Ok as you may know I am home alone because the wife and son went to visit the family. That gave me a much awaited chance to get my home theater PC actually set up and running. I am using the Sonata because it is extremely quiet and doesnt look bad either
Today I went out and bought a 64mb oem Radeon 7000. It is made by Sapphire, and has excellent tv out (even came with S Video cable. Next on the agenda was a wireless card so I could access all the goodies on my file server. I started off with a USB wireless NIC (802.11b), but it kept "pausing" every so often when playing mp3s or divx off my server. I messed around with settings for an hour or so and then took it back. Replaced it with a PCI 802.11b card and all is well. NIC and WAP are linksys.
I control the box using my notebook as a remote control (logging onto the HTPC with Radmin). I am going to eventually get a little wireless keyboard with trackball or touchpad whenever I find an inexpensive one. I am using my Logitech z560 speakers for sound and it is a night and day difference from the Sony tv speakers. I plan on getting a proper sound system in the fall when money is less tight. For now, this only cost me $200CAD or so for cables and vid card and NIC and I had the rest of the system. Here's a pic:
System specs: XP@1750/nforce1 mobo with integrated sound, 30gb hdd, 32xcd-rom, radeon 7000 (64mb), Logitech z560s
TV: 32" Sony WEGA
cheapo dvd player with component out