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I found some technical information about XMBC's DVD player core. They do appear to be using libDVDnav, but there's no mention if they're using Ötvös Attila patch. They might have done it on their own; they were apparently were trying that approach previously in XMBP.

Regardless, I'm sure they've had to make some additional changes and modifications to fit XMBC's architecure and the Xbox's contraints. Hopefully they have pushed some of those back upstream when applicable.

The better way would be to run XBMC (XBox Media Center), and xbmcmythtv. It's not perfect yet, but it's definately getting there. It requires a modded xbox (which you have), and doesn't require installing/booting linux, so it's quicker. It's a bit tricky to get ahold of the programs, since the source is distributable, but the binaries are not (MS won't sign them [hence mod required], and the xbox SDK forbids the distribution of non-signed binaries). They can be found with some digging.

Here's some links that might help you out:

http://waltercedric.com/Mambo/index.php?option=com _content&task=view&id=58&Itemid=40
http://forums.designtechnica.com/archive/index.php /t-4278.html
http://www.xboxmediaplayer.de/cgi-bin/forums/ikonb oard.pl?act=ST;f=8;t=5934
http://hardware.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/07 /01/0353218&from=rss
http://www.dealdatabase.com/forum/archive/index.ph p/t-40168.html
http://www.xbins.org/

• Home of all xbox knowledge: XBox Scene
  
• Being a cheapass, I use cheap modchips. You can get an Aladdin XT for $11 from RobotPig. They're in the UK but they ship quickly worldwide. Good shop and cheap! The $60 modchips come with loads of neat but ultimately entirely useless features.
  
• If you're scared of a soldering iron, here's a solderless solution for all versions of the xbox: The Spiderchip. I've never used one of these things and I've never purchased anything from this shop so take this as a suggestion and not a recommendation.
  
• Here's a great introduction to softmods. Again, despite what all the softmoddie guys say a chip will always be a better solution.
  
• If you buy a new XBox, you'll be getting a 1.6 version and your modding options are somewhat limited. You're voiding the warranty anyway so you might as well pick up a used box. Here's how to tell which version XBox you're getting. Print it out and take it to the shop with you.
  
• All versions of the XBox except the 1.6 can be TSOP flashed, which is just write enabling the onboard BIOS flashrom and flashing a mod bios to it. Cheap, relatively easy, and every bit as good as a chip. The only drawback to a TSOP flash is that you can't easily disable it unless you have a 1.0 or 1.1 XBox. Here is a pretty complete guide to TSOP flashing.
  
• Here is the homepage for XBMC. They're hosted on sourceforge, so you can checkout the CVS and compile your own copy if you have VS.NET 2003 and a copy of the latest XDK.

surely any xbox owning geek should be looking at
http://www.xboxmediaplayer.de/
or
http://www.xbox-linux.org/
if they want software?

Some corrections for this review of XboxMediaCenter that is worth noting:

(I also sent this bellow in a mail to Patrick Schmid and Achim Roos, the authors of the review but I guess they haven't read it yet?)

love the review but I have some corrections for it, (hope I don't come out all defensive):

correction needed on page 01 section The Xbox Mod as sentence Boosting the Xbox' performance and harnessing its potential largely hinges on a modded processor does not fit in on that section at all, if you are referring to a modchip then it should not mention 'performance' as a modchip has nothing do with performance and also modded processor in the same sentence refers to FriendTech's DreamX but putting here sound like it's the modchip, so think you should move that sentence to the FriendTech section on page 02, or alternatively change the whole sentence to something to Unleashing the power of the Xbox and harnessing its potential largely depends on applying a modchip ;-)

Under the picture of the remote control you say is a must for using the Xbox as a media center which is not true, it's not a requirement as you can fully use XBMC with a gamepad, however we recommend a remote control for ease of use

btw, the DreamX are all already pre-modded so no need to open them up, (on a side-note to page 04 new large 7.200rpm harddrives actually run cooler than Xbox default 8GB drives =P )

Personally would have suggested that under Codecs: Divx, Xvid, WMA And QuickTime add link to full official compatibility list: http://www.xboxmediacenter.com/info_project.htm

On page 08 you say Practically all settings on the XBMC are made via an xml file, that is not true, most used settings are done from GUI under Settings, basically only the 'network' and 'shares' settings is in the XBMC and those many end-users don't even have to touch, not if not stream from network anyway.

Reason for the WebServer right now is for remote control and then not from noteboot/laptop editor but ideally from a WiFi connected PDA (there are different skins available that fit PDA's better), in the future full setting/configuration will be added to the WebServer to so there will won't be a need to edit the XML file in a text editor.

Also, you totaly forgot to mention that one can of course use XBMC on a normal retail Xbox (once modded), it's just that one do get the impression from the beginning of this this specific review that it only works on DreamX boxes =(

Finally motion compensation optimizations for better HDTV playback will prorbebely be added to XBMC v1.1 ;-)

again hope I didn't come out to defensive, if so I apologise =)

With the Xbox, there are several completely legitimate uses for a modchip: running Linux (cheap webserver), or playing media files on a TV. The major problem? End users cannot use these applications without a software modification or modchip.

Even though the applications might not be designed to increase piracy, one thing that Microsoft can and will "kick" about is the modified BIOS that modchips or exploits use. It's their intellectual property, and modifying it (like the EvoX team does) or reverse engineering it could be considered piracy. The only legal BIOS out there is Cromwell, which the Xbox-Linux team uses to load Linux. Most chips now come pre-loaded with Cromwell, which can flash the modchip with a more useful bios (think gray-market there.)

Initially, Microsoft's attach rate - the amount of games they would need to sell to become profitable on each console - was nine in-house titles per machine. I'm not sure of the exact figure today, though, with the recent price drop and all.

In any event, if you have an Xbox and don't care about Xbox Live, there are software exploits you can use to perform the same features as a modchip would have. Xbox-Scene has pretty much anything a new modded Xbox user would want.

Damage industry revenue? I'm sorry, did I miss the press release where Microsoft started selling XBOX Media player in a retail package?

Screw games, watching movies from a shared network resource is what it's all about.

Furthermore, by purchasing an XBOX without actually buying games you make MS lose money :) (they're losing money anyway with xbox, but this way they're losing even more)

These days it doesn't even take a screwdriver to hack the XBOX ... The (albeit kludgy) software solution works well.

I'm the lucky owner of an modded Xbox (1), and use it for a number of tasks. The only problem I have with it is that it makes too much noise. It's like having a computer running in my living room (yeah, I know it _is_ a computer).

It's not the harddrive that makes all the noise, it's the fans. But why are the fans there? Because the XBox is hot. Why is it hot? Partially because of the harddrive.

So dropping the harddrive is nice; IF there is way to get the machine up and running something ala "XBox Media Player". My network and my computer would provide me with all the content I would ever need.

It would've been really neat if we could play games from the network too (legal copies of course), because gigabit ethernet provides all the bandwidth needed for such a task.

So to me, this might be good news :).

I have one and it is the most amazing damn thing I have ever had. I can play all my internet movies, music files and copy all my games to it making carting my Xboxen easy to cart around. I need to write up an article about it. Maybe this weekend.

..let's all spent money for something we already have just better.

08-1-2004, 13:38 (Post by Gamester17)

Xbox WMC Extender Kit announced

Yesterday evening Bill Gates, Microsoft Chairman unveiled Windows Media Center Extender Technology at 2004 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES), one of the devices that will use this will be the Xbox though a Xbox Windows Media Center Extender Kit Xbox DVD title. Quote: "Xbox Media Center Extender Kit will be a new Xbox title that brings Media Center entertainment experiences onto your TV or display through your Xbox console, so you have even more choice in where and how you enjoy your digital entertainment. Microsoft will release Xbox Media Center Extender Kit as a packaged software product that runs off Xbox like an Xbox game. With a wired or wireless connection back to the Media Center PC, your Xbox console will now allow you to enjoy your PC's digital entertainment media when and how you want"

Looks like Microsoft has taken a notice of XboxMediaPlayer/XboxMediaCenter success,
(however with our solution one does not need an expensive Windows Media Center PC).

Read the full announcement on microsoft.com here and here
More inside information and a brochure checkout neowin.net

I guess it still won't playback DivX, XviD, RealPlayer, Quicktime, OGG/Vorbis, AAC, OGM, Matroska, SRT/VobSub subtitles etc etc etc etc like XBMP and XBMC..

Why don't they give their customers what they obviously want instead?

BTW, No, I didn't read the article, this post is based on my previous experience with Microsoft. :)

Was planning on getting a deck that included DVD-Ram thanks to the random access feature, especially suitable for computer files and archiving, but which can also be used for audio and video creation for playback in the living room.

Get a DVD +/-R combo drive and look into Packet Writing/UDF sortware such as DirectCD. I've been using CD-RW with random read/write access for many years, and I'm sure the same features work in the DVD world with DVD-RW.

Portable mp3 stereo playback? We'll wait to see what becomes popular.

Get a mobile phone with mp3 playback. Mine has zero restrictions on copying music to and from it, and get this...it's a Microsoft Smartphone. Takes an SD-card flash memory, so you can carry multiple cards around. You already carry a phone (don't you?), so why carry another gadget?

I'll be taking a cd with mp3s on it to the local electronics outlet in the next few months to see if there are problems playing mp3s on several car stereo decks in the price range we can afford.

I didn't have any hassle getting my mp3 player for the car; it's not had a problem with any track I've thrown at it, hopefully you will find the same. Google Groups is handy for finding out other peoples experiences with products.

Kind-of, yes. It is optional, but the studios were of course the ones that demanded it, otherwise they refused to touch DVD. It's obvious that they will try to push this arm-twisting further with next-gen formats; they've been watching the RIAAs troubles closely I'm sure.

However, I think they have missed the boat. There are too many DVD players out there, the format is here to stay. VHS to DVD brought a lot of advantages. However, DVD is pretty damn good, and a well encoded disk looks great. Consumers won't buy into the next thing until there is an advantage for them. Capacity isn't all that big a deal at the moment. With the fear of sounding like the famous quote, I think 9GB will be adequate for the time being.

Besides, ever noticed how many two disk editions there are that are two DVD-5s (sindle layer)? They could put the same content on a single DVD-9 (double layer), however the "two disk!!" aspect acts as a selling point to the consumer for that product and increaces the perceived value of it with little real cost increase to production.

It's a bit like CDs. They are everywhere, and the format is going to be around for a long while. And as CDs have no protection (ditto DVDs with DeCSS), it will be the thorn in the side for the industry for a long time to come.

I predict multi-format players to be the next big thing, not some new restricted format. People will want to be able to play any media they download from the internet on their TV, just like many of us already do with the Xbox Media Player or similar devices.

Not to mention being able to play mpeg satellite streams, while not at HD resolutions yet it's still very cool. xboxmediaplayer.de

I call it my xbox.

You are correct. I rip my kids DVDs so that they can watch them over and over and they don't touch the original DVDs. Lost a few DVDs due to scratches and cracks before I started doing this... Basically the process is extract the video and audio to seperate files, encode the video to divx/xvid/whatever, then mux the audio back in. AC3 audio is typically around 400 megs for a 100 minute movie...but it varies from movie to movie. Depending on the video content/length, very good quality can be achieved under 2 CDs (1400 megs). Playback is handled via XBMP flawlessly.

Next version better have full-on network multimedia capabilities. I want to run my ripped DVDs on the TV without more than a network cord to me server. My current multimedia computer is too loud, and quiet ones are either too expensive, or too low end (no surround sound, etc)

Then just get a normal Xbox, throw a mod chip, then get a copy of XBox Media Player..

It works beautifully.

Also, if the stock Xbox makes too much noise, improve it. I ripped out all the shielding and replaced the fan with a quieter one. It runs a few degrees cooler without that insulation, but collects dust more readily. I just leave the bolts out so I can pop the lid off and vacuum it out when it comes time to vacuum out my PC's (monthly)..

Or you could quit trusting a HDD with all your rips and just slap them on a DVD(+/-)R and get a DVD player that'll read them reliably (all the progressive scan Sony's do, to my knowledge). :]

Yeah. That has worked out for them so well.

This post would look much better without the link domains showing.

In the UK, you can pick up a dedicated DVD player for as little as 30GBP. So what? I wasn't evaluating the cost of the XBox against the cost of dedicated DVD player anyway! Besides, the cost of the actual unit isn't the point. The real issue is, why should I bother getting a dedicated DVD player, when I've already got a device that performs the same duties as more. As well as space considerations, there is the issue of integrating the extra devices into my existing AV setup. Another device would mean another set of cables taking up inputs on my AV Receiver and another video cable kicking around. As far as I'm concerned, if you've got a PS2 or an XBox, you could quite happily do without a dedicated DVD player unless you're a serious home cinema buff. Besides, the XBox has support for Progressive Scan (which is great for HDTV owners) and XBox Media Player XBMP can play just about every audio and video format under the sun *as well* as play games. Can your supermarket special do that? NB: Link is currently down to protest against Software Patents.. I've included it for future reference.

What does this hack let you do?

Well, how about running the code of your choice an Xbox? How does that sound? (Hint: it used to be impossible without doing a hardware mod.)

Disclaimer: Since I don't own an Xbox, some of these details are a little sketchy and may be incorrect.

This hack lets you load unsigned software, such as Linux, of your choice onto an XBox, without using a mod-chip or making any hardware mods. Previously, you could only run software that is signed by Microsoft on an Xbox, unless you voided the warranty and made Xbox Live impossible by installing a mod-chip or flashing the BIOS.

You need a copy of 007: Agent of Fire. You load the "unsigned" (*) code, such as Linux, and a specially hacked 007: AUF savegame onto a special kind of memory card that connects to your PC.

You then fire up 007: AUF, and load the hacked savegame, which takes advantage of the buffer overflow exploit in order to load your "unsigned" code. This "unsigned" code could be Xbox Linux, XboxMediaPlayer, or any of the other homebrew projects out there for Xbox.

If you haven't heard of the open-source XboxMediaPlayer, it looks pretty sweet. It can play all kinds of audio and video files from your Xbox's hard drive or a streaming server, such as: WMV, ASF, WMA, VCD, SVCD, MPEG, JPEG, GIF, BMP, DivX, XVid, etc. It basically turns your Xbox into a cheap Media Centre PC (except for the TV recording part).

(*) Actually, according to the article, you have to sign the code yourself, but it's easy in this case, because of the way the exploit works.

I hope you enjoy using those beasts for something more useful than what they are made for: after all XBOX is about a CHEAP pentium celeron 733, 8Gigs of harddisk and nvidia chipset everywhere; dedicated to everybody who loves reusing hardware leftovers.

I'd really like to use my Xbox as a region free DVD player....two 'League of Gentlemen' DVDs that only get used on my TiPB :-\

Well, if you install a mod chip, you can replace the XBox's hard drive with a much larger drive and you can use the open-source Xbox Media Player to play various kinds of movies, music and pictures on your Xbox, transforming it into a cheap (and uncrippled) "Media Centre PC". On the other hand, they just found a way to run Xbox Media Player without using a modchip, so I guess there goes one excuse....

Stream ty streams directly from your tivo to windows/linux/osx.

Works with MythTV and will probably be included in future XBMP releases.

TiVo MPlayer

A Xbox is cheaper than the PS2 (An Xbox is about $150, according to OSDN Pricewatch), comes with twice the amount of memory, ethernet, and instead of buying a $200 Linux kit, you pick up a flashable, legal* mod chip for $25-$50. How the Emotion Engine compares to the Xbox P733 I have no idea, but I can't imagine the EE is that much faster.
Both The Xbox-Linux Project and Gentoox can provide you with a distro. For free.

Even if you're not planning a cluster, this is a good deal for a low-performance work station, or just a "media box", using Xbox Media Player, which plays most (all?) popular media formats, both music and video.

It's been repeated countles times that Microsoft are losing money on the console itself, and depend on the games to cover their expenses. Therefore, paying up for a Xbox and giving your money to MS isn't immoral as long as you don't buy any games.

See, it's a win-win situation :)

* I lost track of the current situation in the U.S., but in the free world (Read: Europe) at least the chips not using MS code is legal.

The xbox mediaplayer website says (in the FAQ) "For legal reasons, no Xbox(TM) binaries will be released from us or distributed by us until a legal non-MS compiler is available (so please do not ask for any files not posted here). (Note! XDK compiled binaries are NOT released or distributed by the XboxMediaPlayer team). Do not ask or e-mail us requesting any Xbox files or asking where they can be downloaded from, thanks."

Can anyone comment on when this might no longer be true?

timothy

I run Xbox Media Player to play my videos (MPG, AVI, etc), audio (an impressive number of codecs supported), and shoutcast streams. It also can function as a slideshow for your pictures. XBMP is a great application and is only getting better. XBMP will play the files from your server (via a number of different cross-platform protocols).

I have a turbonet card from 9thtee installed on my series 1 DirecTivo (Philips DSR 6000). The Tivo is an excellent PVR. While some try and replace some of its functionality with a PC, I think that the Tivo just has a much better interface. By using software such as Tystudio (beta 2) or MFS_FTP, it is possible to pull down MPEG or M2V/M2A elemental streams. You can use this to create a MTV video juke box, archive movies to your HD, or burn DVDs. And yes... you do get the full bitstream available to the DirecTV -- no signal degradation + 5.1 sound. etc.

Use Xbox Media Player on a Xbox with a mod chip. It'll let you stream music off the net, as well as play video, mp3s off of shares on your computers. Nice thing about it is that Xbox has optical outs and HDTV support.

EvoX and XBox Media Player have turned my XBox into the first Micro$oft product I actually enjoy using! Streaming video, audio, and pictures over my home LAN and playing DVDs without a dongle is awesome! And then, of course, there is the satisfaction of playing Super Mario Brothers and Metroid on a big-old console controller again. Takes me back to 1987!

Now for the fun part, actually USING that bandwidth. I hate M$ to, but the best way to play whatever you need at any location is with a modded Xbox and Xbox Media Player Website. This spliffy piece of software can play just about any media format you can think of, from VOB, DivX, Mp3, Ogg, and many many more obscure formats. It can play them from the harddrive, dvd drive, or over the network with SMB (Windows) shares, Shoutcast for your internet radio, and tons of other options. Divx plays just fine over a 10mbit connection, so switched 100mbit aught to be a dream. Here is a review of XBMP on TechTV with videos of it in action. Picture slideshows, playlists, this piece of software just keeps getting better and better. Fully controllable with a standard controller or the DVD remote you can purchase separately. (I recommend the Logitech RF wireless controller if you can justify the extra money. Solid contruction, flawless performance.) Its all about the wireless, baby.

Even better, no expensive modchip or chip installation required. Some people figured out how to run code without a chip, and some others figured out how to flash a BIOS on the Xbox with this technique. No chips, just shorting two easy points on the motherboard. Check on the #xbins channel of Efnet for information; look for the 007 agent under fire package with raincoat. You'll need a friend with a modded Xbox to get the savegame on a memory card, but once done, Xbox is a cinch to crack.

As a perk, you could even get a few room-to-room Halo/Unreal/RTCW/Doom 3 games going on.

There's an obvious cabal that thwarts unrestricted media management, be it through artifically inflated CD-R/DVD-R costs, MP3 players that don't ship with larger than 128 megs of storage space (Of course, present company excluded...

It just doesn't suprise me nobody has an 'all-in-one' box yet.

Qcast's main competition is this: Xbox Media Player

It requires a modchipped xbox to run (relatively easy to do, with the 007 hack that has gotten press on /. lately), but it supports many more formats (DivX, Xvid, WMP9, with quicktime and real coming soon - basically everything mplayer supports is being worked on) and at better resolutions than the Qcast can support. It's got audio visualization for MP3 and OGG, an IMDB interface, DVD navigation, VCD and SVCD playback, and can stream video, audio and pictures from SMB/Samba shares.

It's also free software, and actively developed.

BBK

It is still cheaper to buy a $199 xbox, a modchip, and add a TV card to the computer in the office/basement/bedroom. Then just stream the captured video from the PC over the LAN to the Xbox.

I've been running XboxMediaPlayer for a couple of weeks now and absolutly loving it.

$199 for the Xbox. $59 for a mod chip. $10 for some Cat5. And the open source Xbox Media Player.

Though you won't get Tivo-like functionality with it. But at that price you could afford to buy a Tivo if you really wanted it.

Of course, you can also get a DVD/CD player from your local big box retailer for $59 these days :-)

Well, the box is a Xbox (retail $200). I modded it with an Xecuter 2 Pro mod chip. This gives me the ability to boot up unsigned code (homebrew software). I then use Xbox Media Player to do all media playback (excluding dvd currently) but you can find a program out there called Dvd-X that gives you full DVD playback (or if you bought the special adapter from M$ you can use the defualt DVD player). I dropped a 120GB IBM drive in there, so I have storage for games I copy over and so on. I can play files over the network, and I can stream music from a shoutcast server off the internet. It's a pretty cool little thing.
Good (More) Info can be found at Xbox-scene

Yeah, You do need a mod-chip but join http://www.operationprojectx.com/, they are trying to get around that by finding the key for the xbox programs. I don't know if divx "certified" necessarily means the quality is better, I'm sure that certification requires some "special" terms that a OSS project like Xbox Media Player. I do believe that certified probably means less "problems" but as the XBMP project matures I am sure the divx decoding and playback will be just as good, if it isn't already.

The xbox is probably cheaper than most other PC-based boxes, and with a modchip installed (total cost for xbox+modchip about $250) you can install Xbox Media Player on it.
I have used it for a couple of months now, works like a charm for playing dvds, divx, xvid, mp3 etc.
Check it out!

Interesting point, which makes me remember, that .de domain names are usually just that, plain .de . For example earlier today we had this, ther's also this site. The same thing goes for .ch - for example the URL this famous site - and probably a few more countries.

Wonder what the regulations really are.

The DNS system is pretty much full of inconsistencies anyway (.tv, .cx, hmm what else?). I once had an idea how they can be arranged to be more logical, but change would just confuse oh-the-so-numerous websurfing grandmothers of the world.

Which version are you using? A week ago, I didn't find anyone who got it working with Samba. For instance here.
This solution isn't really a solution, because I need security=user in my LAN.

With the latest version of Xbox Media Player 2.2 supporting Shoutcast and network shares with PC servers like Relax 0.71, what more will Media2Go offer?

Heck, on the latest CVS build of XBMP, you'll even be able to play Mode2 SVCDs from your bootleg CD-Rs!!

Viva la modchipping!

It looks a bit better than an xbox, but other than that it does nothing that an xbox with xbmp can't do cheaper.

My modded xbox with an 120gb hard drive and xbmp has played everything that I've thrown at it (movie wise), including old divx formats that this thing can't handle. Cheaper (Getting MS to subsidize your hardware helps, thanks Bill!).

I'm not sure where you're looking but this official xbox media player webpage seems to have their source code available for free download.

would be very happy if I could get an X-box to be a 'good file player' that could play DVD, VCD, and everything else I play on my PC (QT, AVI, DIVX, VOB, blah blah... I admit, a big bag), and some basic network functionality without compromising the ability to play legal X-box games.

Xbox Media Player does all that. Easy. Now go buy an Xbox.

Someone is (or was) working on PVR support for XBox Mediaplayer using the WinTV PVR USB. The X-Box got 4 USB inputs (controller ports), so using one of them for this device shouldn't be a problem.

There are a few PVR open projects in early development.

Here are a few mentions :

Dreamix

Xbox Media Player

I have been considering the XBOX for just such a thing. You can get one for around $150 US.

The XboxMediaPlayer for the Xbox allows you to use a modded Xbox to play DivX, XVID, (S)VCD (MPEG-1/2), MP3 & other supported video/audio formats via your TV so it can used as a multimedia jukebox. It also supports network streaming via XStream.

Plus there is a MAME, NES, PSX, Atari 2600, c64 emulators ... than run on it.

There are a few coming to fruition.

One converts exe's to run on the XBOX. And another is a non MS compiler. So soon we will have all these apps available with out having to have a $25 mod chip for the XBox.

I'm going to get two of these. One to replace my dead DVD player with the media player.

The other for the ultimate MAME / emu. arcade machine I'm going to build.

Perfect solution for this application.

Inexpensive, TV out, small form factors, sound, 4 usb ports, remote controlable, good graphics and networkable. I can't make a PC this cheap!

Since MS looses $$ on the hardware, let them subsidize your media system!

Well, pretty close.. and it only cost about $350!

One xbox. $199
one mod chip. $31
one 120GB drive. $120 (although if you just want to stream your media from your computer you don't need this).

There's mame, and nes, snes, genesis, sms, atari 2600, gameboy, gameboy advance, atari lynx and commodore 64 emulators for it.

There's xbmp to play just about every audio and video file format in existance.

There's even a way to connect a usb tv tuner and get some tivo functionality (though I don't have that.. kazaa is my tivo!).

It plays dvds and regular cds too.

Oh yeah, and xbox games! And xbox (and nes games!) over the Internet.

And also basically serves as my home file server, since its 120GB drive is the biggest thing in my house.

I just wish it was all legal.

I have been considering the XBOX for just such a thing. You can get one for around $150 US. XboxMediaPlayer The XboxMediaPlayer for the Xbox allows you to use a modded Xbox to play DivX, XVID, (S)VCD (MPEG-1/2), MP3 & other supported video/audio formats via your TV so it can used as a multimedia jukebox. It also supports network streaming via XStream. Plus a simple clean looking interface navigatible via remote control. Plus there are XBox a MAME, NES, PSX, Atari 2600, c64 emulators ... There are a few projects coming to fruition. One converts exe's to run on the XBOX. And another is a non MS compiler. So soon we will have all these apps available with out having to have a $25 mod chip for the XBox. I'm going to get two of these. One to replace my dead DVD player with the media player. The other for the ultimate MAME / emu. arcade machine I'm going to build. Perfect solution for this application. CHEAP, TV out, good graphics and networkable. Plus you can play XBOX games on it too!