The best HTPC MB has a PCI slot so he can use a MPEG2 TV-capture card. I'd still take the Zotac for the wifi. The wifi card is removable so I could replace it with another miniPCIe device (Broadcom Crystal HD for example).
Also, stations are dropping/have dropped analog broadcast so an MPEG2 encoder is completely irrelevant. You'd be better served with 2 USB tuners that are the size of a stick of gum.
I think that any motherboard with NVIDIA ION chipset is good for building a HTPC...