Black Boxes:
Hewlett-Packard z545-b Digital Entertainment Center
$1,999
HP
3000 Hanover St.
Palo Alto, CA 94304
(800) HP-INVENT
www.hp.com
Accept it. A computer will be in your living room managing all of your digital media. It's just a question of when.
The search for an answer has driven both hardware and software giants to concoct convergence solutions designed to entice more than just early adopters and techies. The new HP z545-b Digital Entertainment Center may just have the right ingredients of style, simplicity and function to tempt the rest of us. If you're reeling at the thought of making your living room look and sound like a home office…relax. The z545-b will slip into your existing media center like spare change into a couch. It's quiet, capable and incredibly cool. But at nearly $2000 you may have to frisk a few cushions first.
At the heart of the z545-b is a digital video recorder with room for hours of recording, a DVD/CD player/burner, two TV tuners, a 9-in-1 memory card reader and practically every conceivable port, plug and slot for your digital and analog media. Powered by a 3GHz Pentium 4 processor, the HP DEC comes loaded with Microsoft Windows Media Center Edition (MCE) software. A wireless keyboard and remote make navigating and playing media files from the couch a pleasure.
Set-up
We suggest you first ask yourself "what goes?" The z545-b is designed to replace at least the DVD/CD player and maybe the VCR. But since you can use the z545-b to easily convert your tapes to DVD you may want keep the VCR nearby.
Upon opening the box, you'll find a quick installation guide (QIG) that provides clear step-by-step diagrams. A second box contains the keyboard, cabling, documentation, and software for the z545-b with an extra 160GB Personal Media Drive and cabling neatly tucked to the sides of the main unit. It took less than ten minutes to unpack and connect our test unit into an existing home theater A/V amplifier. If you've set up a standard component stereo system you shouldn't have a problem but if this is your first attempt at setting up a home entertainment system you should read the full manual before proceeding.
Sit Down
Turn the unit on and you'll notice the two case fans are a little noisy. Don't worry, they soon reduce to a slower speed and are almost unnoticeable except during extended periods of use when they speed up slightly. Fan noise is about 50dB, 3-inches from the top fan. A standard computer fan it is about 78dB at the same distance. Of course, your cat purring on your lap will easily drown this out.
A series of configuration screens guide you though the setup process. To use the online features such as instant messaging, internet browsing, or TV guide programming, you'll need to configure a high speed internet connection via the Ethernet port. Several video test screens help you adjust your TV's ratio, convergence (if rear screen or projected), contrast and brightness to get the best images possible. After about 25 minutes, the MCE home screen welcomes you and you're ready to have fun.
Take Control
The wireless keyboard/trackball sits nicely in your lap and can quickly give you a sense of near omnipotence, and your application possibilities are impressive.
Besides the basics of watching TV, DVDs or listening to the radio you can:
We tested all these functions, and more, and found them all to be extremely user friendly, reliable and in most cases capable of producing very high video and audio quality. In particular we found creating a DVD of your home videos or recorded TV very convenient. Simply drop in a recordable DVD, select "record DVD" from the MCE shell and select the clips you want to include and burn. Done.
The 160GB Personal Media Drive (PMD) is very cool solution for transporting your favorite large media files to another computer or digital media center. We transferred a 510MB file from the C drive to the PMD in a little less than 47 seconds. Then, using the included IEEE 1394 cable and power supply, we easily transferred the file to an older test computer.
Still Evolving
While we feel this is clearly one of the best digital home entertainment solutions available, there are still elements that can be improved. For instance, video quality is slightly less than a direct signal. The increased artifacting is probably due to recompression. Some things are not manageable within the simple MCS shell, such as capturing video, editing, and some DVD burning functions. While in the MCE shell some message windows appear partially underneath the user navigation control bars at the top or bottom of the screen forcing you to either wait a few seconds or hit the tab key.
Also, some documentation can be frustrating. The HP Software Guide directs you to connect to the front panel inputs to capture analog video when connection to the rear is actually required. Among the merely annoying is a slight lag when changing channels, no floppy or zip drives and no plastic keyboard cover to keep crumbs out.
Time to Try?
The z545 looks perfectly at home in your living room entertainment center. At $2,000 the system is still a little pricey but you are clearly getting far more than simply a fast multi-media computer. With its compact size, quiet fans and solid performance you may be asking yourself if now is the right time to bring convergence to your living room. We can only suggest that if you've read this far, you have your answer.
Brian Peterson is a Communications Director with more than 14 years of broadcast video production experience.
Tech Specs
Platform: PC
Operating System: Windows XP Media Center Edition, SP2
Processor: 3.0 GHz Intel Pentium 4 - 530
Memory: 512MB PC 3200 DR SDRAM (expandable to 2GB)
Wireless keyboard w/ trackball: yes
Hard Drive: 200GB internal; 160GB secondary
DVD/CD: 16x double-layer DVD+-/RW Drive
Media Cards supported: 9-in-one Media Card reader
TV Tuners: 2 (on select models)
Video Processor: ATI RADEON X300 SE graphics card with 128MB DDR memory; 16x PCI-Express
A/V Inputs (one per tuner): RF coaxial; S-Video; Composite video; Stereo RCA
A/V Outputs: DVI-D (for High definition displays); VGA (for plasma, LCD and DLP displays/projectors); Component video (YPbPr); S-Video; Composite video
Internet Connectivity: 10/100/1000 Base-T Gigabit Ethernet; WiFi (802.11b/g wireless receiver)
Peripheral Ports: 2- front and 4- rear accessible USB 2.0; FireWire (1-front 4-pin for camcorders, one 6-pin rear)
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