Digital Home Thoughts: Microsoft Xbox 360 Media Center Extender

"The Xbox nation can't play games round the clock. ("Wanna bet?" someone's already saying.) For those other times, the new Microsoft Xbox 360 offers the ability to stream, in high-definition video and surround-sound audio, all manner of music, photo and video files, TV, and recorded TV, from a Media Center Edition PC located elsewhere in the house. It's a nice benefit if you're already buying Xbox 360. But Microsoft stopped one decent remote control and a couple features shy of making media streaming a killer side benefit of its second-generation Xbox."

I have to disagree with Bill Howard on nearly every point in this article. First off, the bundled remote is not meant to be full featured. This is why Microsoft is selling an additional remote with added buttons and functionality. The Logitech Harmony remote for the Xbox 360 is equally competent. The Xbox 360, while more expensive than similar Media Center Extenders, is much more powerful, and has a faster and much easier to use interface which mimics MCE. The Xbox 360 can connect to an external hard drive, in addition to networked PCs. While the 360 may not be able to do photo editing, or have an attached keyboard, frankly I think this is what PCs are for, not a game console / Media Center Extender. The remote-only interface will appeal to far more consumers. It always irks me when journalists chide products for that they aren't, without ever stopping to consider whether or not the designers wanted it to be "that" device in the first place.