Streacom DB-4 Silent Kaby Lake Media PC Build: The Sound Of Silence
Streacom DB-4: Software and Usage
At its core, we’ve got a PC here just like any other. Feel free to load up any assortment of software to meet your needs. For our media needs we will keep things simple. All we really need is the operating system and a way to playback content.
The Kodi media player began life as the Xbox Media Center (XBMC) about a decade and a half ago and now is available for just about any platform out there these days. Kodi is a great tool for simplifying access to your local and on-network media with an interface better suited to a television, and it also supports both game controllers and remote controls.
Kodi can also be used to watch live television when used with a compatible TV-tuner and provide DVR capabilities with plugins like NextPVR. Other plugins are available for popular web video services like Youtube and Netflix as well - though these are, of course, unofficial so use them at your own risk. Configuring Kodi and these plugins is beyond the scope of this article, but let us know if you would like to see a separate feature for it.
Speaking of game controllers, the DB-4 can make a decent chassis for a light gaming PC well suited to a television. Steam’s Big Picture mode can make navigation with a gamepad simpler so you don’t need to reach for a mouse and keyboard quite so often. Steam also makes it easy to search for games with full controller support.
One other practical application for a computer using the DB-4 chassis is audio recording. With no system fans, audio recordings have significantly less white-noise to filter out. Still others may wish to fill the DB-4 to the brim with 2.5" SSD's for an ultra-fast and ultra-silent NAS solution. What other use cases can you think of for a passively cooled chassis like this?
The DB-4 is not much use, though, if it cannot keep your system cool, so let’s see how it fares in our load testing…
The Kodi media player began life as the Xbox Media Center (XBMC) about a decade and a half ago and now is available for just about any platform out there these days. Kodi is a great tool for simplifying access to your local and on-network media with an interface better suited to a television, and it also supports both game controllers and remote controls.
Kodi can also be used to watch live television when used with a compatible TV-tuner and provide DVR capabilities with plugins like NextPVR. Other plugins are available for popular web video services like Youtube and Netflix as well - though these are, of course, unofficial so use them at your own risk. Configuring Kodi and these plugins is beyond the scope of this article, but let us know if you would like to see a separate feature for it.
One other practical application for a computer using the DB-4 chassis is audio recording. With no system fans, audio recordings have significantly less white-noise to filter out. Still others may wish to fill the DB-4 to the brim with 2.5" SSD's for an ultra-fast and ultra-silent NAS solution. What other use cases can you think of for a passively cooled chassis like this?
The DB-4 is not much use, though, if it cannot keep your system cool, so let’s see how it fares in our load testing…
