Home theater PC

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A home theater PC (HTPC) or media PC is a convergence device that combines the functions of a personal computer and a digital video recorder. It is connected to a television or a television-sized computer display and is often used as a digital photo, music, video player, TV receiver and digital video recorder. Home theater PCs are also referred to as media center systems or media servers.

The general goal in a HTPC is usually to combine many or all components of a home theater setup into one box. They can be purchased pre-configured with the required hardware and software needed to add television programming to the PC, or can be cobbled together out of discrete components as is commonly done with GB-PVR, SageTV or LinuxMCE.

HTPC characteristics

Beyond functioning as a standard PC, all HTPCs have three additional characteristics in common:

  • Television connectivity
  • Quiet / minimal noise during operation
  • High storage capacities

Television connectivity

Standard PC units are usually connected to a CRT or LCD display, while HTPCs are designed to be connected to a television. All HTPCs should feature a TV-out option, using either a HDMI, DVI, Component Video, VGA (for some LCD televisions), or S-Video output.

Quiet / minimal noise

See also: Quiet PC § Silencing methods

A common user complaint with using standard PCs as HTPC units is background noise, especially in quieter film scenes. Most computers are designed for maximum performance or clock speed, while the functions of a HTPC system may not be processor-intensive. Thus, passive cooling systems, low-speed fans, vibration-absorbing elastic mounts for fans and hard drives, and other minimal noise devices are used in place of conventional cooling systems.

Putting the operating system on flash memory and keeping the media on a separate file server elsewhere in the home can eliminate the noise and heat generated by a hard drive.

Higher storage capacities

Because of the nature of the HTPC, higher than average capacities are required for HTPC units to allow storage of pictures, music, television shows, videos, and other multimedia. Designed almost as a "permanent storage" device, space can quickly run out on these devices. Because of restrictions on internal space for hard disc drives and a desire for low noise levels, many HTPC units utilise a file server across a network. Some HTPC units also feature a DVD writer to help users copy and move their media.

Comparison with dedicated media devices

Advantages

Quality

HTPCs may support high-definition television and surround sound. Upsampling DVDs to 720p, or even 1080p/i, for display on a connected HDTV will give a picture that rivals some dedicated home theater equipment.

For DVD playback, HTPCs with mid to high end video card technology (Nvidia purevideo or Ati avivo) have defeated standalone DVD players up to the $2000 range in benchmarking tests. link

Digital video recording

Computer-based digital video recorder software that enables the PC to record video from the television signal generally has no monthly subscription fees. The user can schedule recordings from any computer or mobile phone on the Internet. Recording space can easily be upgraded, and/or shows can be burned to DVD or other removable media. These features are also possible with HDTV when using an HDTV tuner card & appropriate software. Premium HDTV channels, which are encrypted, can only be time-shifted with a CableLabs-certified system using an OCUR device under Windows Vista, the same way a TiVo Series 3 can record Premium Content.

One media location

HTPCs often include online storage of music and movies, usually copied from the original media or downloaded from the Internet onto the HTPC or media server. This allows more convenient access to the content, as well as searching by artist, genre, director, etc.

Other common features of a HTPC might include digital photo albums, weather information, news headlines, whole house lighting/appliance control, and the ability to use one remote for all HTPC devices.

Gaming

Advantages over video game consoles include the ability to play games produced by developers who don't get publishing license with the console manufacturers as well as more connectivity options and customizable input devices. An HTPC can also perform very well as an emulator of console games, allowing the user to store a large library of games designed for a large screen.

In addition, computers can usually be built to specifications above that of video game consoles, which means that many PC games will look better than the same game released for a console. However, most HTPCs are not designed with high end gaming in mind, nor are most native commercial PC games designed for large screens.

Disadvantages

Cost

In general, PCs sold as HTPCs tend to be more expensive than ordinary PCs or than dedicated devices as not all PCs include a TV tuner, a remote control, and a flash memory card reader for loading digital photos. It's common to over engineer the hardware slightly so as to keep playback and recording smooth at all times; this increases cost. A special computer case designed to sit near a TV and look like a DVD player may also increase the price, and some of these need smaller motherboards.

Setup and maintenance

Because HTPCs are far from mainstream, a lot of the commonly used software is not easy for the average computer user to set up. Generally, setting up HTPC software should be done by people who are already very comfortable behind a computer. However, once properly set up, it can be easy to use.

Gaming

Computer games work on HTPCs, but apart from classics compilations that use software emulators of console or arcade systems, such as Midway Arcade Treasures, few are designed specifically for television displays.

Games designed for a generic PC tend to draw text using small fonts that are difficult to read on a standard-definition TV. The majority of generic PC games also tend to allow only one player per machine, and multiplayer gaming requires more than one PC. This makes it difficult to find counterparts to popular party style console games such as Bomberman or the Super Smash Bros. series. Lastly, many HTPCs are normally not built with performance in mind. The graphic adapters equipped on HTPCs may not be top-of-the-line, they may not have the required expansion slots for performance-enhancing expansion cards, and even the motherboard may not be using a chipset that is optimized for performance. As such they do not perform well on games that have a very high hardware specification.

Note, however, that most disadvantages presented here apply to pre-fabricated HTPCs sold under that auspice.

Hardware

CPU

Current generation computer systems have enough computing power to record and play at least one stream of HDTV content, but conservatively, a processor of at least 1GHz will be able to play standard definition TV content even without hardware support. A 2.5Ghz Pentium 4 (roughly a 2Ghz Athlon XP) or faster CPU is needed to play back the highest resolution of HDTV content without dropped frames.

TV Capture

Several manufacturers build combined TV tuner plus capture cards for PCs. Many such cards offer hardware MPEG encoding to reduce the computing requirements. Some cards are designed for analog TV signals such as standard definition cable or off the air television while others are designed for high definition digital TV.

Remote Control

Integrating a Media PC into a typical living room requires a way of controlling the computer from a couch across the room. Most wireless keyboards and pointing devices are intended for close range use from a hard surface like a table, but some wireless devices are intended for longer range use.

Many TV tuner/capture cards include remote controls for use with the applications included with the card.

GB-PVR, SageTV, Media Portal and Beyond TV support the use of a Windows MCE remote control or Snapstream's Firefly remote control. The MCE receiver has 2 IR blaster ports to control set top boxes. Some Directv receivers can be controlled with a serial cable as well.

Software

Operating System

There are Media PC options available for Windows and Linux users.

A common approach for Windows based Media PCs is to install a version of Windows Vista that contains the Windows Media Center(Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate) or Windows XP Media Center Edition as the operating system. This release of Windows includes additional software that covers the PVR functions of the Media PC, including free program guide information and automatic program recording. When building your own Windows MCE based Media PC it is worth noting that Windows MCE does not, of itself, provide an MCE certified MPEG2 codec, although one can be purchased from Intel, or is alternatively included when purchasing Intervideo's WinDVD. Other MCE compatible MPEG2 decoders are Nvidia's PureVideo and Sonic's CinePlayer DVD Decoder packages.

Alternatively, a Media PC may be built with the addition of a third party software PVR such as GB-PVR, SageTV or Snapstream's BeyondTV to a Windows-equipped PC. SageTV has integrated placeshifting comparable to the Slingbox and allows connecting other TVs over the home network to the Media PC with the Hauppauge MediaMVP. Snapstream provides heuristic commercial detection and program recompression. When using a faster CPU, SageTV and Beyond TV can record content from TV capture cards which do not include hardware MPEG2 compression. For a free alternative, GB-PVR and MediaPortal provide full home theatre support and good multi-card DVR capabilities. GB-PVR also has a free client, free mediaMVP client, and free network media playback.

For the Linux operating system, KnoppMyth combines the Knoppix Linux distribution with MythTV, a Linux based software PVR, while LinuxMCE combines MythTV and the Kubuntu distribution. SageTV provides commercially supported Linux Media PC software that is compatible with most major Linux distributions.

Portable Media Player

Main article: Portable Media Player

A Portable Media Player (PMP) can be used for portable access to recorded programs, such as for working out at the gym, or for passenger entertainment during long drives. Some devices in this category can be automatically synchronized with a PC.

When using automatic synchronization, or batch converting a directory full of recorded programs to be placed on the PMP, it is useful if the device includes a commercial skip feature. While there have been attempts at automatically detecting commercial breaks, the reliability of those detection algorithms isn't accurate enough to rely upon when converting video content. When moving video to a device which does not include a skip feature, video editing software can be used to remove commercial breaks in the programs on an individual basis.

HTPC solutions

Stand-alone digital video recording software

Further information: Comparison of PVR software packages

HTPC-bundled operating systems

HTPC hardware

  • Hauppauge WinTV PVR Cards
  • nVidia TV-Tuner Cards (discontinued)
  • Vista ViewSaber Cards (Analog and Combo)
  • ATI Theater Cards
  • iMON IR Remotes
  • MCE IR Remotes

HTPC system manufacturers

See also

External links

Media PC Manufacturers

Media PC Retailers

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