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You've probably played MP3 files on your personal computer and even some DVDs. But have you ever wondered what it would take to turn your ordinary PC into an entertainment device capable of delivering audio and video of equal or better quality than what you get with a decent home media system?

You could spend $5,000 or more on a killer audio-recording, ripping, and playback system—and that's before addressing video enhancements. But that type of purchase is the province of a hard-core minority. Instead, you should maintain a price cap of $1,500 to $2,000, because if the enhancements approach that cost, you'd do just as well buying a brand-new Windows Media Center PC. Also, it's probably not worthwhile making too many modifications to an older PC; you'd probably do better buying an affordable new machine and modifying that.

Here we concentrate on solutions for Windows-based PCs, though you could convert to Linux and do pretty much the same things we explain below. But staying with Windows ensures that you can still use your PC for traditional apps. In terms of stability, Windows XP is the best choice. If you already have Win XP, get rid of programs you don't need and, in fact, consider doing a complete reinstall of the OS, wiping the old version.

How do you put together an entertainment device without going off the deep end? For $1,000 or less, you can get 90 percent of the quality of a truly esoteric and expensive PC-based system. The biggest improvements come in the quality of the audio you play through your stereo or home theater system speakers and in the personal video–recording capability.

Enhancing Your PC

Almost every consumer PC sold in the past decade has at least some multimedia capabilities, including playing, ripping, and downloading audio, burning CDs, and storing and editing photos. Many current PCs can play DVDs, and some can even capture and edit video, as well as create DVDs from your video footage. Such multimedia systems are largely PC-centric: You store, create, and view/listen while sitting in front of the computer.

An entertainment PC, on the other hand, whether a Windows Media Center–based PC (from manufacturers such as Gateway, HP, ViewSonic, and others) or a Sony VAIO, is more or less equivalent to your TV and stereo system. Many models include extras such as personal video recording, high-quality output, a remote control, and a display that you can view from your sofa. The enhancements we describe here give you the functional equivalent of an entertainment PC.

How much you enhance your PC depends on its age: The older the PC, the more work it needs, the more costs you incur, and the more you should consider the investment versus the return. Not to mention the question of practicality: Is it worth ripping 250 audio CDs to a three-year-old hard drive that might crash and force you to rerip in 18 months? Conversely, even a new PC running Win XP may have stability issues if it's also being used daily for word processing, Web browsing, and especially for games.

For capturing audio and video (not movie editing), you don't need to be as concerned about the processor speed and memory, though systems with processors slower than 1 GHz and less than 256MB of RAM are not as desirable. Focus instead on the quality of the audio and the need to add a TV tuner card. Almost certainly you'll want more hard drive capacity.

Bump Up the Audio

Compressed audio files take up 1MB to 2MB per minute, and uncompressed WAV files consume about 10MB for every minute. A library of 100 1-hour CDs takes 6GB (ripped at 128 Kbps) to 13GB (ripped at 320 Kbps). Uncompressed video, which is how you'd stream movies off a DV camcorder, takes about 3GB per minute. For audio, the right level of compression is the subject of near-religious argument. Our take, based on PC Magazine Labs listening tests, is that if you rip at 192 Kbps, few if any listeners will be able to tell compressed digital music from CD—and definitely not at 320 Kbps.

Both rates are too piggy for those who want to put music on a portable MP3 player with 64MB to 128MB of onboard memory. So you may want to rerip your favorite tunes a second time at a lower bit rate. See whether you can live with 64 Kbps if you use your player mostly while working out or on an airplane. WMA format will sound better than MP3 at 64K. MP3Pro, based on 96 Kbps, is a good choice if your device supports it. Classical music and unaccompanied vocals may not sound good enough at 64K or 128K. For more information on the best format for various types of music and players, see our February 2003 article "Audio and Video Formats".

To audio buffs, the RF emissions inside a PC raise concerns about degraded audio signals. To counteract this when outputting to an audio system, keep the signal digital until it leaves the PC by upgrading to a sound card with coaxial or optical digital outputs. Alternatively, use an external USB digital-to-analog adapter.

Such high-end external devices are worth considering. Because they have so many jacks, most have external breakout boxes or extender cables. Most will decode surround-sound signals, and some can determine how many speakers are driven and compensate for missing center channel or rear surround speakers. You don't need to spend $800 for high-end audio adapters; you can get good results for around $200. Check out the M-Audio Delta 410 ($249 direct, www.m-audio.net), Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Platinum eX ($250 street, www.creative.com), or Echo Digital Audio Mia ($220, www.echoaudio.com). If that's a little more than you had in mind, consider the Philips Sonic Edge 5.1 ($50, www.pcsound.philips.com), which has fewer features for recording input but still has digital output. Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ($130) is also popular.

If you don't want to mess with opening your PC's case or if you want better sound from a notebook, there are USB sound adapters that bypass the system sound card. The Xitel Pro HiFi-Link ($99 list, www.xitel.com), for example, has jacks for analog audio, coaxial digital, and optical digital, as well as 30-foot cables for each. Also consider the Echo Audio Indigo PC Card ($100 street).

Add a TV

If you want to capture and output TV video, you'll need to add either a standalone TV tuner card (keeping your existing graphics card) or an upgraded graphics adapter with a TV tuner. Both devices tune cable and broadcast TV. Feature differences include PVR (TiVo-like personal video recording) capability, free versus fee programming guides, hardware-based MPEG-2 encoding (common in most products) and decoding ( in some products), analog video inputs (from a camcorder or VCR), and video outputs (for a TV set).

Hauppauge is the gold standard in tuner cards. Check out the Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-350 ($199 direct, www.hauppauge.com), which includes hardware MPEG-2 and composite/S-Video outputs, or the Win TV-250-PVR ($149), with no software decoding and no outputs. There are also USB-based TV tuners available, but unless you have a laptop, it's best to wait until they make the leap from USB 1.1 to USB 2.0. (USB audio adapters are less affected by 1.1's 12-Mbps bandwidth limit.)

Among all-in-one graphics adapters, the ATI All-In-Wonder 9800 Pro ($400 street, www.ati.com) is the current king, though you may be quite satisfied with less pricey adapters, including the All-in-Wonder 7500 ($150). nVidia tuner/graphics cards using the nVidia GeForce4 MX 440 chipset cost about $200, as does the All-in-Wonder 7500 Pro.

Add a Remote

For $40 to $80 you can add a wireless remote control, so you don't have to work from the keyboard. An infrared transceiver on a 2- to 5-foot cable plugs into your serial or USB port and allows you to place the PC in a closed cabinet or otherwise out of sight. Most remotes are programmed to control popular apps such as MusicMatch Jukebox, Windows Media Player, and PC-based DVD-player software.

Probably the most inexpensive remote out there is the Streamzap PC Remote ($39.95 direct, www.streamzap.com), followed by the Keyspan Digital Media Remote ($49, www.keyspan.com), and the Onkyo CarryOn Music COM-270RP ($79, www.onkyo.com). The ATI- and nVidia-based graphics/TV tuner cards have programmable wireless remotes usable for all PC multimedia functions. The ATI Remote Wonder ($50) is available separately.

Unfortunately, the fact that you can control your PC from the couch doesn't cure the problem that ordinary PC displays are viewable only at an arm's length away (DVD-player functions are the exception.) But PC Magazine's new Media Console utility provides an interface viewable from across the room. Visit www.pcmag.com and click on Downloads (where you'll also see pricing information). ATI recently added a similar interface, called EasyLook, bundled with its TV tuner cards.