Media Moguls

Life

24 October 2005

Three years ago, Microsoft launched its Windows XP Professional Media Center Edition operating system. At the time, Bill Gates said the software would greatly enhance home users’ ability to use their PC for both work and play. This newest member of the Windows XP family enables consumers to enjoy the best of what digital entertainment has to offer and takes us into an exciting new era of personal computing.

Exciting times

That exciting era has been a long time coming, but there are signs that the momentum is beginning to gather pace. According to US analyst firm Current Analysis, 46% of PCs sold in the US retail desktop market in September were Media Center PCs. In October, Microsoft said it had sold more than four million Media Center PC licenses and that more than 130 PC manufacturers around the world were selling Media Center PCs in a variety of designs, with prices ranging from $500 to $5,000.

Streaming dream

Also last month, Microsoft upgraded the operating system with the release of Windows XP Professional Media Center Edition 2005, To support the forthcoming Xbox 360 games console, allowing people to stream their music, movies and pictures to the console. Of more immediate significance to the product’s success in the Irish market was the introduction of a local version that features Irish TV and radio tuning and electronic programme guides. Previously, the lack of Irish TV and radio tuning had deprived the product of one of its most important features.

Professional installers

For the hype around Windows Media Center to become solid reality, there have to be companies driving its adoption by putting it to use. One such company in Ireland is E-NVI. Formed in August 2004, E-NVI includes four people who previously worked for Microsoft. A big part of its business is linking with property developers to wire new houses for broadband, telephony and TV with CAT 6 cabling with multiple network connection points and options for wireless connectivity. The company describes it as giving the house “its own digital nervous system”.

According to director Pat Cusack, the company doesn’t “make money out of the cabling – we more or less wire out houses at cost. Then it’s our job to win the customer.” The lure is the ability to provide customers “with cheaper telephone calls, no line rental, cost effective digital television and a dedicated gaming network”. Sky Digital is available without the need for a sky dish through the community TV network.

E-NVI claims the additional services are limitless, citing examples such as video monitored security systems, remote control of all appliances and enhanced sound systems.

Digital home

The attraction is that a developer can offer someone taking on a EUR*300,000 mortgage, the ability to have technology built in to their house for an extra EUR*5,000 with a plasma screen, a Media Centre PC and a pair of speakers in the living room, along with TV services and broadband.

Windows XP Professional Media Center edition has a role to play as the entertainment hub for music, video, photos and TV in E-NVI homes. The advent of plasma and LCD TVs, with their support for a PC signal, has “brought the PC out of the back room and into the living room,” according to Cusack. In addition, a lot of work has gone into making the Media Center PC “fit well in the lounge environment. There are multiple form factors and it’s changing the way the PC is being used.”

PC becomes appliance

Until now, most PCs have been confined to studies and back rooms because they look unwieldy and ugly in the living room, but PC manufacturers are starting to develop products which resemble those traditionally found in the living room, such as DVD and video players. Cusack says Media Center PCs the size of a set top box are likely to be introduced in January next year.

The introduction of the local Irish version of Media Center was particularly important. “It’s not been a good experience up until now because the central function of the TV didn’t work,” Cusack says. As everyone accepts, the TV is the entertainment focal point of the modern day house, so it’s important for Media Center to be able to act as the conduit for programming to the TV if it’s to succeed in its ambition to become the entertainment hub of the future.

HDTV is hot

Support for HDTV in Media Centre is described as a “core offering” by Cusack. “It pushes customers towards HD plasma and LCD TVs. Once they see it, the difference is almost night and day, he claims. “People say ‘we’ve got to have this’.”

Mass appeal

Media Center makes the digitisation of entertainment “accessible to the masses”. Specialist audiovisual companies might charge EUR*5,000 to EUR*10,000 to wire a room for sound and vision. Cusack argues the experience of the PC industry, where prices have dropped for a PC to the point where “you can get a PC and printer from Tesco for EUR*500” is likely to be repeated by Microsoft and Intel in the living room. “They want to bring the same level of accessibility within the living room.”

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Digital home installation

E-NVI recently created the dream digital home.

The following were the key components of that show home:

Living Room