I finally gave in a bought a mac mini. Microcenter is running a $100 rebate on the cheaper one. I have moved over the Battlestar Galatica episodes I bought on itunes and am loving front row. I have a dvi to hdmi cable enroute that should hopefully solve the wide screen issues. Till that comes I just have to use zoom on the tv to remove the black bars. I also experimented with handbrake to see what it was like to convert dvd’s to mpeg4 files and I can report success. After adding the test file to itunes I can use front row play back movie. This should remove the final laziness of having to take a dvd off the shelf and play it. I am also surprised at just how small the mac mini is compared to the mini-itx box it is currently sitting on top of. So I am happy and I got the thumbs up from the wife.