My Low Dollar Entertainment center/computer

[forsailbyowner]

Ive put together a computer and entertainment center for Magic that may seems to be working out well. After researching power consumption I went with the atom processor that won all the green awards in a small compact box.

ZOTAC ZBOX ID15 [ZBOX-ID15-U]

I installed 4 gig of memory and a remanufactered 160 gig hdd both for $60

I use this for a monitor and tv.

19" LED LCD 1080p Full HDTV TV Television 12V Multi Use Car RV Cord AC DC New | eBay

Then connected it to an amplified receiver with marine speakers.

New Pyle Car in Dash Am FM Radio USB SD Player Receiver Audio Input for iPod MP3 | eBay

New Pair Pyle PLMR24S Silver Marine Audio 2 Way Box Speakers | eBay

I installed Linux Ubuntu 12.04 lts and opencpn with the full set of enc and ienc charts from noaa and mil sites.

some other misc purchases were, usb optical drive, usb rf keyboard and mouse, hdmi cable, 3,5mm audio cable, wireless usb dongle, articulating wall mount for tv. I have around $450 invested but now I can watch mpegs, or dvds, check navigation below listen to vast music collection etc... with full power usage like watching dvd with computer on run thru sound system will be using around 6- 8 amps. I like the external usb peripherals., i bought a 7 port usb hub that has switches on each outlet so you can only turn on what your using to save power consumption., Now more solar and get wind gen fixed to handle the extra amp draw,.

I will add a large cap external hard drive loaded with media.

[conachair]

If it's just a media centre then a raspberry pi running xbnc works just fine for a few dollars and 0.3A.

http://www.raspbmc.com

The pi will run opencpn as well but a bit on the slow side.

I went for a class T amp, low budget and just pulls 0.1/0.2A.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/bhp/class-t-amplifier

[forsailbyowner]

That raspberry pi is pretty cool. Im sure the .3 amp is the board only and doesnt include any peripheral power use, powered usb hub. keyboard, mouse, card reader etc..."The zbox is rated at 25 watts running a hard drive in actual use. I am going to get one of these to play with though. it will give me an excuse to introduce myself to debian and arch which Ive been wanting to check out. Maybe boot this up when in economy mode. The pyle audio is kinda stand alone as it plays from usb , sd or 3.5mm so a phone sd usb stick or whatever can be used for music only.