Product Reviews

Media Center Extenders are a new concept, but they work similarly to other networked media players. You plug them into a TV and connect them to your home network. Then you can stream music, videos and photos from your PC to the player in another room. The bonus with Extenders is that they present a user interface similar to Windows Media Center. You can enjoy its slick presentation and ease of use, and stream live TV from your PC too.

To do this you need Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate on your PC and at least one compatible TV tuner fitted, preferably two to allow simultaneous viewing and recording. The Extender will then let you watch live TV and recordings, browse the electronic programme guide (EPG), schedule recordings, and even pause the live TV stream. So you can start watching a programme on your PC in the living room, pause it, walk upstairs to an Extender in your bedroom and resume watching from the same point.

The first generation of Windows Media Center Extenders were released in the US back in 2004, but the DMA2200 is the first dedicated unit we've seen in the UK. The only other Extender currently available is Microsoft's Xbox 360 console. This is handy if you like games too, but it doesn't come with WiFi as standard, looks rather obtrusive, and has rather noisy fans that distract from the TV.

The rear panel has every video and audio port you're likely to need. The HDMI socket supports HDCP for playback of copy protected HD content, and outputs at HD resolutions up to full 1080p. DVD playback

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is also upscaled to HD using this output. The component output supports HD, too, though not when upscaling DVDs. A Scart socket caters for conventional tellies, and for audio there are optical and coax S/PDIF plus stereo phono.

This is the first media streaming device we've seen to support 802.11n wireless networking. If you have a draft-n router, you should be able to stream HD video wirelessly from your PC to the DMA2200. This worked well in our lab, with HD files playing smoothly. Your mileage may vary, as they say, and the layout of your home and the positioning of your router will be crucial. For the very latest routers, this device also supports the dual-band draft-n standard, for smooth connections over longer ranges. The DMA220 even provides a network tuner function to help you get the best wireless performance. It's very handy when positioning the Extender, your router, or their aerials.

We found it easy to get the DMA2200 up and running. The connection is secured by a password, provided by the Extender, which you then enter on your Vista PC. The range of supported file formats isn't extensive, but covers most of the more common ones. Video compatibility is supposedly limited to MPEG1, MPEG2 and WMV9, but we also managed to stream Xvid files. The highly efficient H.264 codec is also supported, though it's a pain to get working, and you'll have to encode your own video files in a specific way.

The remote control is well designed, and the interface matches Media Center on a Vista PC, with all the important transparency effects, like when you bring up the EPG on top of live TV. It responds to your input fairly rapidly as well, and you get all the usual Media Center luxuries like photo slideshows, thumbnails for video and photo files, and music album cover art.

Media streaming devices are most commonly used to enjoy PC files from the comfort of your living room. Extenders, however, are more useful for streaming TV from a living room Media Center PC to a second TV set elsewhere. This is a well designed example, and a better choice than the Xbox 360 if you don't want to play games.