September 13 - Walking around the CEDIA show floor, there are thousands upon thousands of products on display, but since most of them have similar designs, you don’t often do a double-take.

But when I saw Moneual’s new I*magine media PC, that’s just what happened. The I*magine home media PC system looks nothing like a traditional desktop computer, or even a Windows Media Center PC, although that’s essentially what it is.

Designed for people looking for a more unique form factor and user experience in their home entertainment system, the I*magine has the appearance of a tricked-out boombox, and comes in a variety of flashy colors.

And the curiosities don’t end there. You can sit the I*magine horizontally on a table top—next to an HDTV, most likely—or mount it vertically on a stand like a speaker.

You can use Windows Media Center to manage the system, or Moneual’s own custom-built “Revo” multimedia interface, which has easily-recognizable icons for its various functions.

When you want to play music and videos, or just surf the Web, you can click an icon on the 7-inch LCD touch-screen that sits on the front face of the unit, or deliver voice commands to its remote control.

Next year, the company is even planning on adding a motion detector to the PC so users can navigate the system with hand movements.

Built on the Windows Vista Home Premium platform, the I*magine is fitted with an Intel Core 2 Duo T7700 processor with 4GB of DDR2 memory, 750GB of hard-disk storage, a Panasonic DVD/RW drive, an HDMI 1.3 port, and 5.1-channel analog audio outputs.

I*magine also uses the latest Mobile on Desktop (MoDT) platform from Intel, which is designed to be quieter, cooler, and more efficient than normal desktop PC systems. The I*magine will cost around $5,000, and mass production is expected later this year.

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