HTPC Inside Nintendo NES Case For Sale
Play Super Mario Bros. on Your HDTV
For those who gamed on a steady diet of Super Mario Bros., ExciteBike, or the infamous Duck Hunt, here's an HTPC to bring you down nostalgia lane. The Nintendo HTPC is basically a drive-less computer crammed into an NES case, with enough claimed power to play 1080p HD-quality videos smoothly.
Here's what $475 (no shipping or taxes included yet) gets you:
- Custom Modified NES case with
- Zotac IONITX-A-U motherboard with 533Mhz Front Side Bus
- External 90W Power Supply (Rated 100-240V 50-60Hz, comes with US 3-prong cable)
- Intel Atom N330 @ 1.6Ghz
- NVIDIA GeForce9400M on NVIDIA ION chipset
- 2GB Dual Channel 800MHZ DDR2 Memory
- 10/100/1000 ethernet; 802.11n WiFi
- 6 x USB 2.0
- 1x Optical, 1x Coax Digital Audio Out (S/PDIF)
- 1 x eSATA II
- HDMI/DVI/VGA connectors
- Line Out, Line In, Mic In analog audio connectors.
The basic variant of the NES HTPC boots from the included 4GB flash drive running Ubuntu 9.10 and XBMC. It's designed as an online media streaming machine, pulling content from a high-speed internet connection through its 802.11n WiFi or 10/100/1000 Ethernet connection. Etsy merchant melanarchy can install an SSD or hard drive at additional cost, but wealth of ports allows the use of high-speed external hard drives.
The NES HTPC looks like a good package, with a reasonable amount of power under the hood. The maker even insists that the CPU fan is extremely quiet, so the only question is: can anyone build a similar system at lower cost? Fill up the comments below with your proposals, dear readers.
Home Theater PC in Original Nintendo
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only for $475!!!!!!!
Thats just too cool. I can never get enough of mods like this.
That's pretty cool, but I could make a similar rig, with an internal power supply, for less than that. Very cool, but too pricey for my books.
*Note: I realize he's trying to profit for his labor, I'm just sayin'
Why can't I see the power supply? Is it external perhaps? I like the idea of a simple flash drive but would have gone with something bigger (sticking with silent flash) but for the price, it's pretty good I say. The netbook I am currently typing on has an atom and a Geforce 9300M and it struggles for 1080p playback through the HDMI, I don't know how the ion (with 9400m)in this device will perform.
I forgot to mention that I am using Win7 32 though. Performance will probably be better again on linux.
I was looking forward to using different HDs like I would my old NES carts. Still pretty awesome though. Maybe I should take the lead and do the same for the SNES?
Oh, and on 2nd read I saw the word external so please don't spank me too hard
Pretty cool idea, but just an Intel Atom? Come on, I'd use a i3 and then overclock the crap out of it! Then again, I'm inclined to overclock the crap out of anything I build...
I`ve been meaning to build something like this too, but I`d stuff the atom into my Sega Genesis rev2, which still looks pretty modern next to dvd/blu-ray players,etc. Seeing as how he only uses around $250 in parts in addition to the NES shell, the price is way too steep.
Just bought one of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] -_-Product
Add a hard drive and memory and cost is right around $300.00.
There is room for 3 of these inside of a NES. Or one system, matching dvdrw, and you could even fit the power brick inside, so this is nothing special.
Do I have to blow out my bootlegged movies before I can watch them?
That's some pretty slick case modding in the rear...
At least it's not on eBay: "This auction is for schematics to build your own NES HTPC Shitbox."
/end sarcasm
Sure you could build it yourself and save a little but people sell these things because they know there are nerds out there that are lazy and have that extra dough.
This just begs to have an emulator and a rom collection installed on it.
That's cool! add a nice emulator to play the originals with a wireless gamepad O.o and it's awesome
I come to 360 CAD with the same board 4 gigs of memory and a 32GIG flash drive. So once you add modding up the nes case it may be worth it for some, but not for me. I would go with a laptop drive for some space. and YES, i DO have a spare nes sitting here(one is still connected to the TV, the other is awaiting something similar to that, but i will need some kind of USB -> NES controller adapter for a realistic feel).
Board/CPU
http://ncix.com/products/index.php [...] omoid=1069
Memory, may need some with smaller heatsinks.
http://ncix.com/products/index.php [...] omoid=1069
Flash drive
http://ncix.com/products/index.php [...] omoid=1069
you can hack a wiimote to connect to bluetooth in win7, which you could use as a nes controller.
hotness.
Can I use my Game Genie in this? I really like super jumping in Super Mario Brothers!!!!
Very cool mod. I think the options to leave the hdd and power supply external were good choices. IIRC those old machines overheated with their massive 8 bit graphic potential. They ran at 1.78 mhz with an 8 bit (count them, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8) PPU (picture processing unit). With dualing 16 Kbit (2kb) ram units, one for RAM and one for VRAM. This combo put out a whopping 256 x 240 resolution in the greatest year ever, 1986.
Wow! Sh*t! I have thrown away all my old consoles (NES, SNES, PS, and PS2)...
Why didn't I think about that before???
somehow I doubt a 1.6 atom can handle 1080p linux or win 7
somehow I doubt a 1.6 atom can handle 1080p linux or win 7
It can when the video card is doing the video decoding.
Wonder if i can get hip to slap one of those in my dead dreamcast case
And for $475, he couldn't even put blank plates behind all the unused connector holes on the Nintendo case? Neat, yes, but a $500 atom powered toy with no hard drive seems a little overpriced.
I've been working on a HTPC to put into me Atari 2600 case. It's based on the same board, but is designed to store and play DVDs and Videos that have been either
- ZOTAC IONITX-A-U Atom 330
- 4GB Dual Channel 800MHZ DDR2 Memory
- 2x Western Digital Scorpio Blue WD5000BEVT 500GB 5400 RPM 2.5" SATA 3.0Gb/s Internal Notebook Hard Drive
- LITE-ON Slot Load CD/DVD Burner Black Slim SATA
Total cost before shipping = $477.95
This thing is only truly cool if the controller ports actually work...