I rather glibly told some friends of mine that what they needed, in order to play music and videos from their Windows PC on their TV without lugging anything about or rewiring it, was a wireless Media Center Extender. Now they want to put their money where my mouth is, so to speak, but the thing is I don't know that much about the Windows home-networking ecosystem. So I thought I'd ask you lot.

The setup is:

• Windows Vista and Windows XP PCs with the media on
• MP3 audio files, MPEG-2/MPEG-4/H.264 standard-def video files
• Wireless network
• Standard-def, 4:3 NTSC TV with S-Video and composite inputs only
• AV Receiver and 2.1 speaker system, plenty of spare analogue audio inputs

Is it, in fact, a Media Center Extender that I need, in order to solve that problem? (The Vista PC, at least, has Media Center installed.) If so, I'd be interested in recommendations, especially for ones that can be found on Amazon USA.

Many thanks,
Peter

Xbox? They can connect it to the source PC both as a Windows Media Center extender, and with its own server-client software.

logitech network media players are very good, but AFAIK there's nothing for video, there.

Popcorn Hour? You would also need a wireless access point, but I'm not sure how well it would cope with wireless.

Stig

Here's my cursory research so far:

• Linksys DMA2100 -- inadequate codec support
• HP X280N -- no S-video or composite output
• Xbox 360 -- rather overkill, contains fan
• Dlink DSM-750 -- expensive

So that's a grand total of one product that actually fits the bill?

Peter

How about something like this?

• Acer Aspire Revo
• VGA -> S-Video/Composite Converter
• A wireless USB adapter

I'm not familar with Windows home theater stuff, either, but some things Ive come across include the Slingcatcher, the Viewsonic VMP70, the Argosy HV335T.

In addition to Xbox, Playstation 3 does this as well, and you can actually hear yourself think over the sound of the PS3's fan.

If they don't have an Xbox or a PS3, that's a different story.

I picked up one of the Linksys DMA2100's during the Circuit City crash.

It works with the MCE box I have, but it's user interface is noticeably slow responding to remote commands.

edit: Most of the time It sets unused, on only when the content desired is only available on the MCE box.

IMO, from reading about the capabilities of thee boxes, seeing interface screenshots, the best media extender product at this moment is the Western Digital TV Live. Full HD decode and display to 1080p. I can't think of any product that comes even close to it frankly, including any of the ones mentioned in this thread already.

It's wired, but it supports connecting a USB WiFi adapter.

It will play back more formats that most other extenders and has one of the better interfaces. Most products on the market, including the Popcorn Hour are extremely poor in this last regard. The PS3 doesn't support many video formats, so it's generally a non-starter. The XBOX needs something like Boxee or XBMC installed or it's useless. Both it and the PS3 are also loud and failure prone. These dedicated extenders are nearly bulletproof, silent, cool, low-powered and tiny. Very easy to integrate with the rest of your kit.

The WD box is also one of the cheaper alternatives. I'm connecting up one of my friends with it in the next month or two.

I've actually been considering picking up a self contained media player myself, since plugging my laptop into the TV is becoming tiresome. Originally I was looking at the WDTV, but I discovered the CinemaTube the other day, has anyone had a chance to compare these two systems?

Ooo. That does look like a good 'un. It's not a Media Center Extender as such, but actually maybe normal Windows file-sharing is easier to set up and debug anyway. (There's a DLNA logo on WD's page about it, but no mention of any actual DLNA or UPnP features anywhere else.)

Peter

Although it is quieter than the Xbox, I am constantly amazed at how loud the optical drive is in the PS3. It is really noticeable in quiet parts of movies.

I actually second Bruno's suggestion of the WDTV Live. My friend just bought one and it's surprisingly capable for such a little, inexpensive box. No, it's not an MCE extender, but it'll do quite alot. Plus, if you pay for the $20 PlayOn software, it can stream Hulu (and will work with subscriptions, turning it into a DVR), stream Amazon VOD, Netflix, and other services. Pretty impressive.

I think a media center extender is fantastic mostly if you're interested in the ecosystem. For example, I'd love to have one powerful machine with 4-6 cablecard tuners in it as my main MCE box, then have an extender on several TVs, enabling multi-room viewing.

I don't have any basis for this assessment, but I gather that extenders are good with many of them pulling from one source, whereas the WDTV Live might work better for your friends' need to have one device pulling from multiple sources. I could be wrong about that aspect of the extender, though.

One last thing to mention: you mentioned "Windows Vista and Windows XP PCs with the media on." I may be wrong, but I think most XP installations did NOT come with Media Center (I know I specifically had a Media Center Edition of XP), and as such would not work with extenders. I think the WDTV Live would work with those computers though.

You're not wrong. XP didn't come with Media Center. Windows Media Center Edition was XP with the extra bits, and was really only available as an OEM version. Vista (and 7) Ultimate (and Home Premium?) include Media Center.

Given Peter's requirements, a real WMC extender wouldn't be suitable because they require an WMC installation. He mentioned XP machines and didn't say anything about WMC being installed. Also, I'm not certain that all WMC extenders are compatible with all versions of WMC. Not to mention they certainly don't play back nearly the number of video formats of the other boxes mentioned. Lastly, I'm not certain of who's still making real WMC extenders.

These boxes are small because they use a SoC that integrates nearly everything you need.

Also, WD have a couple of other boxes, but only the "Live" box has networking. I might have forgotten to mention that the WD box also does have standard-def support via its AV-out and component ports.

The issue I have with the CinemaTube is that it looks like it's somewhat of a no-name product. That is, a quick Chinese OEM job without much of a custom interface. You can see on its product page that the file listings etc. are contained in a rectangle mimicking something similar to an open/save dialog. I wouldn't be confident this product would receive the updates that the WD products do. I will however give them credit for showcasing the UI of their product so prominently. By comparison, take a look at the Popcorn Hour, Viewsonic or some other web sites sometime. They have what I call "crap-all" consumer data on their site. Nothing that would make most normal people even consider buying. No pictures no sale. No pictures usually means they're hiding something.

I have an eGreat M34A which is basically a Popcorn Hour clone (same hardware/software). I am surprised at how nice the UI is... I was expecting far worse. However, the UI of the WDTV is a bit nicer in my opinion.

When I bought the eGreat, the WDTV Live didn't exist. If I were shopping for such a device today, I think I would go for the WDTV Live. The eGreat really doesn't give me any trouble, though. It streams HD MKVs like a champ and looks great doing it.

Rob, I think you nailed it with the Popcorn hour. They're using the same software as a few other devices. It's based on a media platform with a name I can't remember now. That may have something to do with why they don't show images, though I can't be sure.

I think their old site was better, the new one is pretty much just a shopping page. The benefit of the Popcorn, and probably the eGreat since it uses the same software, is that they receive updates.

Many of these boxes are the same or similar with regards to hardware. Maybe the boards are a bit different in layout. That's because many of them use the same SoC from Sigma and implement their reference designs. The final word in video file support is going to come down to software tweaks. And regardless of how good the playback is, any device can fall down because of its UI.

One thing I don't know about the WD is whether it will deal well with a large media collection. Say 1000-3000 movies and TV shows plus 30-50k audio tracks. I'll find out once I set up one for my friend.

When I was using my PS3 for this purpose, I was using DLNA servers such as Tversity and MediaLink since the PS3 had somewhat limited codec/container support. If the DLNA server had to transcode something on the fly, the trick-play performance of the PS3 really suffered and the PC was getting bogged-down.

The great thing about the eGreat is that you can simply point it to an SMB share. Then it just reads the filesystem without needing any DLNA stuff running on your computer.

The eGreat/Popcorn Hour is also DLNA compliant, so it does work with Tversity and things like PlayOn for Hulu streaming.

One slightly annoying thing with the eGreat is its inability to fast forward and rewind an MKV. It can move in 30 second increments back and fourth. It can also jump between 0-90% of the file in 10% increments, so it's not such a big deal.

I should JFGI, but do the popcorn hour/eGreat or any of the other options support DVD menus from an SMB share? XBMC is great for standard def, but I'd like to modernize it a bit and avoid building a HTPC. Whatever I do I'm not going back to discs.

Also, are there any hacks for ripped bluray menus yet?

SageTV HD Theater can play DVD and BluRay with Menus over your network. I don't know of other specific devices that will do that. Even the WD TV Live apparently will play only the video but not show the menus.

According to this CinemaTube also handles DVD menus from ISO files, and supports streaming over network.

That's a feature I don't really desire, so I don't have a lot of experience with it. However, if you point the egreat to a DVD ISO, it will play it (including the menus) over the network. I'm not sure the same can be said for a video_ts folder, but it would make sense.

If you hook up a USB DVD-ROM drive to the egreat/Popcorn Hour, it's apparently usable as a standard DVD player (with 1080p output).

Rob, I think my favorite thing about the eGreat is that the page you linked to refers to it as a "media tank"