Building a Media Server

I've been using my lappy as a media server for my Xbox360 and my PS3, not ideal. Every time it went to sleep or I rebooted my wife had to restart her movie. So I decided to take an old XP machine and use it as a media server.
I put a 300 gig harddrive in it and did a fresh install of XP. I then downloaded all updates. I also downloaded PlayOn and Windows Media Player 11. PlayOn isn't free but it allows you to watch streaming web content(HULU, Youtube, and Revision3). Windows Media Player 11 has built in media server. You have to click on library> Media Sharing> Share My Media, then your xbox or playstation will show up in the window you just have to activate them.
Once the server is setup just fill it up with movies and enjoy. I used and old machine for mine. you should check system requirements for PlayOn and Windows Media Player 11.

Specs on the old PC:
AMD sempron 1.6Ghz
512 MB memory
PCCHIPS Micro ATX(using onboard video)
300GB harddrive
Pretty old tech, nothing special.

XBOX 360 Lan Party Essentials

I have loved LAN parties for years now. My friends and I get together and stay up all night shooting. Originally we all built LAN party machines or gaming rigs just to carry around, but the gaming world has changed. Now we all have our XBOX 360 setups.

We use XBOX 360 VGA cables to hook them to monitors. I bought my cable from Amazon for under $10. Then for sound I use Turtle Beach X1 XBOX 360 headset $60, I found mine for $35 search around for a good deal. Together these two Items give you everything you need to play without a TV.

Now providing network connectivity I chose a wireless bridge. In the past we ran a wired router and a 75 foot Ethernet cable. Someone gave me an old Linksys wifi router and I used DD-WRT to flash the firmware. Once connected to the internet we party together through XBOX Live

Everyone needs to have a copy of the same game. We use gamefly to rent and plan our next games together. Then we have blast.