S1Digital Intros the New P500 Media Center PC

By Alexander Grundner | February 4th, 2009 View Comments

We just got word from S1Digital that the company has designed a new Media Center HTPC system from the ground up, featuring a custom designed, living room friendly chassis with silent heatpipe cooling technology. Overall the P500 the exterior looks pretty decent, but what’s under the hood is probably more impressive. According to the product page, the P500 can be equipped with up to 4 CableCARD HDTV or 2 ATSC/QAM and NTSC tuners. Standard you’ll get 3TB of RAID-5 storage, a Blu-ray drive (profile 2.0), Gigabit Ethernet, 4GB of memory, a Intel E8500 Core 2 Duo 3.0Ghz processor, ATI All-In-Wonder 3650 (with HDMI / DVI / Component / VGA video outputs), and a slick Logitech DiNovo Mini bluetooth keyboard / media center remote. With all that power under the hood, S1Digital says the P500 is capable of supporting “up to three zones of audio and video streaming (via Extenders or other Media Centers).” Starting Price: $5,999 (with no tuners).

Aside: S1Digital has also updated their entire ProLine Series product line for 2009

S1Digital launches new custom designed P500 Media Center and updates ProLine Series products for 2009.

First, I’m proud to announce the launch of the new P500 Media Center. The P500 builds upon S1Digital’s already successful line of ProLine Series Media Centers and provides customers with powerful features in a high-end, custom designed chassis. Available with up to four CableCard HDTV tuners plus an  unencrypted QAM/ATSC tuner, Blu-ray movie playback with Profile 2.0 features, movie archiving capabilities, and three terabytes (2TB useable) of internal RAID-5 storage. The P500 supports HDMI (with 5.1 channel audio), DVI and component video outputs as well as digital optical and 7.1 channel analog audio. The P500 is powered by Intel’s latest Core 2 Duo CPU, P45 motherboard and runs Vista Ultimate. RS-232 control is available via the built in serial port.

The P500 was designed from the ground up to look great out on display. Primarily designed for the living room, the P500 can also support up to three zones of audio and video streaming (via Extenders or other Media Centers).

I’m also excited to announce that we’ve refreshed the other ProLine Series Media Centers with additional features and new hardware to bring more powerful digital entertainment capabilities to you.

• S800 Media Server – Updating the already powerful S800 Media Center Server with Intel’s latest Core i7 CPU and Extreme Series DX58SO Motherboard, the S800 can handle demanding activities such as streaming multiple HDTV content around the house while recording multiple TV shows and playing Blu-ray movies simultaneously. The S800 supports six terabytes of hardware RAID managed storage with a 12 terabyte option planned shortly.
• P600 Media Center – S1Digital’s silent Media Center has been upgraded with a more powerful Intel P45 motherboard, two terabytes (1TB useable) RAID 1 storage and the video outputs have been upgraded to support HDMI (with 5.1 channel audio), DVI and component video. An unencrypted QAM/ATSC TV tuner is also included.
• Media Center Mini Edition (Home Series) – The miniature MCME has been upgraded with Blu-ray playback capability, a more powerful CPU and motherboard (G45) and HDMI audio capabilities.

All ProLine Media Centers include as standard Blu-ray movie playback and storage with Profile 2.0 capabilities, Vista Ultimate with SP1 and TV Pack and support up to four CableCard TV tuners for watching and recording HDTV cable channels. In addition, S1Digital is offering a free upgrade to Windows 7, when released on all Media Centers, with the exception of the Mini Edition. Full details can be found on the S1Digital website.

ProLine Media Centers are now upgradeable with Soundpack, which provides HDMI 1.3a and 7.1 channel analog audio outputs with RCA connectors. The Soundpack option features support for Protected Audio Playback System (PAPS) and Advanced Access Content System (AACS) certification. S1Digital’s Media Centers are capable of decoding Blu-ray movies that take full advantage of lossless digital audio formats such as Dolby® TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio™ for the ultimate aural experience.

As if that wasn’t enough, S1Digital’s close partnership with Autonomic Controls enables S1Digital’s Media Centers and Servers to be controlled via Crestron, AMX, RTI, HAI and PC based touchscreens over IP or RS232, including full two way feedback.

But we’re not resting on our laurels, even if we do see glimpses of warm weather between the snow flurries. We have some new storage solutions in the works as well as new multi-room audio options in the pipeline. Stay tuned for more!

More details can be found at www.s1digital.com or by contacting us.