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BNI mediabox
Price: £149.99 inc VAT

Features
Performance
Ease of use
Value for money
Overall

Reviewed By: Andy Shaw

This review updated: 18/07/2005
Featured in magazine:
Issue 112
Manufacturer Contacts:
Supplier: Blue Nova International
Tel: 0870 770 8286
Web Address: www.bluenovaint.com


You've bought your digital camera, digital video camera and MP3 player. You've used them to take photos, make movies and listen to seemingly endless gigabytes of music. But what's the best way of sharing all this digital media we accrue? Sure, you can probably stick your photos on a website, write a DVD video or lend a friend an earphone. Or you could even invest in a network media player if your house already has a network. But wouldn't life be a whole lot easier if you could just pull out your hard disk, take it to a friend's house and plug it directly into their TV or stereo to show them what's on it?

Features
Now you can. This little box of tricks is essentially a 40GB USB-compatible external hard disk with a bit of software pre-installed that, with the help of an included audio/video cable, can display its contents on a regular TV. Windows automatically treats it like another hard disk so you can just drag-and-drop files to it, then use the remote control to browse and view its contents at your leisure.

Performance
Using the device is quick and simple. Plug it into your computer and its USB 2.0 connection is capable of transferring files at decent speeds. The hard disk runs at 5,400rpm, which isn't quite fast enough for it to be used as a spare hard disk for doing things like running video-editing software, but it's perfectly sufficient for streaming media already stored on it.

It doesn't have a battery so if you want to take it on your travels you'll also have to lug the power adapter about, which isn't huge but adds significantly to the bulk of whatever you're carrying. The remote control is flat though, which helps.

Ease of use
The MediaBox is very easy to use. The menu appears immediately on your TV screen when you plug it in, and browsing around files and folders is straightforward. If we had one grumble about it, it's that you can't play music at the same time as browsing photos, and you have to stop one thing manually (say a piece of music) to start playing another (like a video file), so you can't even play an MP3 file while you're browsing for other content.

Value for money
Perhaps the best thing about this is the price. Using an external TV or stereo rather than having a screen and speakers built in saves money, so if you're looking for a budget option, you've found it. It lacks some of the flexibility of its rivals with screens, batteries and memory card slots, but it keeps the price down.

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