AndNowYouKnow - making sense of gadgets and technology » HTPC

Amitech Homecenter – You Can’t Always Get What You Want

Morten Rand-Hendriksen — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 22:13:48 +0000

Norwegian hi-fi magazine Lyd & Bilde (Norwegian link) recently tested the Homecenter from Danish computer manufacturer Amitech – a sleek black and silver Media Center PC that gives the Mac Mini a run for it’s money. Only problem is it’s only available in Scandinavia – at least for now.

The Amitech Homecenter 500 is a small sleek PC with impressive features:

Intel® Core Duo T2300E
2 GB DDR2 RAM
160 GB 2.5” S-ATA hard drive
Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 950 graphics
Gigabit LAN and wi-fi (54 MB)
Analogue TV tuner
4:1 memory card reader (SD, MMC, MS, MS-pro)
4xUSB, 1xFirewire
DVI-out, S-video out, composite out
SP-DIF digital audio, analogue audio out
DVD player

The small box is meant to replace all the existing hardware in your living room – from your DVD player to your PVR or VCR and to bring in all your music, home videos, photos and even the internet making the sofa your favorite place to be. The Homecenter is designed to work with Windows Vista and takes full advantage of the extensive Media Center features built into the new operating system. If you have an XBOX360 lying around it will link seamlessly with the device enabling you to spend even more time staring at your TV while the wife takes care of the family.

Product page (in Danish, Norwegian or Swedish – your choice)

Extreme Guide: Build the Perfect Home Theatre PC (HTPC)

Morten Rand-Hendriksen — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 22:50:50 +0000

You hear about them all the time and more and more PC manufacturers (even Apple) are churning out Home Theatre PCs (HTPC). With most versions of Microsoft’s new operating system Windows Vista touting media centre functionality and more and more PCs coming with video in/out and even remote controls as standard the PC is truely making it’s way into living rooms across the globe.

Why do I need a HTPC you ask? In the not-too-distant future the HTPC in some form will take over for many if not all of the current components in your home theatre setup. If you have a PVR (Personal Video Recorder) at home you already have what ammounts to a HTPC hooked up to your television. A full scale HTPC is a complete media centre in one compact(ish) package serving your digital music and movie library as well as recording and playing back your TV shows, family photos and whatever else you decide to load on your hard drives.

The people over at ExtremeMhz.com have created a comprehensive guide on how to build the Perfect HTPC. The guide goes through everything from cases to cooling, graphics cards to peripherals and has a breakdown of what software is available and what each package provides you with.

Just a warning: Still at the toddler stage HTPCs have a long way to go before being completely bug free and easy to set up so expect to spend a lot of time and money when following this guide.