Perhaps their could be a HTPC edition of the fit-pc2 separate from the version that is on the site now, for example sacrificing all of the USB ports on the back to free up space could allow a digital sound outputs like toslink(optical) or coax.
The SD slot could also be cut out as most people using this would have media streamed from a network connection or from a USB hard drive.
HTPC Edition
Re: HTPC Edition
It's an interesting option and one I'm sure many of us are contemplating.
However, I don't get the part about "streaming" programs off another PC or the Internet (if that's all it can do). There are better options out there for that - ones that are entirely quiet, low power, and fully audio/video capable (e.g. HDMI 1.3 1080p with 5.1, 7.1, encoded and unencoded audio). Consider PopcornHour and SageTV's own Media Player to name just a couple. Heck the Roku box is an even cheaper choice if they'd only open it up to development a bit.
My thinking is that unless the storage part of the solution is included in the "HTPC", you are kind of giving up on the extremely low power advantage of the Fit-PC 2 (versus a more traditional HTPC platform). If my Fit-PC 2 records video onto a PC's storage (rather than its own disk), I'm going to have to keep that 100W PC on all the time.
This is precisely why my PopcornHour contains a disk drive btw...
However, I don't get the part about "streaming" programs off another PC or the Internet (if that's all it can do). There are better options out there for that - ones that are entirely quiet, low power, and fully audio/video capable (e.g. HDMI 1.3 1080p with 5.1, 7.1, encoded and unencoded audio). Consider PopcornHour and SageTV's own Media Player to name just a couple. Heck the Roku box is an even cheaper choice if they'd only open it up to development a bit.
My thinking is that unless the storage part of the solution is included in the "HTPC", you are kind of giving up on the extremely low power advantage of the Fit-PC 2 (versus a more traditional HTPC platform). If my Fit-PC 2 records video onto a PC's storage (rather than its own disk), I'm going to have to keep that 100W PC on all the time.
This is precisely why my PopcornHour contains a disk drive btw...
Re: HTPC Edition
plus 1 on this idea. I already have a large NAS, so I just want something to run an XBMC client on. 1080p mkv playback through DVI/HDMI and optical output (toslink) are necessary 
I would buy a popcorn hour if it had a decent interface.
A cleaner front without usb-ports and sd-card reader would make it more tv-room/wife friendly.
I would buy a popcorn hour if it had a decent interface.A cleaner front without usb-ports and sd-card reader would make it more tv-room/wife friendly.