Xbox 360 Streaming Media

Got an Xbox 360? Then there's no need to buy yourself a separate media streamer. It's not just a games console you know.

The Xbox 360 is designed to connect to a PC running Windows Media Center, and if you have a PC running that (either Vista, or Windows XP MCE) then the system works very well. The Xbox's interface is pretty much the same as Media Center and it is slick and easy to use. If you don't have a PC running any form of media center, then you can use Windows Media Player 11 instead.

Once sharing has been setup, the Xbox is able to connect and browse the folders in much the same way as any other media streamer. It's not nearly as good as the Media Center Interface, and it has a nasty habit of failing to connect to our shared library, but when it works, it's pretty good. Since Microsoft updated the firmware, the Xbox is able to play Xvid and DivX content, but cannot play some other file formats. In this case, you can use a program called Tversity (http://www.tversity.com/) which can transcode incompatible file formats on the fly, into ones the Xbox can play.

Using Tversity, the Xbox can even stream live video feeds, which is a pretty unique feature. An alternative is to use Orb (http://www.orb.com/), which enables you to view almost any content you wish to share, by using folder sharing. You may not think that the Xbox is a natural contender for streaming audio and video to your TV and stereo, but after testing a large number of media streamers, we have to say the Xbox is actually one of the best devices we've ever used, especially when you decide to use it with Media Center.