WTF?? A Warning for Windows Media Center Edition 2005

[daveybrat]

I just built a very nice rig for a customer who wanted Windows Media Center Edition 2005 windows with the microsoft remote control. Everything went perfectly smooth until the video card drivers needed to go on.
It's a brand new ATI 9800Pro All-in-Wonder card that i thought would be perfect for Media Center windows with all of it's capture and TV abilities..........guess i was wrong!!

I first used the drivers off of the cd and everything installed but.....Windows on reboot said 'drivers not compatible with media center edition' and there were lots of unknown devices under device manager.

First thought was that it was just older drivers and of course i'll go to ati's site and get all the latest.
I formatted the pc again and downloaded all the latest drivers and multimedia center and installed everthing in the correct order.

Same problem!!

Frustrated i started actually reading on ATI's site and sure enough, here's what i found to my major dismay:

ALL-IN-WONDER? and VIVO variants are not currently supported under Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. Certified/compatible RADEON? PC Graphic Cards or Integrated Graphics Products are optimized for Microsoft's Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 when coupled with a supported TV or DTV Tuner product, such as the ATI E-HOME WONDER?.

Greeaaaat, so i just bought a 9800pro AIW that i can't return and also have a customer that's going to be pissed off?? Or i could just wait maybe months for a driver to release and ask my customer to wait..........sure.....

Well, this is just a warning for AIW users!

 

[dguy6789]

Never build a system without doing research. Take 15 minutes of time and this could have been avoided.

 

[rbV5]

There are some hacked drivers, but I wouldn't set up a customer with them. The card itself is supported, I use my AIW9700pro and it works great...just not the tuner. Adding a supported card won't be too expensive since you now have everything else.

I use ATI eHome Wonder cards for my analog tuners for MCE and they work great (the AIW's YPbPr will come in handy if your customer has a DTV to connect to), Newegg has them cheap. Hauppage PVR series cards are also well supported the 150 model is relatively inexpensive.

Go to thegreenbutton for good MCE info.

 

[daveybrat]

Never build a system without doing research. Take 15 minutes of time and this could have been avoided.

hmmmmm.......and where was i supposed to find this information at? I couldn't find anything at Microsofts's site and even at ATI's site i couldn't find it except at the very end when i found that little blurb.
In fact i still can't find a site that gives a "list" of compatible Tuners for use with MCE.

Does anyone know if the Leadtek series of cards are compatible? Like the ones from newegg, the Leadtek TV2000 XP Expert TV Tuner?

Thanks again guys!

 

[rbV5]

Originally posted by: daveybrat

Never build a system without doing research. Take 15 minutes of time and this could have been avoided.

hmmmmm.......and where was i supposed to find this information at? I couldn't find anything at Microsofts's site and even at ATI's site i couldn't find it except at the very end when i found that little blurb.
In fact i still can't find a site that gives a "list" of compatible Tuners for use with MCE.

Does anyone know if the Leadtek series of cards are compatible? Like the ones from newegg, the Leadtek TV2000 XP Expert TV Tuner?

Thanks again guys!

No, software encoder cards will not be supported. The eHome Wonder card and Hauppage PVR cards I mentioned are hardware MPEG encoder cards.

In addition to thegreenbutton.com xpmce.com is another good source of info.

 

[daveybrat]

thanks rbV5, i'm looking on there right now...Looks like my only feasible option is the ATI eHome FM card for now.

Thanks!

 

[rbV5]

Originally posted by: daveybrat
thanks rbV5, i'm looking on there right now...Looks like my only feasible option is the ATI eHome FM card for now.

Thanks!

I got my model w/fm tuner for ~$70 OEM from Newegg. ATI just released a 100% MCE compatable DVD decoder yesterday as well.

 

[daveybrat]

yeah, that's the one i was looking at with FM. Looks good to me

 

[kuljc]

Thanks for the warning... I was thinking of using MCE for some customers comps too.