SageTV Media Center becomes the first full- featured personal video recorder/media center software product to offer placeshifting capabilities enabling users to access their live or recorded TV, music and photos on any PC when they are away from home. The integration of PVR and placeshifting functionality in a single system yields better video quality and faster navigation than a separate placeshifting box connected to a PVR while also costing significantly less than purchasing two separate solutions.

The new placeshifting functionality is available immediately as a $30 add-on to both the Windows and Linux OEM editions of just-released SageTV Media Center Version 5.0.

"Placeshifting lets you enjoy your personal digital media library anywhere in the world, and combining PVR and placeshifting capabilities solves the performance, complexity and cost problems created by standalone placeshifting solutions," said Mike Machado, CEO of Sage TV. "You don’t need an extra piece of hardware on your network, you don’t need to pay monthly subscription fees for a PVR service, you avoid the losses in video quality caused by having to rerecord the recorded video, and you don’t have to wait while the box sends IR commands to a PVR, records the TV signal and sends it for decoding."

Record in Chicago, Watch in Hong Kong
With SageTV’s new placeshifting feature, users can watch live or recorded TV from their home network as well as access their music and photo libraries from any PC with an Internet connection — whether in a hotel, office, airport, Wi-Fi café, at the pool or beach, or simply visiting family in another city. Watch your hometown news or ballgames from out of town, see a "Desperate Housewives" or "Survivor" episode from your PVR, play your favorite Nine Inch Nails or Nickelback tunes, and share your latest family snapshots wherever you are. No tuner card is required on the remote PC, and no extra hardware or software is required at home.

Share Video at Home Even in 802.11b Environments
In addition, SageTV’s new placeshifting function can be used to stream video to any computer or TV in the home, including PCs located in weak wireless signal areas or those equipped with older 802.11b Wi-Fi. Only the PC equipped with the core SageTV Media Center application needs a tuner card.

No Interference with Family Viewing
Unlike standalone placeshifting products that cannot support different programming simultaneously, SageTV Media Center allows family members at home or away, or in different locations in the house, to watch the programs of their choice without being affected by each other’s viewing habits. With one tuner in the SageTV-equipped PC at home, one user can watch any live or recorded TV while the other watches any recorded TV. With two tuners, both parties can also watch either live or recorded TV at the same time.

Full-Featured PVR with 14-Day EPG
These features extend the functionality of SageTV Media Center, a full-featured PVR that enables users to record a single show or whole season of their favorite television programs on their PCs; pause, rewind and fast-forward live or recorded cable, satellite or antenna TV shows; and record multiple shows on multiple tuners simultaneously. Integrated 14-day U.S., Canadian and European program guides are available directly from the SageTV interface, eliminating the need to switch to a separate online application to plan one’s TV viewing and recording.

For end users, SageTV eliminates the need to subscribe to a monthly digital video recording service or buy a new Windows XP MCE PC or Windows XP MCE operating system to obtain PVR/media center capabilities. For OEMs, the application makes it possible to build advanced multi-stream PVR products that also provide access to all music, photo and movies on the network from a single interface on Windows PCs or Linux PCs and embedded set-tops.

Specifications, Pricing and Availability
Version 5.0 of SageTV Media Center for Windows and SageTV Media Center Linux OEM Edition is available immediately at www.sagetv.com. The special introductory price for both the core application and the new placeshifting feature is $99.95, a $10 savings over purchasing the $79.95 PVR/media center software and $30 placeshifting option separately. A complete package including the SageTV application with placeshifting plus an Hauppage tuner card is $179.95. Addtiional concurrent placeshifting connections are available for $30 each.

Minimum system requirements for SageTV Media Center include an Intel Pentium III 600 MHz or AMD Athlon 600 MHz computer with Microsoft Windows 98SE, 2000 SP3 or higher, ME or XP (Home, Pro or MCE) and 128MB RAM (256MB recommended).