Media Center Extender Reviewed

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.winsupersite.com/reviews/mce.asp' target='_blank'>http://www.winsupersite.com/reviews/mce.asp</a><br /><br /></div><i>"At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2004 (see my review) in January 2004, Microsoft unveiled its plans for TV set top box devices, called Media Center Extenders (codenamed Bobsled), that would let users remotely access Media Center content from any TV in their home using a wired or wireless connection. The idea, I thought, was a good one: Though Windows XP Media Center was a fantastic product, it still required an expensive and potentially unreliable PC, which is not exactly the kind of device one should put in their living room next to the big screen TV. Plus, Media Center Extenders, which would be made by a host of Microsoft's hardware partners, would solve other problems caused by moving a PC from the home office to the living room. "It is thin; it is completely silent," Microsoft chairman Bill Gates said of the device. "There is no fan.""</i><br /><br />I had a great post on this yesterday, then my browser (Maxthon) locked up and I lost it. Extenders are a very cool concept if you're a Windows Media Center user - check out Paul's article.

[mememe]

"At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2004 (see my review) in January 2004, Microsoft unveiled its plans for TV set top box devices, called Media Center Extenders (codenamed Bobsled), that would let users remotely access Media Center content from any TV in their home using a wired or wireless connection."


Gotta tell you though.. just bought a new MCE machine and am not tooo impressed with the video quality being produced by it, on the monitor or resulting TV. It's ok for a small window on the desktop and that's about it..

God I wish Tivo was in Canada..

[Suhit Gupta]

Really? What kind of video card does it have?

Suhit

[mememe]

Really? What kind of video card does it have?

Suhit

It's an HP MCE machine, see here for specs:
http://makeashorterlink.com/?A35622D99

It should be powerful enough.. one would think?

[Suhit Gupta]

You have the 9200 with 128MB RAM. Hmm, that should be more than enough to give you a good picture. So describe what exactly the problem that you are noticing on your monitor/TV? Maybe post a picture...?

Suhit

[Jason Dunn]

Gotta tell you though.. just bought a new MCE machine and am not tooo impressed with the video quality being produced by it, on the monitor or resulting TV. It's ok for a small window on the desktop and that's about it...

Hmm. Ok, the text and interface should look great on the monitor, but on the TV it will look like crap. And the video will likely look like crap on the MCE - all digital video does because the MCE has to up-sample the resolution. I *think* the exntenders will do a better job though because they have hardware assisted re-sampling...I have a network media player that takes 720 x 480 cable TV MPEG2 video and puts it into my old, non-HDTV via composite signal, and the video looks excellent!

I gotta do a front page post about this...