Smart Home Blog

If you’re using powerful Mac Mini as a home, media or automation server then you may be interested in 1U hight rackmount enclosure RackMac produced by Sonnet. It allows mount two Mac Mini into rack. Additionally it provides access to the optical drive and IR receiver from the front panel as well as USB port to connect keyboard, mouse or something else. Also it secures the power cord and other attached cables to avoid accidental disconnects while keeping them tidy and manages airflow from front to back.

[via AutomatedHome]

Apple refreshed its Mac Mini. It’s available in two basic configurations, the first of which includes a 1.83GHz Core 2 Duo, 1GB of RAM, and an 80GB hard drive for $599, while $200 more will buy you a 2.0GHz Core 2 Duo, the same 1GB of RAM, and a 120GB hard drive. Both units come with Front Row and an Apple Remote, iLife ’08, OS X 10.4, a DVI-to-VGA adapter, and the same cute box which I like.

Unfortunately, it’s still impossible to boot Plutohome Media Director on Mac Mini via PXE. Hope LinuxMCE will fill that gap. It’d be great to use such perfect inside and outside device as a part of Linux-based smarthome system.

[via Engadget]

TVMax which is made by Miglia Technology brings you all the basic PVR features you would expect for a Mac including:

• Watch, pause, rewind and skip forward Live TV, timeshift on your Mac.
• Record and edit your favorite shows with a built in EPG (Electronic Program Guide).
• One click Apple iPod (writes directly to iTunes) or Sony PSP export.
• Hardware compression to MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX
• Convert VHS and Hi8 tapes to DVD

It seems the TVMax is good solution till the Apple iTV is not ready. Detailed review of the TVMax is available here.

Japanese computer manufactor DosPara produced a real competitor of Mac Mini – Super Mini 2. It contains 4.3-cm thick case 1.66GHz T5500 C2D processor, 512MB of ram, 80GB HDD, a dual-layer DVD burner, gigabit Ethernet, 802.11a/b/g WiFi, a 4-in-1 card reader, DVI and S-Video outs, and a TV tuner (optional).

Spend $1,043 USD and got stylish and quiet media PC in your living room. But IMHO Mac Mini is much better 😉
[via Engadget]

Apple is going to release iTV – a wireless video streaming set-top box in Q1 2007. It’s around half the Mac Mini height and features a built-in power supply, USB 2.0, Ethernet, 802.11 “wireless component video”, optical audio and HDMI ports, plus regular ol’ RCA stereo audio ports.

iTV will support a standart Apple remote and come with an updated version of the Front Row interface.

The iTV will half the Mac Mini height and its price’ll also half of the Mac Mini price – $299.

[via Engadget]