Link an Xbox 360 and PC

It’s a safe bet that on Christmas morning, lots of lucky children (and adults alike) found an Xbox 360 games console under the tree.

But it’s not just a toy - the 360 includes some clever features that make it worthy of the attention of adults who have no interest at all in games.

That’s because the Xbox 360 is designed to work with a part of Windows called the Windows Media Center (you’ll have to ignore the American spelling). It’s included with Windows Vista - as long as you have the Home Premium or Ultimate editions - and is included in the Media Center Edition of Windows XP.

Media Center allows users to easily access the music, video and pictures on a computer, with a simple interface that’s easy to follow. It’s a great way to make the most of your digital entertainment.

But Media Center isn’t limited to the computer; thanks to devices known as Media Center Extenders, it can even be used to play music and videos from the computer on a television set elsewhere in the home. And the Xbox 360 is itself a Media Center Extender as well as a games console. Nobody wants a bulky PC taking up space in the lounge and making the place look untidy, so with the 360 you can pack the PC away to another room and still have access to its music and video.

Make the connection
All you need is a PC with a version of Windows with Media Center as described above and an Xbox 360, both connected to the same home network. To set it up, go to the Media tab in the 360’s Dashboard. Select Media Center and follow the prompts - it will show you an eight-digit number, which you should write down. Then open Media Center on the PC - if you’re running Vista, it will recognise that there is an Xbox 360 on the network and prompt you to enter the eight-digit number. Do so and follow the prompts.

You will be asked whether you want to enable a mode that allows the Xbox to switch the PC on remotely to access media, if it is in standby. It will take a while to configure the PC and Xbox, but once it’s done you’ll see the Media Center home page appear on the television screen to which the Xbox is connected. If you’re using Media Center on Windows XP, you’ll need to install some extra software. Go to
www.xbox.com/pcsetup and follow the prompts, install the software, and the process will be similar to the above.

The PC automatically indexes the media on your computer so that the Xbox can pick it up easily. The only catch is that all the files need to be in the correct folders - music needs to be in the My Music folder, video needs to be in My Videos, and so on. You don’t need to have Media Center running on the PC the whole time, though - having the computer switched on is enough.

Accessing media on the Xbox is slower than on the PC - the menus can be slow and if you have a lot of devices on your network or the connection is slow, you might find that some videos can’t be played on the Xbox because the computer can’t transfer them fast enough. This can be the case for wireless networks, although most should still work fine for music and the majority of video files. The Xbox is also more limited in what it can play - music and pictures usually work fine but some video files that will play back on the computer will not do so on the console.