Ultimately, the biggest benefits from a media PC must come from its performance during playback. This is where we also give every single build we assembled high marks across the board.

On the audio side, we couldn't test all the formats known to man (or to us, anyway) simply because we didn't have a big enough HD-DVD and Blu-ray library to make that possible. That said, all our media PC builds were able to handle the list of audio formats below, producing magnificent sound. Our entertainment system is currently configured for 5.1, so even though we could decode 8 channel audio, we could only listen to 6 channels.

Conventional DVDs: Dolby Digital 5.1, and DTS 5.1 surround sound Audio DVDs: DVD Audio (HD-DVD only) HD-DVD: Dolby Digital Plus, Linear PCM 5.1 Blu-ray Disc: DTS ES 6.1, DTS HD Master Audio 7.1 Audio CDs: HD-DVD only

Though one of your authors cut his teeth in a recording studio and our listening room was pretty well equipped, we couldn't hear much difference between 5.1 surround sound schemes and newer schemes available only from high-definition media (Dolby Digital Plus, DTS ES 6.1 and DTS HD Master Audio). Sound was well-spatialized and crystal clear throughout, thanks at least in part to the excellent Sony STR-DA5200ES A/V receiver through which we piped all of our HDMI signals for output to our speaker rig.

On the picture side, the difference between 1080p or 1080i video and other, lower resolution formats (HDTV is typically broadcast at 720p, though an increasing number of stations are upgrading to 1080i) including standard television is pretty noticeable, but only on larger displays. On the smaller Dell 2407 monitor we used for testing, differences at the high end were difficult, if not impossible, to see. When we did hook up the PC, the receiver (and speakers) and the Sony KDL-46XBR3, the highest high-definition resolutions stood out sharply and clearly against their less-detailed counterparts. For example, when we watched Swordfish on conventional DVD versus HD-DVD, the differences were stark and arresting. At the high end, motion was much smoother; we saw no edge artefacts or pixilated transitions, and a lot more detail was readily visible. We observed the same phenomenon in spades on 3DMark benchmarks as well, as we increased the resolution but also, alas, inevitably decreased frame rates as well.