I've been on the search of the best HTPC.
 
What I want from it, is:
 
Must be silent.
Cheap as possible.
Capable of HD via HDMI or DVI.
Capable of streaming from my PC.
Remote controller.
Must look nice.
HD-DVD / Blu Ray
 
I have built 2 HTPC, the problem with them is that if you want them to be silent and look nice in the living room you need to invest much more money and a Blu Ray player is far to expensive for the PC a HD-DVD is not as expensive but is not cheap either.
 
The HTPC from HP are not powerful enough to play video at 1080p smoothly and they look like a regular PC which stands out in my living room and they lack HD-DVD or Blu Ray.
 
Now my GF bought my a PS3 and Im in sock. This hardware is super silent, I can use linux with it (but is not possible to use beryl by the lack of drivers for the GPU).You also have HDMI, looks nice,plus Blu ray and is relative cheap. A HTPC with all that would cost 1k.
 
Now I havent tired the PS3 remote controller but as for now Im quite surprised by the quality of video, it doesnt get choppy playing 1080p files using VLC.
 
I really recommend to buy the PS3 if you are looking for an inexpensive HTPC and you dont mind using linux, Im not sure if you can use any distro but I have no problems using Ubuntu.

I think i would rather build my own, and make it better for the same price. an 8500gt and a passivly cooled Athlon X2 BE-2300 are great choices, not to mention that memory and harddrive prices are so low.
 
Only reason i can see buying one is if you want to invest in a bluray player

Yup, PS3 is pretty kick ass, it is going to help cure a lot of diseases too. See 'folding at home'.

While the PS3 is an nice piece of hardware and offers media-player like features, it is 1st and primarily a gaming console, there is no comparison to the flexibility and long term functionality of a well built HTPC.

Could you please direct me to a list of every disease cured thanks to Folding@home?

Look when you have a BSC then you can talk. It will potentially help, it has been here about 1 year you moron, drug trials take 10 years to complete and about 2 years to be accepted. Any medical advances that are out now will only be seen in about 12 years time. SO talk when you know what you are talking about and go in for a drug trial in which they cure stupidity.

It would be really hard to build a better one for $600.  I guess if you don't have an HDTV it would be ok to forgo the BD player but if it's going to come for free anyways, why would you leave it on the table?  BD (or HDDVD) is going to be the (near) future.

 
Not quite,  Why?
 
You still to buy the power supply, a case (and if it is a good looking one with remote controller, spect to invest some good money on it), the mobo, the dvd player (blu ray and hd dvd are for to expensive), some wifi connection to serve as a a media streamer for laptops and such, a multi card reader (quite handy on these days).
 
Is really hard to beat the ps3 on the HTPC aspect for just 600