Media PC or blu-ray reader ? for a newbie !!

[admin_exported]

Have spent a lot of time trying to understand the benefits of either - but just after a few pointers or some good websites that can give me the info.

At present i have a dvd player and an xbox (dvd is stand alone, xbox is networked to office pc - mainly for tv stuff and v.v. occasional games). I want to get a blu ray drive (mainly for my home hd videos) but would also like to watch the tv stuff i dontload in hd (the x264 ones).

I am not a serious av person - i just enjoy my tv & film. I was originally looking at something like the panasonic dmp-bd35 which is good enough quality for me. is a media pc likely to be able to match this for quality ? cos that would then give me the benefit of player the tv stuff via my network from the office pc.

any help would be much appreciated

kind regards

matt

 

[professorhat]

I'd seriously consider a PS3. You can get software which will allow your PS3 to see your office PC (either over wired network or wireless, though wireless may not be up to the job of transmitting HD video) plus you'll get a very good Blu-Ray player with it. You might have to convert the x264 videos (not sure, need to look that up), but it would definitely be the cheapest option for getting both in one.