSIS 3.0 specification) network everywhere it has presence.

With this speed available, perhaps video streaming of HD movies won’t be the pie-in-the-sky concept it seems now. At even the full capability of standard definition, downloading missed television episodes would be trivial for anyone in the family.

www.hkavc.com_images_home_theater01 and a tower PC in the corner, quietly providing everything but the popcorn

What is going to be needed for this? An HTPC with the latest processor, a quality video card (no current onboard graphics will do - we’ll see what nVidia has upcoming), and hard drive space like you’ve not imagined in your wildest dreams. Most motherboards have 4 or more SATA ports on them now, and you’ll want a terabyte-sized drive on each one of them. If you really want to be prepared, perhaps a Promise SATA controller allowing 4 more drives can be added. Cost? Well, it won’t be cheap, but it won’t cause a run on the Fed either. Big drives are getting scarily cheap. Perhaps Iomega will be able to make a comeback with the number of Rev drives purchased for backup of content.

So in the next few days I’ll be looking forward, and giving  a complete assessment of the new, next generation HTPC will look like, both inside and out.

-


Posted in General on April 28th, 2008

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With the new and intermediate home theatrician in mind, Talking Home Theaters takes you on a tour of what's hot, what's affordable and what's not. If you've ever been envious of the endless home entertainment options available or are looking to build your first home theater without eliminating your children's education funds, you've come to the right place. We focus on scouring the internet for excellent entry-level ideas, incredible deals for newbies and home theater tips and tricks, so you don't have to.

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