Pinnacle PCTV MediaCenter 300i review

With Microsoft's Windows XP Media Center Edition still a closed system that's difficult to install and configure, the door has been left open for other companies to release their competing products.

The PCTV MediaCenter 300i provides the software, remote control and TV card needed to turn your PC into a media centre. As the hardware is provided in the box, it's certified to work with the software.

After installing the PCI card and software we were hoping to continue without a problem. Sadly, we then encountered a common issue for this type of product: the software isn't as polished as Microsoft's Media Center.

While Microsoft lets you configure it from the remote control using the excellent TV interface, Pinnacle requires you to rummage around inside a settings application.

If you're planning to use MediaCenter on a TV, you'll still need a monitor, mouse and keyboard to configure the software. The basic configuration requires you to scan for TV channels.

The PCTV 300i Stereo DVB-T TV tuner provided in the box is a digital tuner and works with Freeview services. Bizarrely, the software is configured to scan for analogue channels, which will work but won't give you the best picture.

To configure it properly we had to change the detection options manually. The auto scan then took just a few minutes to correctly identify all the channels in our area. Once this was done, the main MediaCenter application was ready to run.

The interface is very similar to Microsoft's Media Center, but misses out on some effects. We tried the Live TV option, which was simple to use, although the picture had noticeable artefacts when examined closely. The software isn't configured for timeshifting automatically. To turn this on, you have to go back into the settings applications.

It's easy enough to record a programme you're watching using the remote control, although it triggers a slight pause while it starts streaming to disk, but the programming software is a different matter. There's no built-in Electronic Programming Guide (EPG) and, strangely, the software doesn't pick up the now and next information that's broadcast with Freeview channels. Pinnacle installs TVTV (www.tvtv.co.uk), which provides an EPG for £6 a year.

Music, videos and photographs all play a part and the interface to use them is very simple, but populating the software's database isn't. A separate media manager has to be used inside Windows.

While it's not a bad package and the price is competitive, it doesn't feel quite finished to us. Once Pinnacle integrates everything under one simple interface it will be a much better buy.