Media Centre Project - Part 1: The Computer

When my DVD/HDD recorder packed up recently I decided it was about time I tried to build myself a Media Centre. What I was looking for was a machine which would allow me to watch DVDs and web content on my LCD TV, record TV, play music and, if possible, allow me to experiment with streaming over my rudimentary network.

Obviously the first question was what to use as the base system. Having used Windows for over ten years the first place I started looking was Windows PCs but I rapidly became disillusioned due to the price I'd need to pay for a reasonably quiet system. In addition, I've had all the usual issues with Windows being a little temperamental, slow to start up and coming with a pretty high overhead if you want it connected to the net.

It was all starting to look pretty expensive and not as easy as standard consumer electronics (i.e. robust and easy to use) so that I could get a sufficient SAF (spouse approval factor). Then a friend of mine introduced me to the Apple Mac Mini.

I was really impressed, it's only 6.5" square and 2" high with a DVD drive, HDD, Intel processor, built in WiFi and Bluetooth and most importantly, it runs almost silently. Now, having not looked at Apple machines for many years, my first question was how much is it? Expecting a PC busting number considering the form factor I was rather surprised to find it only starts at £399! Of course that is a little misleading as that's the BYODKM (Bring Your Own Display Keyboard and Mouse) but since I was going use the TV as the display that doesn't add too much overhead.

In the end I decided to up-spec it a little as I was worried the basic 512Mb of RAM might not be sufficient (and you can never have too much RAM can you) [BTW a recent upgrade now gives the £399 model 1Gb of RAM] and the DVD burner (as the base model only comes with a DVD reader).

The machine plugs straight into the PC input on my LCD TV and auto detected the native panel resolution thus giving a pretty nice picture.

So what about media centre software? Well Apple bundles their own Front Row software and remote with the machine so no extra needed there. Front Row allows you to access your music library (from your iTunes library), play DVDs, stored video and photo slideshows (from iPhoto - also bundled).

So it's relatively inexpensive and does most of what I want - what about the downsides? Well, the Mini is pretty much self contained with no easy way to open it up and modify it or expand it within the box. It does, however, have four USB ports and a Firewire port on the rear. But it doesn't have a TV tuner built in.

Obviously moving from Windows to OS X requires a feww adjustments, but not as many as I was expecting. It's not as crash proof as Apple might have you believe but it's a heck of a lot more robust than Windows and much closer to what you need for a living room device.

So a pretty good start - next getting a TV tuner.