NAS or HTPC?

[McCordRm]

I currently have a pretty cheap NAS setup which streams movies to

my new TV through DLNA. However, it doesn't allow me to sort

Alphabetically, only by the date the movie was added to the NAS.

So I'm curious if I'll get better functionality building an HTPC instead

of using a NAS setup. I'd like to keep it fairly cheap (price of hard drives

aside, of course). Suggestions?

[123456789A]

Can't you have a HTPC that gets media off the NAS?

[McCordRm]

That's two machines to do one job. Thus the Either/Or question.

[123456789A]

Can never have enough machines. I would use both.

[McCordRm]

Nope, too much.

I don't want to dedicate a computer to serving files to yet another

system that then serves files to my TV. That's just too many steps.

I want a single solution to work as my network backup (thus ripped

movies from my DvDs and music) and be able to serve those files

to my TV. I already have a cheap NAS, but when the TV reads the files

it auto sorts them by date, with no way to change it to Alphabetically.

If there's a NAS that will allow that, I'm all ears. Otherwise, I'll be

looking for an HTPC solution.

[Kami-]

I use a NAS box to serve media to numerous 'Boxee Boxes' - also my NAS sorts alphabetically by default - D-Link make it, but I can't recall the model number at the mo, it's a pain in the to get at too lol.

[Inertia]

I use a HTPC in my lounge because it can play any format then, DLNA TV's don't support enough containers / codecs, there's always something that wont play, in many cases most things wont play.

Something like a Intel G840 CPU, GIGABYTE GA-H61M-DS2 Motherboard, A lowish end graphics card with hdmi out and 4gb DDR3 1333mhz wont set you back too much.

[Open Minded]

I'm on the fence right now with this same question. I think I'm going to go the NAS route, only because it's a little cheaper. If I had some extra money, I would get a 35 watt Ivy Bridge with a 7x series chipset and use that to serve files and be the HTPC.

Comes down to price and what options you want.

[cybertimber2008]

What OS is the NAS running? Could you run something like XBMC on it, since I assume the NAS is connected to your TV? I mean... if you made a HTPC it'd need to be connected to the TV so I'm assuming you're open to connecting it to a TV anyway.

[McCordRm]

My NAS is a Seagate Black Armor 220, and is connected to my home network.

As for OS... I have no idea. The web panel doesn't even tell me the model number.

[Lindkvist]

Pivos Xios-DS, they have an XBMC firmware for it (Linux).

I'm ggoing get it, when it gets released to the EU market

and it's dirt cheap

[TPreston]

http://www.mini-box.com/Intel-D2700DC-Mini-ITX-Motherboard