TOTAL NEWBEE NEEDS HELP

[kevinandnadine]

i FOUND THIS FORUM AND LOVE THIS IDEA AND NOW ITS TIME TO BUILD MY OWN RIG

ALL ME AND MY WIFE WANT TO DO IS DVD STORAGE AND PLAYBACK

AS SIMPLY AS POSIBLE

OUR PROJECTOR HAS VGA INPUT I GUESS I NEED ADVISE AND WHAT IS THE MOST BASIC MACHINE I NEED TO GET FOR THIS TO RUN WITH NO SUPPRISES

OUR CURRENT DVD PLAYER JUST BROKE AND WE WOULD LIKE TO USE THIS AS OUR PRIMARY PLAYER ALSO

PS CAN THIS ALSO BE SET UP TO BE EASY ENUFF FOR AND FRIENDS TO USE LIKE A REGULAR PLAYER

[rembetis]

OK, welcome, but let me be the first to advise you to stop typing in all caps. VERY unpopular, and usually comes off as SHOUTING.

generally speaking, most people who set up an HTPC for DVD playback do so for one or both of two reasons.

1) Convenience of having DVDs archived to a hard drive, accessible at the touch of a button. For this, you only need a big hard drive. Virtually any computer with a 1 ghz or higher chip can handle standard dvd playback without problem.

2) Ability to scale/upscale DVD output to virtual HD resolution and/or 1:1 pixel map for their projector. For this you will need a CPU of 2.4 ghz minimum, FFDshow (and playback software that is compatible with it, such as Zoomplayer or TheaterTek), and the time and willingness to do lots of reading and tweaking. I recommend the HTPC forum on AVS and HTPCnews.com as excellent places to start.