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When they had to venture outside Front Row to Netflix and Hulu via Boxee, however, they got lost. And considering that’s the avenue to the family’s music and movies, it’s a great start. With Front Row configured to launch at startup and some instruction on how Rowmote works, the family-already comfortable with the Apple TV’s interface-could navigate local and networked content with them. Would they have the patience to control it? The answer to that depends on what they wanted to do with it. My wife and daughter are renowned for their smarts and perseverance, but anyone’s patience can be pushed to the limit when forced to deal with too much complexity. One important test of the mini’s suitability as a media center is its family friendliness. Yes, the HD content looks better, but not so much better to my eyes that I’m willing to pay more for it or wait longer to receive it. Personally, I’m more than happy with standard definition programming from the Store. Video content from the iTunes Store, however, looks darned good.

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And free is good, particularly when compared to a cable or satellite bill that runs nearly $100 a month. On the other hand, that streaming content is free (or nearly so with a $9 a month Netflix subscription).

If your eyes explode when forced to watch video with obvious artifacts and occasional stutters, the Mac mini as media center may not appeal to you.

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Streaming video doesn’t look as good as video coming from a cable TV box, satellite receiver, or OTA antenna. I’m fine with the black border that appears around the Mac’s screen with Overscan off. To begin with, there’s every likelihood that your mini will either over-fill the bounds of your HDTV’s screen (meaning the menu bar will be cut off at the top) or under-fill it if you turn off the Overscan option in the Displays system preference. With this setup I was confident that I could do without my DVD player, the receiver’s radio, and much of the content currently offered by my satellite TV provider. With iPhone in hand I was able to play music, videos, and podcasts watch slideshows access Hulu and Netflix and purchase and rent iTunes content from the couch without much bother. At the end of that day the mini functioned much as I’d planned.

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Once I had the parts it took me the better part of a day to upgrade the mini and configure it as I’ve outlined. And, if I can stand using half-a-dozen remotes instead of just one, I could do without the Harmony 880. RadioShift is another luxury if I’m willing to listen to radio live via iTunes or a Web browser. Toast Titanium is helpful for many things but Handbrake, though slow on this Mac, is a capable ripper and converter. For example, the Mac mini’s 120GB internal hard drive is slow and it doesn’t hold a ton of media, but if much of my media is stored and accessed on network drives, who cares? I could do without both the Elgato EyeTV Hybrid and Turbo.H264 HD if I were willing to use my existing TV connection and TiVo and convert media more slowly. I could throw together something nearly as functional for not a lot more than the price of the mini, however.

Some of the components of my Mac mini-based media centerI was after a completely tricked-out Mac media center and that’s what I built. Roxio Toast Titanium 10: $80 (after rebate)Įxcluding the Netflix subscription, taking the sale price on the external hard drive, and assuming that you already have all your AV components and an iPhone or iPod touch, that comes to $1,530.