One of the first things I did with my MediaSmart Server was get it talking to my XBOX 360. As a first test, I dropped a home movie into the videos folder and some photos from a recent vacation into the photos folder. Once I pointed the 360 to it, it worked like a charm. Photo viewing was quick, and the video streaming was quite impressive.

Using the files from the WHS to XBOX360 was easy. I only wish we could do the opposit and save files from the XBOX to the server. This way we could save downloaded games or purchased movies on a central location that could be shared all through the house via extenders or other XBOX360's. The games and movies would also be available in case of the XBOX "red circle of death" I've read so much about.

I plan to use the server as a center location for XBOX, the media center application and movies I've ripped from my collection. I have not purchased movies from MS XBOX Live because I didn't want to have a large collection on the XBOX console only.

I can see the day when the home server can be used as a home automation , entertainment center and storage location. If they upgrade the server to include cable cards and have a bit more robust processing, it could really take off as a center piece of the home computing.

JesD said: I use my 3 XBOX 360s to stream my music , photos, and videos from my MSS. My challenge was this: I also have 3 Apple TVs and the XBox cannot display .h264 format ( m4v )when streaming but it can show it if you burned it to a dvd and played it locally. SO I installed ZUNE player ( a little tricky ) to stream the same content to the XBOX 360 and I have no problems

Okay, that's pretty cool. I may have to look into using ZUNE player so I can get .264 content on my 360.

However, the one thing you said that peaked my interest, "I use my 3 XBOX 360s..."

Why exactly do you have 3 XBOX 360s? It's cool that you do, just wondering why 3 is better than 1.

TheOfficeMaven said: I have three Xbox 360's as well. The reason for three is that they are used as Windows Media Center extenders. Thus, one Media Center PC and then three Xbox 360 extenders connected to the one PC and three different TVs (either wired or wireless). The best part about using extenders is that all TVs then share the same guide info, recording schedules, etc. and everything is maintained from the one WMC PC.

Totally. I get that, but aren't there cheaper Media Center Extenders out there than the 360?

I guess having three 360s must be nice when you do a COD4 LAN Party though. :-)

Wont be using my 360 as a media player with WHS or anything else. Too noisy.

Im using an apple tv with itunes installed on the server, serving up all my music, tv shows, films, podcasts.
The one annoying thing about this is that the HP mediasmart server has no sound card, so when itunes starts up it complains and needs user interaction to get rid of the dialogue box.
I had to turn off automatic updates as this can cause the server to reboot itself.