Windows Experience Blog : HP MediaSmart Connect

HP Announces New HP TouchSmart PCs

Brandon LeBlanc — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 23:01:33 GMT

Several weeks ago I had blogged about HP’s all-in-one PC with amazing touch capabilities – the HP TouchSmart PC. Specifically, I discussed the IQ500 series HP TouchSmart PC models (the IQ504 and IQ506). The IQ500 series HP TouchSmart PCs were considered the 2nd generation HP TouchSmart PCs. The original HP TouchSmart PC made its debut in January of 2007. Just recently, HP has announced the IQ800 series HP TouchSmart PCs – the IQ804 and IQ816.

So what’s new with the IQ800 series HP TouchSmart PCs? The IQ800 series HP TouchSmart PC is 25 ½” versus the IQ500 series models which were 22”. Just like the IQ500 series HP TouchSmart PCs, the IQ800 series sports ambient lighting that shines on your keyboard. This can be very useful in low lighting. However the IQ800 series allows you to change the color of the ambient lighting. The IQ800 series also comes with a pocket media drive bay for user’s portable media (the HP MediaSmart Connect has a pocket media drive bay so you can take media between the two devices). The IQ800 series (both the IQ804 and IQ816) come with built-in TV Tuners for Windows Media Center awesomeness.

The IQ800 series HP TouchSmart PC is also wall-mountable as well!

There are some differences between the IQ804 and IQ816 HP TouchSmart PC models. The IQ816 comes with a Blu-ray drive for HD movies. The IQ804 comes with a 500GB harddrive while the IQ816 comes with a 750GB harddrive. The chipset and graphics for the IQ816 is a bit higher than the IQ804. If you’re looking to maximize your investment in the HP TouchSmart PC – the IQ816 is top-of-the-line.

The IQ800 series makes a worthy addition to the HP TouchSmart PC Family. I hope to blog more about the HP TouchSmart PC this fall!

My Experience at the Innoventions Dream Home at Disneyland

Brandon LeBlanc — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 04:39:00 GMT

Last Monday, HP invited me to visit the Innoventions Dream Home in Disneyland down in Anaheim, California - which opened this summer.

The Innoventions Dream Home sits inside Disneyland's Tomorrowland and uses Windows Media Center in Windows Vista - along with hardware from HP and others - to combine technology available today with technology we might see in our future. Other partners such as Life|ware (more about Life|ware below), Honda, Siemens, St. Joseph Hospital, and Taylor Morrison also showcase technology at the Innoventions Dream Home providing a very rich experience to Disneyland visitors.

When I arrived to the Innoventions Dream Home, I discovered that the building was actually rotating. Yes - rotating. Ok so not the entire building. The building actually has an outer "ring" that rotates while the inner area of the building remains stationary - like a carousel. The walkway near the entrance is actually called "360 Tomorrowland Way" referencing the building's unique feature. I thought it was a very interesting "introduction" to the Innoventions Dream Home in preparation for what's inside...

Once inside the Innoventions Dream Home, I discovered that the Innoventions Dream Home consisted of different rooms of a "fictional family" (called "The Elias Family") such as the living room, kitchen, a brother's room, a sister's room, and a home office (or den). Disney has "fictional" family members wearing yellow soccer jerseys in which visitors can follow through the Innoventions Dream Home and will remain in character as a specific member of the family talking about their home. The idea here is that visitors are exposed to how families can use this technology within their homes to improve their lives - or become more efficient with specific tasks.

I shot some video of those "fictional" family members doing some of the demos (to get the full experience - you'll have to visit the Innoventions Dream Home yourself J ) in each of the rooms and the technology within them. See how Windows Vista and Microsoft Surface along with hardware from HP and others can be combined to create some awesome experiences:

Video: Innoventions Dream Home

Sorry about the lighting. It was kind of dark inside the home and I didn't want to blind folks with my Canon HV20's light. Did you catch the Sidebar Gadgets running on the "Magic Mirror"? The Magic Mirror has a camera that points at you creating the affect of being a mirror. And in the den, did you see the 100" glass projection screen? This is perfect for watching HD content in Windows Media Center.

As I mentioned above - the technology I saw was a mix of technology available today such as Windows Vista and HP's TouchSmart PC along with technology not yet on the market. Part of the excitement is that visitors can actually see some of this cool stuff on the market today and in stores.

Much of what I saw (and what you saw in the video) was connected together using Windows Media Center. Each room had a special panel that was running Life|ware software on Windows Media Center. These panels were used to adjust settings within the room per user. Each "pretend" family member had a profile of settings that can be set from these panels. When a family member enters the room, they use these panels to adjust the settings such as lighting and images in digital picture frames.

Home automation using Windows Media Center? Absolutely! As you can see in the above shot - the ability of home automation is given to Windows Media Center by Life|ware. This level of home automation is actually quite doable today! Read Life|ware's whitepaper of home automation and Windows Media Center for more information here.

To make all the cool stuff work in the Innoventions Dream Home - you need some pretty cool hardware. That's where HP steps in.

To extend the Windows Media Center experience throughout the Innoventions Dream Home - Xbox 360's were used of course but HP also deployed its Extender for Windows Media Center device the HP MediaSmart Connect. You can read my comprehensive look at the HP MediaSmart Connect from a few weeks ago here. I also found HP MediaSmart TVs around the Innoventions Dream Home with Extender for Windows Media Center capabilities built in!

Visitors were also treated to HP TouchSmart PCs placed all over the Innoventions Dream Home. The HP TouchSmart PC boasts some impressive touch capabilities.

There is actually quite a bit to talk about in regards to my experience with the HP TouchSmart PCs from the Innoventions Dream Home. Because of that - I've decided to publish a separate follow-up post later this week discussing my experience with the HP TouchSmart PCs. But to summarize - HP has done a fantastic job bringing touch features to the consumer via the HP TouchSmart PC and they just released the 2nd generation HP TouchSmart PC which is available at retail today. HP plans to completely exchange the remaining 1st generation HP TouchSmart PCs at the Innoventions Dream Home today with the new 2nd generation HP TouchSmart PCs.

For a more comprehensive look at the HP technology at the Innoventions Dream Home - click here.

I was joined by fellow bloggers and community members Mike Garcen from Missing Remote and Michael Reyes from HardwareGeeks.com. You can read Mike's 9 page post on his experience at the Innoventions Dream Home here at Missing Remote (with lots of pictures!). And you can read Michael's post on his experience here at HardwareGeeks.com. Both are definitely worth the read so check them out.

If you're heading down to Disneyland, definitely check out the Innoventions Dream Home. It is a perfect place to see what technology today can do and what technology of tomorrow might do. Oh and ask for the "fictional" family member named Neil - he was awesome (not sure if that's his real name though).

REMINDER: Attend one of the HP MediaSmart Connect Webinars!

Brandon LeBlanc — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 00:39:00 GMT

Yesterday, the 1st of 4 webinars on the HP MediaSmart Connect took place with special guest Ed Bott from ZDNet. You can register to watch the session on-demand here. The HP MediaSmart Connect is a brand new Extender for Windows Media Center device that enables you to "extend" your Windows Media Center experience to any HDTV in your house. I took a look at the device myself and posted about it last week.

There are 3 more webinars for you to attend - with the next one being tomorrow June 26th, 2008 at 1:00pm PST with Ian Dixon from The Digital Lifestyle. Click here to register for the webinar.

I'll also be posting reminders for the webinars coming on July 8th and 10th.

A Comprehensive Look at the HP MediaSmart Connect

Brandon LeBlanc — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 12:16:00 GMT

Last week I had blogged about upcoming webinars from HP and Microsoft on the new Extender for Windows Media Center - the HP MediaSmart Connect (you can register to attend those webinars here). Today I'd like to take a more in-depth look at the HP MediaSmart Connect with an overview of the device.

But first, take a gander at today's Press Release from HP on the HP MediaSmart Connect...

Press Release: HP MediaSmart Connect Makes It Easy to Enjoy Digital Media from Any HDTV

Ok, now let's take a look at the device. First off - the form factor for the HP MediaSmart Connect is perfect for "extending" your Windows Media Center experience into other rooms in your home as it does not take up tons of room. Its exact dimensions (width x depth x height in inches) are 8.5 x 8.5 x 1.8. The unit would fit perfectly right next to a flat panel HDTV or on an open shelf. I currently have my review unit sitting on a small shelf next to the entertainment unit that my HDTV sits on. It would fit within the shelves of the entertainment unit had they not been completely filled with DVDs (heh). It is also not very heavy (around 3.5 lbs).

It will come in black with HP's identifiable "Zen" pattern on the top which also exists on some of their laptops (similar to the pattern seen on my HP tx1000 Tablet). You'll see in the photos I took of my review unit HP sent me that it doesn't have the "Zen" pattern however the production version will.

The front of the unit consists of 2 panels that open.

The HP MediaSmart Connect comes with 2 outputs for HD video: component out and HDMI.

Video output is either 720p or 1080i - with a switch (depending on your TV) in the front to switch between the output options.

There is a single USB port on the front as the HP MediaSmart Connect comes with the ability to read media off a USB device such as a thumbdrive or external harddrive. There is also a USB port in the back giving the HP MediaSmart Connect a total of 2 USB ports. If you want to get fancy you can add a HP Pocket Media Drive as there is a single slot for one in the front as well.

For audio you have stereo analog audio out and digital audio out.

You have several networking options with the HP MediaSmart Connect. It comes with a single Ethernet port supporting 10/100-Base-T or wireless IEEE 802.11 a/b/g/n. The wireless antenna is built directly into the device so there are no protruding wireless antennas to get in the way.

A Universal Remote is also included with the HP MediaSmart Connect. In comparison to the remote that comes with a HP Pavilion dv6871 - the HP MediaSmart Connect has more buttons designed to accommodate it's functionality as a digital media hub as well as Windows Media Center extender.

The HP MediaSmart Connect supports a variety of digital media formats:

Video: MPEG-1, MPEG-2 MP@ML, MPEG-2 MP@HL, MPEG-4 ASP, DivX®, WMV, WMV-HD, DVR-MS, H.264 (MP4)
Audio: MP2, MP3, WMA, WMA-Pro, AAC (m4a)
Photos: JPEG, BMP, GIF, PNG

The HP MediaSmart Connect also supports online services for digital media:

Snapfish
CinemaNow,
Live365

Some of these services work with Windows Media Center - such as CinemaNow.

In terms of features - you get the "extension" of Windows Media Center with the unit. But HP has added functionality on top of the Extender experience you get with Windows Media Center by giving the HP MediaSmart Connect the ability to also aggregate content for multiple "media servers" or PCs sharing media. If I have 1 PC sharing media and say a Windows Home Server - the HP MediaSmart Connect will aggregate content from both those systems. I currently have a HP MediaSmart Windows Home Server that the HP MediaSmart Connect finds content off of and aggregates it.

The HP MediaSmart Connect certainly comes with some pretty good specs.

Following up this post in the near future - I plan to post about several of my experiences in using the HP MediaSmart Connect.

Upcoming Webinars on the new HP MediaSmart Connect

Brandon LeBlanc — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 02:55:00 GMT

This summer HP is launching a brand new Extender for Windows Media Center device - the HP MediaSmart Connect. The HP MediaSmart Connect will let you wirelessly stream your Windows Media Center experience including content such as Live TV, Recorded TV Shows, Music, Photos and Videos to any TV in your home using your wireless or wired home network. And I've got some information below on how you can attend online webinars put on by HP and Microsoft giving you a first-hand look at the HP MediaSmart Connect! Read on...

Extenders for Windows Media Center are devices that are designed to "extend" the Windows Media Center experience from a centralized Windows Media Center PC running Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate to any room in your home with a TV using a personal home network.

The HP MediaSmart Connect packs quite a punch. You can stream recorded or live HD content from your PC to your TV as well as take advantage of Windows Media Center's Internet TV Beta - which I blogged about here a few months ago. With Internet TV Beta - you can watch movie clips, movie trailers and even music videos such as Weezer's brand new single "Pork and Beans" (a personal favorite!). The HP MediaSmart Connect is also capable of searching all the PCs on your home network and creating a single list for all digital media such as photos, music, and videos and as well as access to great entertainment from services like CinemaNow, Snapfish and Live365. There is much more to the HP MediaSmart Connect but I'll save the rest for a later post!

I'm personally very excited to get my hands on the HP MediaSmart Connect myself because I have a Windows Vista PC that serves as my digital media hub in my living room using Windows Media Center that is connected to my HDTV. However with the HP MediaSmart Connect - I can now "extend" my digital media I have on this centralized Windows Media Center PC to any room in my house such as the master bedroom. I'll be able to stream recorded HD TV shows such as Discovery Channel's When We Left Earth series to my bedroom for late-night-geeking-out to stunning video of NASA's early missions. And the form factor is perfect for sitting right next to my TV (whisper quiet - no fans!) in the bedroom.

To celebrate the launch of the HP MediaSmart Connect - HP and Microsoft are putting on 4 webinars this summer to demonstrate the capabilities of the HP MediaSmart Connect. HP's Director of Marketing for their Connected Entertainment group Brian Burch will be headlining the demos along with industry experts who will share their own experiences during the webinars.

Tuesday, June 24th - 10:00 am PST with Ed Bott, http://www.zdnet.com/
Thursday, June 26th - 1:00 pm PST with Ian Dixon, http://www.thedigitallifestyle.com/
Tuesday, July 8th - 10:00 am PST with Patrick Norton, http://www.tekzilla.com/
Thursday, July 10th - 1:00 pm PST with Mike Garcen, http://www.missingremote.com/

And I of course will be attending the webinars myself as well! Click here to register for the webinar you would like to attend!

I will also be talking about the HP MediaSmart Connect here on the Windows Experience Blog in the coming weeks as well. Stay tuned!