PVR Wire

To kick off the new Up Close feature, the kind people at VidaBox were nice enough to loan PVR Wire one of their recently released RoomMate Media Center PCs.

We covered the VidaBox line-up of Media Center PCs in a cursory manner back in July; however, an opportunity to take a closer look at this quaint little PVR arose so we hopped on it.

VidaBox RoomMate Up Close after the jump. Also, be sure to check out the VidaBox promotion at the end of the write-up.

Most people are probably turned off about two things when it comes to compact, entertainment-center-ready Media Center PCs.

Foremost, the cost is almost always prohibitive. It's much cheaper to rent a PVR from the cable/satellite company or buy yourself a TiVo than to drop one to two grand on a Media Center PC. This takes into account the rental fee and/or subscription fees. At the conservative price of $1000 for a Media Center PVR, it would take you 5 years to offset the cost of not paying the $16.95/Mo TiVo Fee and much longer than that to offset the cable company's rental fees.

Secondly, people are probably intimidated by the "PC" part of the nomenclature. You'd think in this day and age we'd all be pretty much computer literate. Wrong. I have co-workers who look at me in wonder when I say, "You don't have to double click the links on a website." This computer phobia/ignorance working with the fact that people aren't used to the concept of having a personal computer in their living room both act as pretty big deterrents.

VidaBox can't help you too much in the funds department as their PCs are a bit on the pricey side, but they do a great job in the ease-of-use department which could go along way in helping Media Centers further permeate the PVR market.

The makers of the RoomMate appear to be a company on a mission to simplify the Media Center PC experience. In all, it took me about 5 minutes to get the PVR hooked up to my television/monitor and another 5 minutes to complete the Media Center setup. This is a testament both to the RoomMate and the Microsoft Media Center software.

Before that, what do you generally want in a quality roommate? I can personally narrow it down to 3 things:

1. You want the roommate to entertain you on occassion.

2. You want the roommate to be quiet.

3. You don't want the roommate to drink all your beer.

The RoomMate has you covered in all three of these regards. Let's see how it looks up close.

When it comes to electronics, I'm the kind of guy who doesn't care much for a fancy box as I generally rip open packaging like I was just diagnosed with Ebola and the package magically contains the antidote. To some people a fancy box with pretty graphics and catch phrases is important and that can't be discounted.

The RoomMate doesn't win any awards when it comes to packaging, although it is snugly wrapped to ensure no damage occurs during transit. The RoomMate's true beauty is unveiled when you remove it and the bevy of accessories from the box.

On top of looking slick and trendy, the unit is really svelte measuring in at 7 7/8" (W) x 4 3/16" (H) x 12 9/16" (D). The swing door on the left contains a 7-in-1card reader. The bottom door conceals an optical SPDIF output, headphones/line out, 2 USB 2.0 ports, and firewire. The power button glows a trendy blue when turned on and the circle beneath the power button blinks a seductive blue when the DVD+RW eject button is pressed.

It's pretty busy on the back on the back of the unit, but for good reason. VidaBox had to cram a lot into a tiny package.

Ports include:

• (2) USB 2.0 ports
• (1) PS/2 keyboard input
• (1) 6-Pin firewire (IEEE-1394) port
• (1) PS/2 mouse input
• (1) VGA (15-pin) monitor port
• (1) Parallel port
• (1) 10/100/1000 ethernet port
• (1) RS-232 serial port

Being that the RoomMate is marketed as a Media Center and not a desktop, VidaBox prefers you not open your unit and tinker with the innards. If you do, you'll void your warranty. There are special screws on the back that prevented me from having a look inside myself which I would have done had the tool been available. The specs for the standard system which this Up Close is covering is the Standard Model circled above.

More detailed information can be located on the specs page.

Here's the RoomMate when compared to my ancient Shuttle XPC SS51G case that serves as my current Media Center set-up. The roommate is a little more than half as tall and sadly, quite a bit prettier in the face. (It's okay my little shuttle wuttle. I still love you). The VidaBox symbol, while cute, is a bit reminiscent of the TiVo logo.

The RoomMate has a bit more junk in its trunk than the Shuttle, but not so much that it can't fit a standard entertainment center.

I have a wired keyboard hooked up to my Shuttle for some occasional BIOS tampering. Other than that, I'm not sure why anyone would want to have a wired mouse and keyboard dangling from a Media Center set-up. You get an attractive Kensington branded keyboard and mouse included with the package.

I for one prefer to use a Microsoft Remote Keyboard and a Gyration wireless mouse. If you prefer wireless too, VidaBox offers a compact wireless keyboard as an option available on their site.

To round out the accessories the RoomMate included the following.

• Microsoft remote control w/ batteries
• Microsoft infrared receiver
• (2) infrared blaster for set-top box control
• (2) FM antennas
• Cable splitter with (2) short jumper coaxial cables
• (2) S-Video/Composite/RCA audio dongle for TV tuner

Optional accessories include:

• Matching LCD display
• 802.11g USB wireless adapter
• RF wireless keyboard with integrated trackball & storage sack
• Logitech Harmony® universal programmable remote control
• VGA to S-Video/Composite video converter
• Karaoke kit #1- (1) mike, (1) mike mixer, and 400 songs
• Karaoke kit #2- (1) mike, (1) mike mixer, and 900 songs

Here's how the RoomMate looked in my entertainment set-up. As you can see the RoomMate does a good job of blending in, especially when sitting next to a like colored 360.

Here's the last aesthetics picture. Please disregard the jungle wallpaper. I swear it was on the wall when I bought the place.

As mentioned before VidaBox markets its product as PVR first PC secondary. When you intially boot up the system you are greeted by a VidaBox desktop background for a split second...

...then are immediately kicked into the Media Center application to begin the set-up process. I can see how this little detail could go along way in making the set-up simple for the less computer savvy in the world.

When I built my Media Center PC, I admittedly had some serious issues and wasn't sure how to get everything to work properly.

Was my tuner set-up correctly? Are all the components I installed actually Media Center compliant? Why isn't the IR sensor working? Do I have Service Pack 2 installed? Do I have all the Media Center Roll-ups? What DVD Decoder do I need to get this to work? Question after question arose, but with some persistance and some serious time over at the The Green Button it all worked out for me.

On the contrary, when I hooked up the RoomMate, turned on the TV, and went through the Media Center setup above...

... in about 10 minutes total, I was watching TV, and dual-recording to boot. OveralI I was very satisifed with the results.

The picture was standard analog fair and perfectly adequte for TV viewing. Over-the-air HD is available with the RoomMate if a separate add-on package is purchased. Unfortunately, HD received via satellite or your cable company is not currently supported but may be in later models.

On my Shuttle Media Center, I had some initial difficulty archiving a copy of a show to DVD. It appears Windows Media Center 2005 does not innately have this ability from a fresh install (at least the version I installed didn't). I ultimately got it working thanks to downloading the sonicencoders.msi a user on The Green Button was kind enough to post.

The RoomMate appears to already have the msi file installed as I was able to burn a show to DVD without issue. If you want total control of the DVD authoring (i.e. want to create menus, cut out commercials, etc.), you'll have to find a third-party application to accomodate this. For straight out of the box no-frills DVD archiving - the burning application built into the RoomMate and its version of Media Center is perfectly sufficient.

The RoomMate also comes with My Movies and MCE Weather pre-installed. Not a huge deal because these are Media Center add-ons freely distributed online, but it's convenient nonetheless.

My Movies is an application worthy of its own post at a later date. With some ripping tools freely available online, the program basically allows you to rip DVDs to your harddrive and access them directly through the Media Center user interface, and it does it all rather elagantly.

In summary, the VidaBox RoomMate packs a lot of punch in a footprint smaller than the size of the average shoebox. It's incredibly easy to configure, very attractive, and is quite as a whisper sitting beneath your television.

Could you build a Media Center PVR with similar specs cheaper? If you've got the know-how and you're willing to spend the time on it, you probably could. Are there cheaper pre-built options out there? Sure, but chances are they're probably not as aesthetically appealing or meant to fit beneath your TV and as Apple and Jessica Simpson have proven, looks coupled with form factor can get you pretty far in the world despite your faults.

I'd have liked to see HD reception as a part of the standard package as well as a more eloquent approach to controlling a set-top box (instead of having to use the sometimes finicky IR blaster solution). Aside from these two shortcomings and the hurt it puts on a wallet, I was ultimately impressed with what the RoomMate has to offer.

From now until the end of October VidaBox is offering an exlusive discount to PVR Wire readers who purchase a system and use one of the following codes at checkout: