Microsoft Windows XP Media Center 2005

Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 is an operating system that enables you to enjoy the best in home entertainment, personal productivity, and creativity on your home PC . With Windows XP Media Center 2005 you can store, share and enjoy all or your photos, all of your music, all of your home videos. Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE) is a special version of Windows that is designed to turn your PC into a home entertainment center, complete with DVD playback and television time-shifting PVR functionality. It is available only on preconfigured systems, from various OEMs and SIs. Media Center Edition 2005 represents the third go-round. It adds some interesting capabilities, plus a wireless-networking option that should have been offered at the start, but the changes can't outweigh the basic flaws that have dragged down this software from the start. Instead of a third attempt, it feels more like a third strike.

Windows Media Center 2005 provides what Microsoft calls a "10-foot interface," a combination of a simplified front-end for Windows' music, photo and video software and a remote control that lets you watch and listen from the couch. Such a computer could take the place of a TV and stereo. There's the problem: Unless you devote a separate computer for Media Center use, you will either need an enormous (and enormously expensive) screen to make your e-mail legible from the couch, or you'll need to keep a desk chair handy for up-close use. Most living rooms don't lend themselves to that arrangement. 

Distributed only to OEMs for use in custom built systems, this wasn't an OS you could go out and buy. Even though some managed to get it (through MSDN and other less legal routes), there were relatively steep hardware requirements keeping that barrier to entry nice and high. You had to have a hardware MPEG-2 encoder card, which at the time of the release of MCE was far from common (since then times have changed, mostly thanks to MCE). You had to have one of the fastest CPUs available on the market, which at the time was around a Pentium 4 3GHz. And you had to have the MCE remote control setup, which also wasn't readily available to end users.

Things have changed however, and while it was still difficult to get a hold of the copy of the OS, the rest of the items became much easier. Places like Newegg began selling the Media Center remote control, with the stipulation that you had to buy it with some sort of hardware to make it look like you were buying a PC with it. And the price of CPUs went down, as the power of CPUs went up. The introduction of the Athlon 64 provided a nice, very powerful, very capable alternative to the Pentium 4 with one very important feature - an on-die memory controller. The on-die memory controller would prove to be very helpful in making the Athlon 64 an extremely high performer when it came to Media Center PCs.

In between MCE's maiden launch and today, Microsoft released a much-needed update to the OS: MCE 2004, which provided bug fixes, performance enhancements and introduced a few new tweaks and features to the OS. But it was clear that MCE 2004 was not an example of perfection, rather an example of the direction Microsoft was going in. There were still numerous features missing from the MCE equation, things like HDTV and multiple tuner support were left unaddressed, only to be serviced in the latest version of Microsoft's Media Center OS - MCE 2005.

While Microsoft can hardly be faulted for basing the feature set of its first Media Center version on internal testing, field tests, and surveys, the company now has a large body of dedicated users who are clamoring to provide the company with feedback about the product. Some of the feedback was surprising, according to Windows eHome Division General Manager Joe Belfiore, who noted that while almost 50 percent of all Media Center buyers were using the machines in their dens, studies, or home offices, 27 percent use the machines in their living rooms, and 23 percent use them in bedrooms.

The usage patterns are interesting as well, and point to the success of Microsoft's current strategy of augmenting Media Center PCs with Media Center Extenders, which allow users to enjoy Media Center content remotely on other TVs in their home (see below for more details, and also my Media Center Extender review). 58 percent of Media Center users watch TV on their PCs, while 27 percent have their Media Center PC connected directly to a TV set.

Most Media Center customers are happy with their machines, too: 89 percent say they are "satisfied," while 66 percent say they are "very satisfied. That said, there is still certainly plenty of room for improvement. Customers told Microsoft that the features they'd like to see most in XP MCE 2005 include improved TV quality, easier music management, the ability to save recorded TV shows to DVD, multi-tuner and HDTV support, archiving/backup of personal memories (photos, home videos), and the ability to enjoy Media Center content in other rooms in the house, and on the go.