I'm seeking to build a HTPC, but this is my first build; while technically capable, I have no experience of specifying individual components in a machine having, up until this time, bought pre-built systems. While I'm able to get a general idea of the overall performance of a machine (having kept myself up-to-date on the latest hardware releases via Tom's Hardware for the last few years) I've no idea whether individual components are capable of what I need them to do, or whether they are just overkill.
As previously mentioned, I'm intending to built a HTPC; however, all it really has to do is be a media server. I have almost 700 DVDs that need to be stored on hard drive for easy access; I've calculated that, assuming an average of 7GB per disc, I will need 6TB of storage. In the future I will probably replace these DVDs with Blu-ray versions, so I might end up pushing the storage much higher.
As a 'green' hard drive is, in the UK, often half the price of a comparable 'performance' drive of the same capacity and, as I want the energy consumption to be as low as possible, I would prefer to use 'green' drives in my build - especially as I want to keep the price as low as possible. That said, you can see my inexperience showing, as my question is: are so-called 'green' hard drives made by Western Digital / Hitachi / Seagate fast enough to be able to serve a single Dolby Digital or DTS audio & 1080p video stream to a connected TV / home theatre receiver?
Any comments to help a novice would be gratefully received!
As previously mentioned, I'm intending to built a HTPC; however, all it really has to do is be a media server. I have almost 700 DVDs that need to be stored on hard drive for easy access; I've calculated that, assuming an average of 7GB per disc, I will need 6TB of storage. In the future I will probably replace these DVDs with Blu-ray versions, so I might end up pushing the storage much higher.
As a 'green' hard drive is, in the UK, often half the price of a comparable 'performance' drive of the same capacity and, as I want the energy consumption to be as low as possible, I would prefer to use 'green' drives in my build - especially as I want to keep the price as low as possible. That said, you can see my inexperience showing, as my question is: are so-called 'green' hard drives made by Western Digital / Hitachi / Seagate fast enough to be able to serve a single Dolby Digital or DTS audio & 1080p video stream to a connected TV / home theatre receiver?
Any comments to help a novice would be gratefully received!