Build a Kitchen PC

1. Assemble the PC: At its core, this is a fairly standard PC build. You'll need to install all the system components—CPU, TV tuner card, hard drive, optical storage, and memory—before you install Windows and boot the system up.

You can use the touch screen display as a normal display until you set it up. Once you've installed Windows XP Media Center Edition, you can go ahead and install the M170's drivers.

Because SFF boxes are so compact, they often require that you install components in a certain order. The Shuttle SN27P2 is no different.

Here's the recommended order of installation in seven steps:

• Remove the hard-drive trays. This will give you access to the Shuttle's innards. Feel free to mount the drives in the trays, but do not place the trays in the case yet.

• CPU: First remove the cooling device. Next, install the CPU. Don't install the CPU cooling device until after you've installed the memory.

• Plug in the two RAM DIMMs.

• DVD drive: This mounts in the optical storage bay, which sits over the hard drive bays.

• TV tuner card: The Shuttle's integrated graphics and audio mean you only have to install one expansion card, namely, nVidia's Dual TV MCE.

• Plug in the drives. Connect the SATA and ATA cables to the drives.

• Connect power and other cables. At this point, you can plug your cable or satellite box(es) into the TV tuner card you just installed. To receive a TV signal, you'll probably need to run a long extension of S-Video or coaxial cable from wherever your cable line or cable box is located into the kitchen.

2. Install Windows XP Media Center Edition: This is another standard installation. Once you progress through the installation of Windows, you'll boot into the Media Center setup wizard, which will walk you through an intuitive step-by-step process. The following screenshot shows how Windows Media Center allows you to quickly find and record or watch TV shows that interest you:

Media Center Edition is essentially an application that sits on top of Windows XP. You can minimize it or resize the window as you would any other Windows app. If the primary use will be watching TV or listening to music, then set Windows to boot into the Media Center interface when the PC starts up. But if the primary use will be surfing for recipes or for news, then booting directly to the desktop is preferable. In the Settings option, the General Settings tab is where you can make this selection.

3. Set up the touch screen display: Now it's time to transform this rig into a kitchen PC. Installing and calibrating 3M's M170 display is easy. First, install the software. Then reboot the system. While the system is booting back up, connect the supplied USB cable between the display and the PC. The Found New Hardware Wizard will pop up. Allow it to search for the drivers automatically.

Once the drivers are installed, a calibration wizard will pop up on the display. Follow the instructions, and you're up and running.

The M170 works remarkably well with Media Center, mainly because Microsoft designed the Media Center interface to be used with a remote control. In real-world terms, this means big, shiny buttons that can be easily activated with your fingers. Having said that, using the display in the conventional Windows environment can be a little trickier—the smaller icons and lack of keyboard require some fairly straightforward tweaks to the Windows interface.

Here are the steps I took to make accessing the Web and entering text a fairly easy process:

• Create bookmarks for favorite cooking/recipe Web sites on the Windows desktop. This way, the user can easily access their favorite sites.
• Set up a single desktop folder containing all the user's recipes.
• Set up your PC to use large icons. This will make navigation easier.
• Use Windows' On-Screen Keyboard. This is a fairly easy way to enter text into the Web browser or any other application.

Once you get everything up and running, perform the following steps to permanently enable the on-screen keyboard:

• Press the Windows logo key + U.
• Next, select the "On-Screen Keyboard is not running" option.
• Press the Start button. Then click the "Start automatically when I log in" radio button.

If the On-Screen Keyboard app doesn't work well enough for you, there are numerous virtual keyboards you can download and/or purchase. For example, Virtual Onscreen Keyboard from Mount Focus is an excellent choice. These virtual keyboards make entering text easy, because they feature large buttons that can be easily activated with a touch screen. By displaying a full-screen keyboard on the display, Mount Focus' Virtual Onscreen Keyboard makes text entry via touch screen a snap. Here's a screenshot:

4. Assemble the swing-arm mount: Assembling the Ergotron swing-arm mount was surprisingly straightforward. The device comes with three key parts: wall mount, arm mechanism, and arm extender that you can use to add an extra 12 inches of reach.

First, attach the wall mount base unit to the wall itself. Carefully measure out the height at which you want the mount to be placed. Keep in mind that the location that you screw the wall mount into will serve as the lowest point the display will reach.

Next, attach the wall mount to the wall using the supplied screws. A word of caution: When attached to the full swing-arm mount and display, this apparatus will be quite heavy. So make sure you're attaching the wall mount to a portion of a wall or other support that can bear the weight.

The rest of the swing-arm assembly process is fairly easy: Simply slide the arm and/or arm extender onto the wall mount. However, before you do that, you must first first attach the display to the business end of the swing-arm. To do so, attach a metal plate that comes with the swing-arm mount to the desired display with a series of four screws. Many flat screen displays, including the M170, come with what is known as a "100 mm VESA mounting pattern." This is a universal four-screw mounting platform.

In the case of the M170, a little extra work is involved to attach the display to the swing-arm. First, remove the LCD base stand from the screen itself in order to connect the two. To do this, remove the M170's base cover, then unscrew the base. (The manual for the display does an excellent job of explaining this process in clear detail.)

After you have removed the base, connect the steel VESA pattern plate that comes with the swing-arm to the display and to the end of the swing-arm using the bundled screws. Now you can go ahead and slide this arm (with the display attached) onto the wall mount. Once you've attached and mounted the display, use the supplied Allen wrench to fine-tune and tighten the springs that govern the position and maneuverability of the arm.

Final Conclusions

After I used my custom-made kitchen PC for a week, I drew these three conclusions:

• The use of the swing-arm and touch screen makes life in the kitchen easy—even easier than I expected. The ability to move the screen around, plus the elimination of the keyboard and mouse, let me find an ideal position without compromising counter space.

• I was concerned that the screen would become covered with kitchen grease and fingerprints, and it did. But cleaning the display turned out to be simple. Just run a damp cloth over it.

• More processing power is better. After a week, I wondered whether I'd made a mistake with my choice of processor. Windows XP Media Center Edition puts more strain on the CPU than I expected. I can't help but think that if I had spent another $60 on a low-end dual-core Athlon 64 instead of the Sempron, I would have been a lot happier with the system's overall performance.

GEORGE JONES is a San Francisco-based technology writer and computer-games consultant. Since 1992 has worked at numerous computer publications, including PC Week, CNET.com, and Maximum PC.