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The Hauppauge MediaMVP sells for around $85 in the US - Compare Prices.

 

Overview
More and more video and TV content is distributed over the internet. The PC is not the most comfortable place to watch video, it is still the TV. Besides the illegal sharing there seems to be indicators that TV stations will offer TV shows for download for a fee (article on BBC). Jon Stewart! Please be the first to offer The Daily Show as legal downloads on ComedyCentral.com.

Last year several media boxes appeared on the market, like the D-Link MediaLounge DSM-320, Philips Streamium SL400i, Netgear MP115 and the Linksys WMCE54AG. Hauppauge mostly known for its video capture cards got also into the game and offers the lowest priced device the MediaMVP. Only obvious drawback: it does not have wi-fi integrated. So to the about $85 I have to add about $115 for the 802.11g wireless Ethernet bridge making it in some cases more expensive than the competitor devices with integrated wi-fi. Hauppauge will introduce a new product at CeBIT 2005 in March that will address the wi-fi issue.
 

The MediaMVP (Measurements: 15x14x3cm) is a small flat, silver-colored box that runs Linux on an IBM PowerPC CPU. The device can decode MPEG-2 Transport Stream, MPEG-2 MP@ML, and MPEG-1. It decodes full CCIR601 resolution NTSC and PAL encoded MPEG-2 bit streams in real time, up to and including 720x480 (NTSC) or 720x576 (PAL). Decodes MPEG data rates from 1.5 Mbits/sec to 8 Mbits/sec.
The video output option of the Hauppauge media streamer is composite, S-Video and SCART (Europe only).

In talking to Hauppauge I learned that people already "hack" the MediaMVP and install custom Linux based applications on it. To learn more about this visit this MediaMVP Hacking forum. Hauppauge is not against those activities and even helped with technical support in some cases. The MediaMVP when rebooted actually loads the firmware via the network from the server with the Hauppauge software installed, which is of course than easy to leverage to upload own code. It is also a neat solution for transparent firmware upgrades. See also the MediaMVP specifications at the end of the review.

Installation and Setup
The installation is extremely simple. I can either put the box on top of my other devices or use the bundled stand to mount it vertically. Then I just plug in the SCART (Composite of S-Video in the US) video plug in my TV, connect the power adapter and the network cable to the Linksys Wireless Ethernet Bridge. I had to first connect the WET54G to my PC to configure the network access. The Hauppauge MediaMVP requires a server software to run on the PC the media files are stored. I installed the software that came with the CD, which you can skip and go straight to Hauppauge.com where the new DivX supporting software version 2.2 is available for download and install that instead. There is also a new 2.4 beta version that has some more new features.

Besides DivX the 2.2 software also supports WMA and Internet Radio streaming. Installation of the software is straight forward. After installation the MediaMVP should be briefly unplugged for reboot. The device finds at boot time automatically over the network the PC with the server software installed. All folders and drives are automatically available for access from the TV. To define favorites a simple program called Search For Media is in the Hauppauge Program folder. There are no other software settings. The Hauppauge services run in the background and behave pretty well. Only when the box connects to the PC memory and CPU are utilized.

Usage
The MediaMVP is very easy to use. After switching it on the Go main screen appears showing the four supported media formats and the settings. selecting Videos with the remote shows me the folders or configured favorite folders on my PC. Selecting a file shows the full filename on the bottom of the screen. I tried to playback MPEG2 videos and DivX movies in full TV resolution. The MediaMVP decodes MPEG-2 natively on its hardware, which frees up the PC and streaming does not take much resources.

A completely different situation is with DivX movies. Hauppauge recommends a PC with at least a 1.8Ghz P4 CPU. I run the server software on a 3.4Ghz Machine I recently built (specs). When watching TV resolution DivX encoded movie (resolution 512x384pixels), you better do not do anything else on that machine, else the video playback stutters. I asked Hauppauge why watching DivX movies is so resource hungry. The reason is the transcoding of DivX encoded video to MPEG-2 video before streaming the data to the MediaMVP. To decode natively DivX in hardware would have increased the price of the Hauppauge product. Watching video works great for me and I am very pleased with the quality. I had also better results switching off the Flicker Control in the settings for the video playback.
I also tested music and photo playback. Both features work straight forward as expected. I did not play around with the Internet Radio Streaming. See TV Screen-shots below.

Conclusion
The Hauppauge MediaMVP is a great low-cost way to enable media streaming to a TV. If you have a wired network it is the most cost-effective way to do it. Hauppauge created a very simple to use product here, that will work also for consumers that have not much technical knowledge. The software and the hardware are plug and play - there is no need to configure anything. On the other hand it is also an interesting device for hardware geeks because it runs Linux and it is open to modded.

The PC resource needs for DivX video are an issue, if you have no powerful PC available. The need to buy a Wireless Ethernet Bridge drives up the cost. As mentioned above Hauppauge will address this with a new product to be announced at CeBIT. A small negative is the somewhat awkward remote control. Hauppauge actually offers a new remote to address that for purchase on their site.

 
How to Buy
The Hauppauge MediaMVP sells for around $85 in the US - Compare Prices.
The Hauppauge MediaMVP is also available for in Europe - Compare Prices.

TV Screen Shots

Specification