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Small form factor (SFF) PCs have become very popular as the basis for home made media playback machines. However, these can often be difficult to set up and often have limited functionality compared to more tailor made machines. For those of use that don’t have time to mess about modding our system and experimenting with tweaked versions of Linux to get it all working, AOpen has come to the rescue.

The XC Cube AV EA65-IIa 2.0 is the latest revision in the EA65 family of SFF systems from AOpen. Although the core of the system has stayed the same, the XC Cube AV EA65-IIa 2.0 supports several features that the earlier models didn’t.

The front of the cube is dominated by an LED display and a set of function buttons that sets it apart from most SFF systems on the market. These are used to control the various media playback features and to give you status information. AOpen has developed an application that can be used to customize the display and it can be downloaded for free from AOpen’s website. A remote control is also part of the package, so you don’t have to get up from the sofa to change channel.

Another inclusion is an AOpen branded TV-tuner card. These aren’t usually included in barebone systems but as this system is intended for media centre use, it makes sense. Not surprisingly it isn’t digital, but it does offer video input and has a built in FM tuner. This can be accessed either in Windows via InterVideo Home Theatre or if you don’t want to wait for Windows to boot up, through InterVideo InstantON. Some of the functionality is limited in InstantON mode, as you can’t use the XC Cube AV EA65-IIa 2.0 as a PVR this way.

But the beauty of InstantON is that it takes only a few seconds to start – not quite instant but close enough – and you have access to the TV-tuner, DVD and video playback as well as radio, CD and MP3 playback. It might not be quite as easy to use as a home DVD player or a stereo system, but together with InterVideo, AOpen has managed to create a pretty decent user interface.

Once your boot the machine fully, you’ll have InterVideo’s Home Theatre software to use a the main interface when using the PC at a distance with the remote. It’s very reminiscent of Windows XP Media Center Edition although it’s not as tightly integrated with the operating system. You have to set everything up here before you can use InstantON the first time, as the two are linked together. This affects DVD playback – as you have to set the correct region – tuning in the TV channels and selecting the directory were your MP3 files are stored.

Recorded TV programs are captured in MPEG2, rather than MPEG4, which is a shame as it takes up far more space. Recordings are of reasonable quality, and do a decent enough job with the analogue source.

The XC Cube AV EA65-IIa 2.0 also has built in memory card readers which support Compact Flash Type I/II, Smart Media, SD, MMC and Memory Stick formats.

The motherboard in this XC Cube is based on the 865 chipset and can only be used with Socket-478 processors, which makes it far from a cutting edge machine. This is however, a small issue if you’re going to use the XC Cube AV EA65-IIa 2.0 purely as a media centre rather than a gaming PC.

If you’re about to upgrade your main PC or have some spare parts knocking about the EA65-IIa 2.0 could make a good home for them. There are plenty of connectivity options, both internally and externally. There are two IDE controllers and two SATA connectors for more recent devices.