Windows Media Center
Windows Media Center is an application designed to serve as a home-entertainment hub. It is included in Windows XP Media Center Edition and premium editions of Windows Vista (Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate). It is designed to be controlled by special remote controls which prominently feature the Green Button (similar to the logo to the right), but can also be operated with a mouse and/or keyboard. This button is used to either launch Media Center from Windows or to return to the Start Menu from within the application. Media Center visualizes the computer user’s pictures, videos, and music from local hard drives, optical drives, and network locations. It then categorizes them by name, date, tags, and other file attributes. Media managed through Media Center can also be relayed via a home network to standard TV sets via the specially designed Windows Media Center Extender or the Xbox 360.
Media Center
The term media center refers either to a dedicated computer appliance or to a specialized personal computer software, both of which are adapted for playing various kinds of media (music, movies, photos etc.). A media center may also allow watching DVD movies and watching and recording television broadcasts.
The media itself may be stored, received by terrestrial, satellite or cable broadcasting or streamed from the internet. Stored media is kept either on a local hard drive or on a (wireless) network attached storage. Some software is capable of doing other tasks, such as finding news (RSS) from the Internet. Media centers are often operated with a remote control, connected to a television set for video output, and can sometimes function as a normal personal computer.
A media center can be purpose-built, modified or created by individuals by adding media center software to a PC or some other computer, for example an Xbox. Lately, some video game consoles (Playstation 3 and Xbox 360) with their network services can act as a media center devices by default.
Typical, complete media centers offer the following functions to the user:
* Integration of all forms of media, entertainment and communication functions including TV-reception (analogue TV, DigitalTV via terrestrial-, cable-, satellite-, IPTV-, webTV-networks), broadband Internet access, IP-telephony, video-telephony, e-mail etc. into one common user friendly GUI (graphical user interface) controlled with a remote control or wireless keyboard by the family members typically in the living room
* Ability to receive digital media files (via direct video signal, computer network or USB)
* Ability to store digital media (usually on a standard computer hard disk drive)
* Ability to play back digital media through standard television or hi-fi equipment
* Simplicity (compared to a computer equipped to accomplish transfer, storage and TV/hi-fi playback)
* Cost savings (compared to a computer equipped to accomplish transfer, storage and TV/hi-fi playback)
* Portability (compared to a computer equipped to accomplish transfer, storage and TV/hi-fi playback)
Devices
* Telly Home Entertainment Server
* Dreambox
* Moxi
* Niveus Media
* Hauppauge MediaMVP
* MediaImpact Media Center
* Daboda HMC-1 Multicodec Media Center
* Klegg MediaShare
* Popcorn Hour