Connected Home Products Ship

New stand-alone Media Center Extenders and Windows Home Server software cater to users who are interested in transferring digital media and other data between PCs on a home network. However, Microsoft’s own interest in such connected home scenarios has waned—for example, the 2007 marketing campaign for Windows Vista makes almost no mention of digital media and the connected home—suggesting that these will be positioned as niche products.

Media Center Extenders, Take Two

Several partners are shipping new stand-alone Media Center Extenders.

First introduced in 2004, Extenders work in conjunction with a Media Center PC and a home network to let users view digital media on a TV set rather than on a computer monitor. Users connect the Extender to a TV set and to a home network that also contains a Media Center PC. A remote control for the Extender lets them control certain functions of the Media Center PC—such as recording and playing back TV shows, watching DVDs or video files, and listening to CDs or music files—while sitting in front of the TV.