Popcorn with My PC

摘要

Warning to videophiles: before you rush out and buy a $1,000-plus DVD player to go with your rear-projection or plasma TV, consider using your humble PC instead. It sounds goofy, especially after years of failed efforts "converging" the TV and PC. But a growing number of programmers and innovators within digital-entertainment circles are focusing their efforts on turning the ubiquitous PC into a better-faster-cheaper brain for controlling high-end home-theater hardware. If these "home-theater PCs" take off, Toshiba, Mitsubishi, Sony and the rest of Japan Inc. had better watch out for brutal competition from the likes of Dell, Compaq and Gateway.