Lenovo Ideacentre Q180 as music streamer & HTPC?

Twill

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Anyone seen the Ideacentre Q180 that's been getting good reviews of late?

Small, cheap, blu-ray-equipped, and with a handy qwerty remote thingy, looks like an excellent option for a music streamer.

If you already have a decent USB DAC, seems to me that a machine like this offers a lot. You could hard wire it in to your DAC and control music playback and library management from the comfort of your sofa using the little keyboard - which sounds half useful for once.

Then you'd also get internet radio, catchup TV services, multiformat disc playback etc all from one box. I have just bought a new Freeview HD PVR, so will be replacing my old Pioneer DVD / HDD recorder anyway, and was looking at a dedicated bluray player. Since I'm also mulling over streaming options, a unit like this could tick both boxes.

Sounds too good to be true, like a Marantz NA7004 and blueray deck, internet radio, and smart TV all rolled in to one.

The only thing is that I've read some suggestions that the puny Atom processor inside isn't enough to stream video over the web at any kind of serious quality. apparently local playback off disc is fine, but it can't cope with 1080p, or even 720p over the net. Not sure if this is likely or not, or just a reviewer with a thing against atom - said review wasn't from a site I recognised.

Any thoughts? Could be an interesting option.
 

Overdose

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Perfect for the job!

I had/have a similar setup, the first was an ASRock Ion 3D Blu-Ray HTPC and did everything you could wish for in a streamer. I used XBMC and controlled it with its own remote, although you could probably get an app to do just that.

The Macmini I have now does the same job, but integrates better with the other Apple devices in the house.

As for HD streaming, the GPU needs to be capable and your internet connection needs to have enough bandwidth. If this model of Pc won't do it, there are plenty that will.
 

amcluesent

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I have a Acer Revo 3600 wired to the TV by HDMI which I use for video, iPlayer, Windows Media Center etc. Wouldn't dream of using it for music streaming, for which I have the Squeezebox Transporter. Don't want the TV switched on when listening to the hi-fi.
 

Twill

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Presumably that's a 2010 Mac Mini, didn't they take the optical drive out last year... helpfully?

I know discs are dying, but not for a year or two in most common households I reckon.

What about the boot time for a PC, does that drag, or do you tend to drop it in to some kind of sleep?

HD streaming doesn't really bother me right now, but things move at such a pace these days, you wouldn't want to think you're buying something that won't do something you might want it to in the near future. Especially when funds are tight!

Cheers.
 

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