Does anybody own a Windows Media Center PC?

[bmacd]

Do you have any problems with it? Is it worth installing over XP Pro?

-=bmacd=-

 

[VivaLasVegas]

posted March 02, 2004 09:39 PM
PC:Fry's model- FS7470
Microsoft® Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004
Processor: Intel® Pentium® 4 processor 3.0GHz with Intel® Hyper-Threading Technology
Secondary-Level Cache (L2) : 512Kb advanced transfer cache
Front Side Bus: 800MHz
Memory: 512MB Dual Channel DDR SDRAM (expandable to 4GB)
Memory Speed: 3200 MB/sec
Hard Drive: 160GB 7200rpm Ultra DMA
Motherboard: ECS PF1
Optical Drive 1: Sony 4x DVD+R/+RW/-R/-RW Burner
Optical Drive 2: 16x DVD-ROM
Flash Drive: 8-in-1 Media Card Drive (Compact Flash, Secure Digital, Multimedia Card, MicroDrive, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, SmartMedia, xD Picture Memory)
Floppy Drive: 3.5" (1.44MB)
Video Graphics: ATI RADEON 9600 8x AGP Video Graphics Card
Video Memory: 128MB DDR with VGA and DVI connectors for dual monitor support
TV Tuner: Hauppauge TV Tuner Card
Audio: Onboard AC'97 Audio
Network Card: 10/100/1000 Integrated Network Connectivity
Modem: 56K Modem V.92 Standard
USB 2.0 Ports: 6 (2 on Front, 4 on Back)
IEEE 1394 Ports: 2 (1 on Front, 1 on Back)
Other Ports:
2 PS/2 ports for Keyboard and Mouse
1 Serial port
1 Parallel port
1 Video port
1 External Serial ATA port
1 Line-in, 1 Line-out, 1 Microphone
DIMM Slots: 4 (2 open)
PCI Slots: 6 (4 open)
Drive Bays (Full): 4 (2 open)
Drive Bays (1/2): 5 (2 open)
Accessories:
Wireless Smart Office/MultiMedia Keyboard
Wireless Optical Mouse with Scroll Wheel
Creative 5.1 Inspire Surround Sound Speakers
Microphone
Power Supply: 350 Watts

Monitor: Sony WEGA 36" flatscreen HDTV/DVI
720by480 pixel (excellent for gaming)

both TV & PC are silver

my HTPC setup, more for gaming

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: bmacd
Do you have any problems with it? Is it worth installing over XP Pro?
-=bmacd=-

MCE is not available standalone, therefore the 'is it worth installing over XP pro' doesn't apply.
Bill

 

[bmacd]

Originally posted by: bsobel

Originally posted by: bmacd
Do you have any problems with it? Is it worth installing over XP Pro?
-=bmacd=-

MCE is not available standalone, therefore the 'is it worth installing over XP pro' doesn't apply.
Bill

I received it as part of a beta testing package and never had the opportunity to use it. So yes, installing it is still an option.

-=bmacd=-

 

[thegorx]

I'm interested in this LinDVD idea


LinDVD

It would be neat to see a OS that was strickly geared to multimedia
something you could easily dual boot and user friendly

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: thegorx
I'm interested in this LinDVD idea


LinDVD

It would be neat to see a OS that was strickly geared to multimedia
something you could easily dual boot and user friendly

Check out here
And here

That's mythsettopbox, a attempt to make a dedicated multimedia box easy for people to setup. The Knoppmyth link is to a bootable Knoppix liveCD that has will turn your PC into a MythTV based PVR machine.

MythTV is a program for linux to try to turn your computer into a PVR, that is you can pause, rewind, play, and record "live" tv ala the linux-based TiVO.

Obviously it's easier and cheaper to just go and buy a TiVO, but this way you can set it up the way you want.

I am currently in the proccess of building a multimedia hub for a hobby.

The OS is Fedora Core1. It uses a Via vt400-based motherboard with 512 megs of ram, 2400+ Athlon (will end up being slightly overclocked), 120gig WD "special edition" with the 8meg cache, and a Gforce4 mx420pci card with tv out (orginally used for running dual monitors + TV with my main desktop, will replace with a AGP card eventually. Also plan on adding another 512 megs of RAM, DVD burner, and probably a big 250gig+ HD for long-term storage)

For TV capture cards I am using a older ATI wonder VE (low end value model) and a Happauge WinTV PVR-250 with hardware mpeg2 encoder. (If you want 2 capture cards you need to have at least one that sends sound thru the pci bus. My model ATI capture card sends sound seperately thru a line out into line in on my audio card).

So then I can get picture-in-picture stuff with MythTV and be able to watch one tv show while recording another.

For software I plan on using Mythtv and then VideoLan server for streaming tv shows and stuff like DVD movies to my roomate's computer and my main desktop.

Also going to use it as a 802.11g-based wireless access point (bridge realy) for my laptop, that way it should be fast enough to stream decent media to that computer, too.

My main network is a 100Mb/s ethernet operating off of a cheap switch in full duplex mode giving me a total of 200Mb/s amount of bandwidth from computer to computer. That should give me plenty of bandwidth for even the highest quality DVD stuff.

Also am going to mess around with using VideoLan to stream tv shows out into the internet. Obviously in heavily encoded form. But since it supports multicasting I can send one stream out and have several people leach from it via the internet's mbone network(my own personal usage/entertainment though, no need to violate any laws here.) (I need to get a router/firewall that supports multicasting first though.)

It's going to take a lot of time and effort to get all this working though, but it's fun to do.

 

[bsobel]

I received it as part of a beta testing package and never had the opportunity to use it. So yes, installing it is still an option.

There are no current beta packages which include MCE (except SP2, but that is an update, not a full version), so I presume your refering to MSDN. If your going to install the MCE build, I highly recommend you insure that the hardware in your machine matches the HCL exactly, MCE isn't tested at all with drivers and cards that it isn't certified for. You should be able to install ontop no problem, but I'd suggest a clean install (but I almost always suggest a clean install )

Bill

 

[Tsunami982]

Please do not ask for "copies" of MS software.

AnandTech Moderator

 

[wallsfd949]

Originally posted by: Tsunami982
would you be able to send me a copy of your mce?

Doesn't that = piracy?

 

[Need4Speed]

Originally posted by: Tsunami982
would you be able to send me a copy of your mce? ill pay for your shipping and throw in a couple bucks for the trouble.

I recommend you edit out your post before the mods come along and do it for you...