The best media streamers for Windows Vista

Most of us have music stored on our PC, but Stuart has taken it to extremes: nearly all of his 600- odd CD collection is on his laptop, which is hooked up to his stereo amp with an old-fashioned bit of wire. Having got a wireless router, he wants to cut the cable and broadcast straight to his stereo from anywhere in the house. As Stuart’s also building up a healthy collection of photos and videos of his four-year-old twins, we thought we’d broaden it to include the ones that can share video as well. I expected a few hitches with the wireless signal, but it worked fine: it was Stuart’s TV that posed the biggest problem.

Terratec Noxon 2

Stuart approached the Noxon with some trepidation, citing the problems he’d had getting his wireless router set up. The oddly lyrical way in which the manual was written was initially encouraging, but its talk of SSID setup and proxy servers left him cold. Once he’d abandoned it and turned to instinct, though, things were very straightforward: it found and joined the wireless network, immediately popped up as a device to be shared to in Windows Vista, and was running in under 10 minutes.

Decisions, decisions - Which one would Stuart prefer?

The internet radio stations were a bonus, too. “I like tuning into music from around the world,” he said, flicking through US bluegrass stations with the built-in LCD display, “although as an interface for viewing music, this is terrible. Why can’t I just use the PC as the interface? It’s where my music is, after all.” He wasn’t a fan of the plasticky design, either. “It’s trying to look like an iPod, and failing.”

Netgear Digital Entertainer

Not keen on the Noxon - "As an interface for viewing music, this is terrible."

After the simplicity of the Noxon, the Netgear was more advanced, capable of streaming video as well and relying on a TV as the central display. Which proved to be the main problem, as it took ages to tune it in. Stuart cheerfully admitted it was the TV’s fault, but was annoyed that this wasn’t covered at all by the documentation. “In all honesty, I would have taken this back to the shop by now. I’m bored of all this pratting around, and it’s too complicated – they need to come up with a system that’s idiot-proof.”

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Once his ageing set was displaying the signal, things started to look up. The menu system was easy to use, it found the PC and cheerfully streamed all Stuart’s videos along with the handful of copy-protected tracks he’s bought from Napster. It looked good, too, fitting neatly into his stack of hi-fi separates, although the elegance wasn’t matched by the rather crowded remote control.

That's entertainment? The Netgear's advanced setup infuriated Stuart.

Xbox 360

Having by now cut his TV-tuning teeth on the Netgear, Stuart had the Xbox 360 up and running quickly. It was instantly recognised by Windows Vista, and after a few steps through the wizard we had the full Media Center interface to play with. Stuart was a big fan of the music view, with its gallery of CD labels to flick through, and preferred the neatly-animated interface to that of the Netgear. He didn’t enjoy using the game controller to navigate it but there’s a Media Center remote available that would resolve this. Would that be enough to win him over? “It’s better than I was expecting, and I like the visualisations while the music is playing, but I don’t think I’d use half of it. If I could get TV working on my PC I’d be tempted, though.” His only other grumble was the slight but constant whirr of the fan.

Better than expected - The Xbox 360 exceeded Stuart's expectations, but the fan was too loud.

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