Media players, or media streamers as they are often referred to, allow you to play a wide variety of digital content across the home. This content can range from photos on memory cards, videos on external hard drives and files on your network storage to a wealth of online content from suppliers such as Apple, the BBC and Boxee. Media players range from standalone boxes such as Apple TV and the Boxee Box from Dlink to the more sophisticated, feature-rich Media Centres from the likes of Tranquil or indeed custom built machines.
The choice is is entirely down to what you want to use your player for and how much you have to spend. The Boxee Box by D-Link is a very capable player that will handle almost any file format and excels with online content. There's over 40,000 movies and TV shows available or you can view catchup TV with the BBC iPlayer. If you prefer to rent your films and TV content through iTunes, then Apple TV is the perfect choice as it lets you play the content in your iTunes library on your TV.
The most versatile and feature rich of media streamers is a Windows Media Centre. A Media Centre is basically a small, quiet PC in a lounge friendly (i.e good looking) case, with all the capabilities of other media streamers but with the added bonus of being able to use it as a Digital Video Recorder (DVR, sometimes known as a PVR). When fitted with a TV tuner card, recording films and TV shows is as simple as pressing one button on the remote control just as you would have done on your old VHS video recorder. There's also a range of more advanced functions available such as the ability to record all episodes of a new series with series record and even record every show with your favourite actor. Tuner cards can be mixed and matched between DVB-T (aerial) or DVB-S (satellite) and each service has four free HD channels (BBC HD, BBC One HD, ITV 1 HD and Channel 4 HD, DVB-S2 cards required). What's more, you can extend this functionality to the other rooms in your house by using an XBOX 360 as a media centre extender connected to the same network.
