windows vista

One of the first things I noticed when I set up my home theater PC running Vista Media Center is that there are some pretty cool online features. You can watch a huge library of music video's MTV's Overdrive interface for MCE, or watch The Daily Show on Comedy Central's Motherload page.

There are also a ton of obvious online features missing. For example, no built in weather forecast application? What's up with that? Luckily there are plugins for pretty much anything you could ever need (including weather forecasts).

But what about podcasts and video blogs? Surely there must be an easy way to download and enjoy online media from Media Center's 10-foot interface. Well, there kind of is. You can subscribe to feeds and automatically download enclosures with Internet Explorer 7 or the podcatcher of your choice. Then you can tell Windows Media Center to monitor your download folder and your files will show up in your My Videos and My Music folders. This is hardly an elegant solution, so here's a few better options for you:

So you've been meaning to turn your old PC into a home theater machine, but you're not quite sure where to begin. The MCE-Components database includes a huge list of TV tuners, CPUs, graphics cards, motherboards and operating systems used in media center PCs.

The database was built on information from users who have built their own systems, and you get to benefit from their mistakes (and successes). Want to know if that Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-1600 TV tuner will work with your Abit-NF M2? Just browse the TV tuner section, find your tuner and then check to see if anyone's used it with your motherboard. Or vice versa.

Right now the database consists of 100+ systems and counting. You can add to the wisdom of the masses by contributing your information.

[via The Green Button]

Alienware has launched its Hangar18 line of high end home theater PCs. Looks like we were off a few months on the timing, and about $1000 on the pricing when we first told you about Alienware's newest HTPCs last year.

The Hanger18 machines come loaded with Windows Vista Home Premium, AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual core processores, up to 4GB of DDR2 RAM, and integrated NVIDIA graphics with support for 720p or 1080p HDMI out, as well as VGA, S-Video and analog outputs.

You'll also get a dual analog/HDTV tuner, and support for up to 4 tuners total. The base unit ships with 250GB of storage, but supports a max of 2TB. And of course there's all the usual goodies like 802.11b/g, firewire, and USB support. There's also an integrated 4-in-1 flash memory card reader.

Hangar18 units start at $1999, but you can easily trick this puppy out to eat a much larger chunk of your life's savings.

[via Dave Zatz]

Blue's supposed to be a nice calm, soothing color. But what if you want a bit more passion in your Windows Vista Media Center interface?

MediaCenterFX is designed to give you a boatload of options for changing the way Vista Media Center looks and sounds. You can download custom themes or design your own.

You can change everything from the background colors to the sounds that will play on different actions. You can also tweak image sizes and background animations.

The latest version of MediaCenterFX is in alpha, but you can sign up to test the product at the MediaCenterFX forums.

[via Chris Lanier]

Exceptional Innovation, the company behind Life|ware home automation for Windows Media Center machines is launching its own PC line. Life|media servers will include home automation features to control your lights, security and heating and cooling system. But like any good media center PC, these high end machines are optimized for media.

With prices starting at $4,500, the media servers pack Intel Core 2 Duo or quad-core chips, up to 4GB of RAM, up to 4.5TB of HDD space in a RAID 5 array, support for CableCarrd, NTSC/ATSC tunors, and HD-DVD/Blu-Ray optical drives. There's also an optical audio out, an NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS graphics card, a 28-in-1 card reader, and your usual assortment of HDMI, DVI, S-Video, composite, serial, USB 2.0, Firewire, and IR inputs and outputs.

[via Engadget]

TiVo recently released a public beta of TiVo Desktop 2.4 with support for displaying high definition photos and sharing content from more folders on your PC. Unfortunately, the current release doesn't play nice with Windows Vista -- unless you're willing to get your hands a little dirty.

A PVRblog reader submitted his workaround. Essentially, it involves using Microsoft's Orca database editor to alter some settings in the TiVo Desktop installer. You have to install TiVo Desktop 2.4 as an administrator, and when you're told that you can't go any further because Vista's not supported, you stop the install process, find the temporary installer file, edit it, rename it as TiVoToGo24.msi and you can install the program on Windows Vista.

It's easier than it sounds, if you just follow the step by step directions on PVRblog. Of course, this raises the question, if it's this easy to make the program work with Windows Vista, why didn't TiVo do it?

Now that most computers on sale at your local Best Buy or Circuit City are running Windows Vista Home Premium, there are a lot of folks out there with Windows Media Center, although they might not realize it. You can use your PC just fine without ever looking at its 10-foot interface.

Still, market research firm In-Stat projects that nearly 51 million TV tuners will be sold by around the wold 2011. That could turn what's now a niche market into a multi-billion dollar industry.

Most consumers will probably find a TV tuner bundled with their PC running Windows Vista. But those numbers also include USB tuners and CableCard tuners that probably won't be bundled with many PCs.

Hopefully as the market for PC-based personal video recorders grows we'll see more innovations in the software market with more companies developing commercial plugins for Windows Media Center. Of course, there are plenty of free plugins available today to do everything from singing karaoke to checking the weather forecasts. But there's plenty of incentive for developers to think outside the box with a potential customer base of 51-million people.

[via The Green Button]

Microsoft has released an update for Windows Vista Media Center. The April 2007 Cumulative Update is available for x86 and x64 systems and includes the following features and bug fixes:

• Online media support for the 64-bit version of Windows Media Center on Windows Vista Home Premium and Windows Vista Ultimate
• Video playlist support for Media Center extenders
• Improved caching
• Support for some combo TV tuners
• Fixed bug that caused video playback to stop when resizing the Media Center window
• Fixed bug that caused video to freeze when playing some DVDs
• Fixed some cover art and photo problems.

[via Aaron Stebner's Weblog]

High end PC maker HiPe PC has announced a new in-car PC running Windows Vista Home Premium with Windows Media Center.

The Drive-N car PC comes in a variety of models, with base prices starting at $800 and going up to $1600. All models include voice control courtesey of OneVoice Media Center Communicator.

Options include BlueTooth, GPS, and rear-view cameras. You can also get WiFi and GSM receivers to connect to the internet and check traffic for traffic while you're stuck in it.

Oh yeah, and you can listen to the radio, mp3s, CDs, or watch DVDs on the included touchscreens, ranging in size from 6.5 inches to 15 inches. You can even get an external TV tuner, antenna, and remote for watching live TV on the go.

[via Electronista]

Computer users running Windows Vista with Windows Media Center will soon be able to download and purchase original content from Showtime, including full episodes, cast information, and various video highlights. Unfortunately, this is only available to people running Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate and not to folks like myself still running Windows Media Center on Windows XP. I've been meaning to upgrade, but I'm an extremely lazy man.

I've already said it about a million times, but I'm always happy to see evidence of this sometimes atavistic industry's realization that "television" no longer refers to just the "TV set." As more and more people turn to the Web to see their favorite programs, partnerships like this make a lot of sense. More ways to watch means more people watching, and that's never a bad thing.

Exceptional Innovation is demonstrating CableCard support in Windows Vista at the Electronic Home Expo. CE Pro reports that Exceptional Innovation has a demo unit consisting of a Sony XL3 Media Center PC and 1080p Sony Bravia TV.

Up until now, the only way to get high definition programming on a PC running Windows Media Center was with a HDTV card that can pick up over-the-air broadcasts.

Niveus will also be showing off the ability to stream CableCard content to multiple Xbox 360s serving as Media Center Extenders at the Electronic Home Expo. Of course, all the demos in the world aren't going to help your local cable guy better understand how to install CableCards in your PC. TiVo Series3 owners are full of stories of cable installers trying to put CableCards in the TV rather than the TiVo.

Microsoft seems to have left out from Windows Vista the ability to log in to your PC without logging out another user. While this was something that was technically only supported on earlier Windows Server products, there was an easy hack that allowed you to replace a dll file in Windows XP.

Okay, so why is this important? Well, if you want to update your Windows Vista machine or access some files on it, but someone's currently using the media center application to watch a movie, you pretty much have to wait until they're finished watching, take over the machine until you're done, and then deal with an angry spouse.

On the other hand, if you could login from a remote computer without logging off the first user, one user could continue to use the media center while the other user performs tasks in the background.

Well, as tends to happen when Microsoft leaves a useful feature out of their operating systems, the user community finds a way to enable it. The fine folks at The Green Button are working on a hack. Unfortunately one of the primary developers had his computer (with the source code) stolen the other day, which could slow the progress.

[via Missing Remote]

Doug Berrett plans to release an update to Webguide 4.0 for Windows Vista. The program already lets you schedule recordings on your home theater PC from any web connected PC or Windows Mobile PDA. But why bother opening a web browser if you don't have to?

The latest update will show your guide, recorded programs and upcoming recordings in a Vista Sidebar Gadget. You can set it up to show the latest info for the PC its installed on, or you can configure the gadget to work with a remote machine, allowing you to keep track of your recordings while you're slacking off at the office.

[via Ian Dixon]