MediaPortal is a free tool to turn your home computer into a multimedia entertainment center. From its level we can listen to music, radio, watch movies, TV, view photos in the form of a slide show, record selected programmes and programs, as well as watch the weather forecast. MediaPortal is one of the most valued HTPC (Home Theater Personal Computer) software and is a great alternative to the Media Center module available in Windows.

Its characteristic feature, which is also one of the biggest advantages, is its modular design. It is up to the user to decide which functions of the tool he wants to use and which functions are to be available from the MediaPortal tool. By default, the offered functionality is very rich, and yet it can be further extended by means of publicly available plug-ins.

Once installed, the user is provided with a fully functional platform, which allows to play various multimedia from the computer level. All functions for working with multimedia are available from the appropriate tabs. Among them you will be able to play music, watch movies, DVD/VCD/SVCDs, listen to Internet radio, view weather forecast, TV program, and if your computer is equipped with a suitable TV/FM tuner, also watch TV and listen to the radio.

For the latter, the software supports analogue, digital DVB-T and satellite standards. Importantly, the software allows both manual and schedule-managed recording of selected materials on the hard disk. There are many advantages of MediaPortal, but the steps start when you go deeper into more advanced configuration options.

While the basic configuration, selection of appropriate codecs, etc. should not cause any problems to anybody, a more in-depth adaptation of the application to their own preferences is not so simple and intuitive. The operating software requires, among other things, a MySQL database system installed on the computer.

Although in most cases this type of solution is redundant, it is used to store information about the history of loaded and played media. This function could certainly be solved in a slightly simpler and less troublesome way. The software is available in Polish language version.

In addition to the many plugins that extend the functionality, graphic themes are supported. Thanks to this, we can freely change the appearance of our multimedia entertainment center. It is also worth noting that MediaPortal can work in server mode, sharing multimedia with other client devices.