For nearly ten years I’m trying to find “THE” ultimate Media Center. I took some expeditions into Linux land mostly VDR, tried Microsofts Media Center, evaluated and patched some high-end Sat-Receivers, tried to leverage the XBox 360 and bought some other devices that delivered digital content stored somewhere else on my network.

All solutions worked more or less. Usability was mostly limited. I often had disappointing situations, mostly when the system stopped in the middle of a movie for some reason. My wife disliked all previous solutions. Her comments mostly focused on complexity of the required UI and very often on the bad response time between  issuing a command and seeing the designated effect.

Since six month we’re now using a Mac Mini, hooked up to our LCD TV, running MacOS plus Elgato EyeTV, iTunes, Plex and Frontrow. Input device is mostly Apples Remote Control. As a software interface we use Remote Buddy. And this system works as expected and is simple to control. We like it.

My original intent was to describe in detail about the setup, but somebody else already did this. Thanks to Christina Warren. You’ll find her article on TUAW at “Guide: Setting up the Ultimate Mac mini Home Theater”

- PTL -