When I built my HTPC several years ago I wanted it to blend in like the rest of my equipment in the living room and dropped $500+taxes for this Thermaltake DH102 HTPC case with 7" touch screen.
The touch screen scrolls through system stats and I can see this being useful if you it hooked up to a projector setup. From the touch screen interface you are able to browse and play music without having to turn on your projector (saving the bulb's life) other then that and being able to read some RSS feed new headlines it is pretty much just looks "cool". Would I splurge on it again? Definitely "No" and would just get a more basic desktop case like this which is much cheaper and should blend in just fine with the rest of your setup.
http://products.ncix.com/detail/nmedia- ... 7-1544.htm
I have used this Nmedia case for a few HTPC builds for my friends and it works great for the money. Sometimes you can catch it on sale from NCIX for $60. Nmedia has some other HTPC cases which use mATX or ITX small form factor which are smaller.
http://www.ncix.com/search/?q=Nmedia+case
This is another thing to consider when you are getting a "specialty" case is that is uses a standard ATX power supply. These smaller form factor cases use a non standard ATX power supply and often the cost to replace them is about the same as buying a new case and usually special order. Since this computer will be running 24/7 you know in a few years it will need to be replaced so just be nice to just go into a store and buy whatever is off the shelf.
Now onto power supplies which can be one of the more noisier components in your computer you will want to stick with brands such as Seasonic. It's been a few years since I did my research on Seasonic or other companies that specialize in making quiet power supplies. I used a Seasonic for a friend who wanted his HTPC for his bedroom and one of the main criteria was it silent.
http://www.ncix.com/search/?q=seasonic
On that same build I also used some elastic band suspension kit for his hard drives which is the next area that can be noisy in your build. I don't remember the company as he sourced and bought it himself online and gave it to me at the time of the build but it sort of looked like this:
Keep in mind if you wanna go this route you will want to make sure you have enough free 5.25" bays because that is where the drives will need to be installed. There are tons of DIY thread and examples online such as this where you can do it on budget:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/vi ... hp?t=19147
The last area for noise are cooling fans for your CPU, GPU and case fans.
I've use this controller for a few builds which has a fancy touch screen and cooling looking display vistors can "ooh and ahh" at when they see it. There are other ones with bigger displays and even allow you to set temps, speeds and even control from your iPhone provided you are running the latest version of iTunes and most importantly Apple lets you :twisted:
http://products.ncix.com/detail/nzxt-se ... -42881.htm
Once again something to keep in mind as a controller takes up 1-2 5.25" bay in your case. If you are going with a desktop case there is usually only 1-2 of these accessible from the front and there might be another 1-2 internally.
My recommendation if you want to centralize your media so that it is accessible from anywhere in your house is to build a file server and put it away somewhere in the basement where noise is not an issue. You can even use older hardware as it doesn't take much processing power for what you are going to be using it for which is file sharing. If you have really dated hardware 5-6 years old you can even use linux builds share files via SAMBA so other windows machines or media playback devices such as a WDLive can access it easily.
The only problem with using older hardware is that it might not support SATA drives and the cost to add in say a Promise 4 port SATA card you are better off just buying a new motherboard which would have 6-8 SATA onboard ports and then once you have exhausted all those you can then add a Promise controller so you could have potentially 10-12 SATA ports ~ 3TB x 10-12 = 30-36tb.
If you are not a download or media whore like me then you could probably get away with a NAS such as the D-Link DNS-325 2 bay and install two 3TB drives, setup your RAID and call it a day. My own file server I have 9x2TB WD Greens and 2x1TB Hitachi which I will soon retire and replace with some 3TB drives as I am starting to run out of space :FP:
http://products.ncix.com/detail/d-link- ... 1-1064.htm
For your daily use I would recommend just getting an Android media playback device like this Minix Neo x7 paired with one of these remotes/air mouse. It also runs an Android XBMC build or else most prefer to flash to the Linux build as it is supposedly better. You will have to do your research on that one.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cBR3ZrurMKI[/youtube]
My friend Brian aka InfamousKid has been organizing group buys for the past few months and lots of happy end users there and tons of support for it too. Check this thread for more info and if you want to get in on Group Buy #10, pick up is near Yonge and Finch.
http://forums.redflagdeals.com/minix-ne ... c-1386982/
I have been meaning to order one of these to play with as it seems to be the best Android offering for the money and specs compared to say the Pivos which was released a few years ago. Again if you are looking at dedicated media playback devices make sure it has a dedicated RJ45 port and I always recommend going wired if possible when streaming over your home network for 100% smooth playback.
A HTPC gives you a more "fuller" experience but for me it is just easier for me to fire up my Patriot Box Office media playback device which I got for $40 after rebates back in the day (4-5 years ago). That god I picked up 3 of them at this price and it has been able to playback anything I have thrown at it without requiring a firmware update too! My wife and I just use the file browser and hell even my 5 year old knows how to find stuff now too using the remote :lol:
These smaller Android boxes like the Minix let you to browse the net, youtube and basically play any games or programs from the google play store. If your wife and kids are already familiar with Android phones then the learning curve is nothing. These devices typically use passive cooling and a power brick so there is no moving fans to generate noise. They are also portable enough that say you are going away to the cottage or to a friend's for the weekend you can bring it with you along with a flash drive with some movies or shows copied on to watch while you are there since you won't have access to your home file server.
Anyways, any questions feel free to ask.
