Zinc is a web browser that’s been rejiggered to look like a media center application. Peer inside the thing and you find a heaping helping of Firefox 3.0.10. To make this relationship even more obvious, launch Zinc, place your cursor where the menu bar should be, and click the Restore button in the upper-right corner of the menu bar. Suddenly the Firefox interface appears—complete with address field, navigations buttons, and History, Bookmarks, and Tools menus. At this point you’re welcome to use it as you would any other web browser. When you’re ready to return to the Zinc interface, just click the Zinc button in the toolbar.

Within the Zinc interface you find navigation commands arrayed along the left side of the screen and 25 large icons representing content channels to the right. The navigation commands include Zv Presents (a view of the main channels offered by Zinc), Favorites, New, History, ZvHDTV (tutorials about using the company’s go-between box), Settings, Help, and Exit. The channels include such old favorites as Netflix, Fox, CBS, ABC, Hulu, MTV, Nickelodeon, and ESPN. Internet-only channels such as YouTube, Yahoo, Revision 3, and CollegeHumor are also represented.

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