Media streaming with Xbox or PS3?

bretttp1

Hi all,

I am looking to stream movies from my PC to the living room TV and I am in the market for either an xbox 360 or a PS3 there are a couple of questions I have about both these methods :

1. Which one do ye think is best for performing this task, I know that the x box requires a wireless adapter but can the PS3 perform this task out of the box?

2. Do you have to have windows media centre for the 360 method to work? If not what software is a good alternative?

3. What wireless adapter do I require on the PC?

4. Apart from the streaming option, is it possible to connect up an external hard drive to either machine that would play movie content?

I was just wondering what you guys use that you find successful.

Thanks in advance

ongarite

How far a distance and through how many walls will TV/console & PC from the wireless router.
IMO wireless is a poor technology for streaming video. Its far better to have wired CAT5 connection. That said if you could have the PC wired to the router and then TV/console wireless it would be acceptable.

You can share pictures, media using WMP11 for 360, PS3. You can connect any FAT32 formatted HD to PS3 and play DivX media from it, not too sure with 360.

IMO if you just going to be using the console for streaming movies, TV shows; I would get an original XBOX for €20 in GameStop and install XBMC on it. It capabilities are far greater than PS3, 360..

bretttp1

ongarite wrote: »

IMO if you just going to be using the console for streaming movies, TV shows; I would get an original XBOX for €20 in GameStop and install XBMC on it. It capabilities are far greater than PS3, 360..

Yeah I was thinking that aswell, I have an original xbox but seeing as I am going to buy a next gen console I thought I'd use it for streaming aswell as gaming.

Could anyone recomend a place where I could get the original xbox modded or has anyone done it themselves and found it easy, I've looked it up before but the sheer number of options were ridiculous, can anyone here recomend a system that worked for them?

BTW the streaming will be going through one partition wall and a wooden floor.

randombar

Check the console mod sections there's a very good xbox mod on that!

also i'd recommend "homeplug" for networking throughout the house!

I've it now and it's de job!

bretttp1

GaryCocs wrote: »

Check the console mod sections there's a very good xbox mod on that!

also i'd recommend "homeplug" for networking throughout the house!

I've it now and it's de job!

That sounds interesting, where did you get the homeplug system?

randombar

Ebay sell em cheap enough. not really a system as such, you just buy two plugs and you have a system really?

If you have a bit of spare cahse it might be worth your while to get the 200Meg ones, i've the 85 and they're grand it's just not sure how far into the future they will be any good?

as for the xbox, one thing I'm finding is the fan is a bit loud, you get over it but compared to the ps3 there's a difference!

Joe_Soap

I have my 360 in the bedroom, and its wirelessly streaming from the PC downstairs with no problems (FFWD and REW work fine) . There was a dashboard update pre-christmas that allows you to connect directly to a shared drive on the network, whereas before this you had you use a media server on the PC like winamp remote which i found very flakey.

bretttp1

How do movies look on the PS3/xbox 360 if streamed from a pc?
The reason I ask is that I use Nero to watch movies on my PC because if I use WMP I can't fill the screen in widescreen

Also would I get full 5.1 in my living room if streamed?

randombar

Full screen movies and all of that, not sure about the 5.1? Would be interested to know myself!