Meedio Essentials 1.15.22.0, Part 1 - A Sleek and Clean HTPC Interface

Meedio Essentials - System Requirements

Since this half of the Meedio HTPC suite deals primarily with playback, the hardware requirements are significantly less than those that will be required when Meedio TV comes out.

At the moment, Meedio Essentials requires:

• 40MB of hard drive space
• 600MHz CPU
• 128MB RAM
• Windows XP/2000
• DirectX 9.0

ME (Meedio Essentials) does not use DX9 specific technology. Meedio explained that the media player was simply written in the DX9 API, which is why they have that requirement. This means that a non-DX9 card with DX9 installed will be OK. Our recommendation is that you use your DX8.1 card, or better yet, any DX9 card, since it will be a safe bet when Meedio TV comes out.

And as always with any software DVD player, you need a DVD decoder for DVD playback. Native remote support is supplied if you have IrMan, Tira-2, or WinLIRC, but there are plug-ins developed by the large user base that extend support to remotes for the Remote Wonder, Firefly, StreamZap, among others. Keep in mind that any device that can mimic keyboard functions can also interact with ME without the need for plugins, which is why the directional arrows on the Remote Wonder will work with ME just by installing the RW drivers.

The system that we used to test ME was a Shuttle ST61G4 with a Pentium 4 2.4GHz (533FSB), Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 7200.7 120GB hard drive (we recommend at least 20GB of free space), Kingston HyperX 1GB PC4000 (2 x 512MB), and eVGA's GeForce FX 5700 Personal Cinema.

Based on our use, we recommend at least a 1.0GHz CPU, 256MB of RAM, a DX9 compatible card, and broadband internet support, if you plan on using plug-ins like the Internet Browser or are often updating weather information. And if you plan on using the DVD player function of ME, you will obviously need to have a third party DVD software decoder and a DVD drive.