You can watch some movies from DVD, listen to music and if you own a TV-adapter you are even able to watch TV on your computer. Then why do you still have all those other equipment like TV"s, stereo, ... The answer to this question is rather simple and obvious: practical use! Without the desired comfort, the pc will never aside the standard entertainment equipment.
Remote controls are nowadays very common. In almost every house there are 5 or 6 present to help us, lazy people in being even more lazy :-).
Actually it"s very strange why PC"s aren"t equipped with a standard remote control interface. A lot of motherboards are equipped with an IRDA port but this isn"t compatible with the frequencies (38 kHz) used in regular remote controls.
But Heatseekers to the rescue: with just a few components and a little bit of software we can make our own IR-receiver. We will be able to control every application on our pc from a distance up to 30 meters. And this with a unit from an old TV or stereo.