The only thing I would do different if I was starting again would be to build the thing into any old box & hide it away somewhere in the house. My place is an old victorian terrace, so for me that wasn't an option, hence the aesthetically saucy case, but in truth, I don't actually want a box in the front room per se, what I want is the benefit conferred.
My brother has a bespoke rackmount system in his place that is squirrelled away under the stairs & cable networked to screens & ceiling mount speakers all over his house, using xp media centre. The upshot of that is that he has a tv and a remote in every room, where I have to have a box in my front room. I do however have a couple of Linksys extenders that network my media centre round the house via powerline networks. Still boxes in each room, but far more discreet than a pc per room.
The thing about extenders though is that they were a little under powered and under developed and thus not all that popular with media centre heads and so have been discontinued. as time goes by, they're getting harder to find. Still ok in my view though