Voodoo PC Launches VIBE Xbox eXtender

BlueMoon writes "TeamXbox released information today about the launch of the Voodoo VIBE, a Central Home Theater and Entertainment PC running on Windows MCE 2005 that is designed to sit in your home office as a central media server PC. What's special is that you can then hook up a custom VIBE XBOX to your TV that will allow you to record and pause live TV. You can also stream videos, display slide shows, play MP3, play live FM Radio, and even burn recordings to DVD from your VIBE XBOX on the VIBE HTPC."

how is this combo better than just an XBOX + XBMC?

[Khyron]

I saw reported elsewhere yesterday and I'm still thinking the same thing - why pay $5000 for something the XBOX can already do, by itself, for free?

I must be missing something because I don't see a lot of functionality that my existing modded XBOX running XBMC lacks, in fact, I see fewer codecs being supported this way.

Re:how is this combo better than just an XBOX + XB

[Chris Pimlott]

XMBC is pretty great but it has no TV in, so it can't perform the TiVo functionality that Windows Media Center can.

Re:how is this combo better than just an XBOX + XB

[drinkypoo]

No, but it supports playing ReplayTV streams over the network. You can also run Linux (debian is readily available) and MythTV on the Xbox, and use it as a MythTV frontend. So really, what you're buying is convenience. If that's worth $4000 to you (assuming the Xbox and the PC will cost about a grand together... Maybe I should call it $1500 though, if you want a couple tuners) then that's fine by me.

Xbox extenders next month

[JVert]

The standalone extenders are out now, I dont know where to get them from except for hp. Theirs is $299 or but includes wireless. There should be some out there without wireless for a bit cheaper.

The xbox extenders are being released next month by microsoft. Looks like you'll get the same functionality as this voodoo xbox without hte dvd burning.

This media center 2005 is probably the worst launch ever. Big PR conference will bill gates presenting and absolutly no way to go out and buy the damn things. PC venders are hit and miss for support. HP is taking names to get the 2005 upgrade only if your HP shipped with 2004. But they arn't even mailing the upgrade CD's till next month. Dell says they will not give out the upgrade to 2005, other vendors have no info or at least hard to find on their website.

The media center website at microsoft is trashed with links on where to buy the stuff, but you can't actually buy anything. I dont understand why microsoft is breaking the media center. They release upgrades through limit distribution channels and leave it up to the manufacters to decide if they want to support it or not. 2005 can now be bought through system builders but so far it hasn't fixed any of the problems. Now you have people building their own pc with no garantee of the quality of experiance and at the same time people who bought the damn thing so it could be a media center are stuck with an older version with their only option is to pay a full $150 for a new OS.

Or use your existing PC

[technopinion]

Not sure how this is any better than running SnapStream's BeyondTV on an existing PC, and using an older PC (say a P3-800) as a client attached to your TV.