PCMag is in a roll of very useful how-to's, the Get Safe was good, but this is one is better. Make your own Media Center PC in ten a few easy steps..

To get you started, here is a list of products you'll need to buy, from the Case - SilverStone LaScala LC17 - to the Operating System - Windows XP Media Center Edition - everything is there. It will cost $2,276 but the final product is worth it:

A lot of unique capabilities in a very attractive package.... We got capacious storage, four tuners, very quiet operation, and good performance. We even got the ability to record four video streams simultaneously

If you're in a low budget you can lower the price, but the performance will also drop...

can reduce the price by scaling down the number of tuners and storage, removing one of the DVD burners, and using 1GB of RAM instead of 2. You could even go with a motherboard, such as the ATI Radeon Xpress 200 or the nVidia GeForce 6150

The first image in this post is the PC without the case but with everything installed and ready to boot up, here is the final look:

• Motherboard Tips - more images "inside the box", and a technical tip


• Reasons behind every product

Via PCMag