Windows XP Media Center Edition Review 407
Harpreet writes "It took 2 months but someone finally published an informative review of the new
Windows XP Media Center Edition operating system. AnandTech's
review has got everything you could want, including pictures galore. It looks
like the folks who make the Linux based Video
Disk Recorder have a new standard to live up to." Update: 01/08 21:06 GMT by T : Read on below for a different (Free software, CD-based) approach to computer-A/V integration.
Trunkboy writes "There are a lot of PVR projects out there (Freevo, TiVo, Dave&Dina, etc... but MoviX is a little different. MoviX is an entire distribution (linux of course) that is designed to play avi/mpg/mp3/etc files from a computer. Upgrading is easy, because it boots from a CD! Videos/music can be stored on a local hard drive, or on a network share. This project is incredible, but needs more developers. Stop in and give Roberto a hand -- MoviX shows some great potential!"
Well (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Well (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Well (Score:3, Interesting)
Piracy is a real problem and I have spoke out vigorously against stealing intellectual property of any kind.
However, DRM destroys our fair use rights as defined under copyright law. It's not good for the consumer. It's being pushed by a Software monopoly that has already been found guilty of breaking antitrust laws and an entertainment cartel that fixes prices and lobbies (bribes) our politicians in order to subvert justice.
Re:Well (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Well (Score:3, Insightful)
107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use38
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include-
(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.
Re:Well (Score:2, Informative)
You can only imagine what it sends when you record tv....
Re:Well (Score:5, Funny)
I don't trust my win-box farther than I can throw it (which happens to be approximatly 7,5 meters if detached from all cables.)
Re:Well (Score:5, Insightful)
Putting a firewall on a box that's already running hostile code is a non-starter in terms of security. Remember, Microsoft has complete access to your system, and can do whatever they want to your firewall, including ignoring it completely. You'd be much better off front-ending your XP box with a firewall running on a Linux machine.
Re:Well (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Evidence? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Evidence? (Score:2)
Re:Well (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_me
Re:Well (Score:3, Funny)
Freevo (Score:4, Insightful)
I doubt that.. (Score:5, Interesting)
3. Profit.
I don't think they have any grudge for Tivo, they just would like to make money off anything they can.
Microsoft has a wonderful monopoly going. Everyone knows they want/need a computer, and it comes packaged with so many things that most people don't have any idea what they bought it for.
They just continue to package things in it that people will use. Tivo may never make it, but when Microsoft can just bundle things together, you will.
I don't like corn, but if i had to buy it at the store every time I bought carrots, I would own a lot of corn, and you would never know I hated it.
Check out MythTV!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
The project mentioned in the topic is only for DBS satelite users. For everyone else, check out MythTV [mythtv.org]. This project is so impressive I cannot even explain all its features here. Just go look at it yourself. It is amazing, does almost everything TiVo does (including interactive electronic program guide), plus is a MAME front end, CD player, image browser, and more. Make sure to check out the screenshots!
Re:Check out MythTV!!! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Check out MythTV!!! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Check out MythTV!!! (Score:2)
Tivo's revised service agreement. (Score:4, Interesting)
This is Tivo's new service agreement in PDF [tivo.com], and here is Google's copy of Tivo's service agreement converted to HTML [216.239.51.100].
Unfortunately I'm unable to dig up the agreement I originally signed on for to comparision, but the following are changes from the previous agreement:
This is fairly subtle, but the previous agreement basically just said that service consisted of program guide information. Nothing else. The other features were implicitly part of the unit you purchased. Sure, the features weren't terribly useful without guide information, but if you could find another way to provide guide data those feature would work. Now they're claiming that if you fail to pay you have no rights at all these features which are entirely managed within the unit.
Given the helpful definitions of features in the previous section, TiVo is clearly reserving the right to remove Season Passes, WishList, Smart Recording, TiVo Suggestions, Parental Controls and other functionality. Sure, it seems unlikely that they'll take such features away, but why are they asking for the right to? Those are specifically the features they advertised the Tivo as having, and the reason I bought mine.
But I can terminate the service if I don't like it? Given the new changes, my Tivo effectively becomes a giant paperweight. And (checking Section 13), my lifetime subscription that I paid for before this change will not be refunded in any way, so I'm especially S.O.L..
The rest of the section is pretty reasonable, but this little clause is unreasonable. I purchased my Tivo specifically because they were very open and had a "You void your warrantee, and we won't support you, but feel free to hack on your Tivo" policy. I wanted to support that behavior. This effectively reverses the decision. No more hard drive expansion hacks. To heck with that.
In practice it looks like they only use this to record the silly promos I see on my main menu. That I don't mind. What I do mind is that this implies that they can preempt my normal recording to record their ads. That I object to. I doubt they ever will preempt my programming, but why not state as much in the policy?
When I purchased a lifetime subscription, I understood that the lifetime in question was for the unit, not me. I figured it just meant that if the system failed I'd need to pay to get it repaired. This working left me fearing that they may claim that once a Tivo experiences any failure that they can claim that its lifetime is over and cancel the service. Since my Tivo actually experienced a modem failure nine months into its life, this seems like a real risk to me. (On a related note, it looks like Tivo modems are fragile, thus products like this one [9thtee.com]. Get your Tivo on a phone line surge supressor!)
I brought up all of these complaints to Tivo support when I became aware of them. I got a form letter back that failed to address the issues I brought up. Feh.
or you could try DAVE/DINA (Score:3, Informative)
At the moment MythTV has beter TV-options, better layout and a better logo
DaveDina has more AUDIO options, at the moment.
Re:Check out MythTV!!! (Score:3, Funny)
What it does:
*Basic 'live-tv' functionality. Pause/Fast Forward/Rewind "live" TV.
*[lots of other really cool stuff]
hmmm... that IS a cool feature...Fast Forward live TV.
I'd think the box would pay for itself in a matter of days, I'll just watch CNBC and keep my Ameritrade account open and ready to go.
Re:Check out MythTV!!! (Score:5, Informative)
Ever heard of the LiRC [sf.net] project? Myth fully supports all liRC remotes.
Re:Check out MythTV!!! (Score:3, Interesting)
I am using Girder now (Girder and LIRC/WinLIRC can also work in concert). I have girder on WinXP Pro using an ATI AIW128pro hooked to my living room TV. I built a $9.00 IR receiver (parts all from RadioShack) so that I could use my One-for-all programmable/learning/pc programable remote to play DVD/CD/Winamp without needing to touch the wireless kb/mouse.
The setup is pretty painless, I can schedule shows or use a transmitter to send DVD broadcasts to my kids' or wife's room, if someone is watching something else on the TV. I can watch something on cable, record something on the PC, and record something else on the VCR if need be. The One-for-all is a great remote for the price and has good punch through and macro features so I don't have to do alot of key mashing just to watch a DVD or play the VCR (i.e. First turn off the cable then hit VCR then change to channel 00 then hit tv/vcr then hit DVD then power then play - JUST HIT MACRO1). After I get the IR transmitter built I won't have to use the MACRO1 button GIRDER or LIRC will take care of manipulating the VCR/CableBox.
The other nice thing about this setup is that I can watch TV while someone else plays a game on the PC or browses the net(with the headphones on). Unfortunately if I want to use the "live TV mode" of the computer it has to be free from other users.
Of course (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Of course (Score:4, Funny)
In the mean time... (Score:2)
Standards? (Score:5, Funny)
It looks like the folks who make the Linux based Video Disk Recorder have a new standard to live up to.
Yes, the Linux VDR people will have to figure out how to hide spyware in their (open) source code.
Some things are better left off the computer (Score:5, Insightful)
I use a TiVo instead of piping my cable through my computer for a reason.
Its the same reason I have a football games on my GameCube.
Some things are just better without the PC.
Why would I use awkward PVR abilities of my PC (requiring me to sit in a specific spot, and use a mouse) when I can plop down on my couch and pick up the TiVo remote?
There's a reason speciliazed components sell better than PC software geared to do the same thing.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Informative)
As the article notes, there is a remote available for the MCE PC. There are also 3rd party remotes available if you want to build your own home theater PC.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Interesting)
Plus w/ replayTV you can just use DVarchive (http://dvarchive.sourceforge.net/) to offload your shows to your PC and stream them back to your replaytv whenever you want.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.9thtee.com/tivoquaddrive.htm
The upgrade process on a tivo has been mainstreamed enough that upgrading your tivo drive is a pretty easy job.
The main difference between MCE and Tivo is that on MCE a 93gb disk gets you 5 hours and change of recording at best. A 40gb Tivo gets you the same amount of time, so until Micro$oft stops using a bloated encoding system you're not getting value for your disk space.
Personally, I still wouldn't trust MCE as my primary PVR. I don't want something that can be that flaky when recording stuff I want to watch.
My Tivo does a wonderful job for that, and in 3 years my Tivo has never crashed. This is where you want to spend money: Linux is designed to remain up for infinite periods of time, and that has always been an issue that Microsoft has been weak on. You can make MS platforms reliable if you are willing to take the time and devote energy to it. I know, I manage a large mix of MS and Linux platforms. My linux platforms have always been "install and mostly forget" servers. All I do it keep them updated and tidy up sometimes. My MS platforms need babying, they are always finding a different way to require attention, and when MS needs attention *everything* stops until you fix it.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, if you'd bothered to read some of my past comments you would've noted that I recommend AVSforum for HTPC needs, and that they've been doing HDTV time shifting for two years now. I know quite well of what I speak.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:4, Interesting)
They would have done better to design a simple set-top box that you put on your TV and has all the fancy interfaces on the TV screen and the remote and all that, and which records the shows on an internal hard drive which is then accessible from your PC (through a Firewire, USB2, or even an ethernet cable), so that you can download/manage the files from your PC (which is good at that).
Why buy a whole PC and leave it sitting next to your TV, afraid to use it for other things (like playing that LAN game of UT2003 when friends come round!) because then it might crash or somehow fail to record the show you wanted recorded??
Daniel
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Insightful)
You don't have to worry about spyware telling somebody what shows you recorded, and then having it tell someone everytime you watch it.
Those are the advantages of using a computer. as far as asthetics, get a case that matches your entertainment center.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Insightful)
You may really need a big ass expensive machine to do this right. Also, one other concern that they didn't address is sound. When my Tivo is recording and the room is silent, I can barely pick up the hard drive writing sounds. No fan, no other hum, nothing. Would you really expect that from a PC? I used to have a server in the room with dual CPUs and 3 hard drive (one SCSI monster) which made my room sound like you were in a car on the highway. Even after removing SCSI drive and one IDE drive, and otherwise altering the fans, it's still too loud for the living room.
My point is just that having a PC vs. having an appliance involves more than just upgradeability. One of the reasons that modifying an appliance should void a warranty is that Tivo or ReplayTV can make assumptions about cooling, noise, and ventilation based on their tests on fixed hardware. You throw those out the window if you decide to put a 10000 RPM drive into your Tivo.
Also, aesthetically, the HP they used didn't really look like it belongs in my entertainment center... it's vertically oriented, has a keyboard (!!!), and it otherwise annoying.
Anyway, I guess if you have a spare PC or lots of money and want to get upgradeability in a familiar setup, go for it. I'd rather stick with my Tivo, with it's known privacy issues and have a quiet living room with low power consumption. I can see a place for both, and I'm sure people will buy the one that makes the most sense for them.
Sujal
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:2)
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:2)
That is exactly why I didn't agree with Microsoft when they said that video streaming was going to power the next generation of PCs. Why would I want to sit at my PC for a couple of hours and watch a movie on my monitor??
Lots of people have entertainment centers that allow the whole family to be comfortable while watching movies. I just can't see my family croweded around my PC watching "The Two Towers."
Oh well, to each his own I guess.
Re:Some things are better left off the computer (Score:3, Informative)
This is different than Microsoft's strategy, as Apple is positioning its machines as the traffic controller, helping disparate devices exchange the relevant data. How about dumping your faves from TiVo onto your iMac and burning your own archive DVDs? How about a video iPod that can take your TiVo's recordings on the road? Or pictures from your digital camera into a TiVo album/slide show?
Not interesting enough? Well, Apple's opened the source of Rendevous, and has no qualms about allowing a Linux adaptation of it! Apparently they want to compete on the basis of their hardware/software integration again, not just on lockout.
So now we have two opposing philosophies: Microsoft's "embrace and extend", and Apple's "digital hub". One wants to take over the whole show, the other wants to connect and choreograph.
Re:your sig. (Score:2, Funny)
ha, ha..
just kidding
Re:I just had a vision of the future (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, imagine the power of controlling a media center pc. All kinds of information flowing through that one device would just be too tempting to attack and manipulate. Imagine rewriting email messages, rewording web pages or even altering news broadcasts to be more favorable to your corporation. How many people get most (if not all) of their news from the internet and tv? Talk about a serious chokepoint to control information dispersal.
Kinda scary if you ask me.
MSFT marches on.... (Score:5, Insightful)
------
Anand also wrote about MCE in (Score:3, Informative)
Lack of ATI support (Score:2, Informative)
Personally, I think I'll stick with my ATI card and Video Disk Recorder.
Re:Lack of ATI support (Score:2)
A hardware MPEG2 encoding/decoding board is what is needed for the Media Center OS.
direct link (Score:5, Informative)
Want to know why it took that long? (Score:5, Funny)
I took me that long to get it installed.
An unstoppable marketing blitz.... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:An unstoppable marketing blitz.... (Score:2, Funny)
*... taking notes
*... taking notes
*... taking notes
Dude, how do you spell 'PC'?
Hmm... (Score:2)
I don't want a PC. I want a nice AV unit in my component rack, like my TiVo. But the TiVo is getting dated. I need high def support. I need faster processing so I don't get annoyed at the menus. I think if you'd put the TiVo interface on the RePlay hardware we'd have a hit. Good interface with the best features.
Why do you need all this? (Score:2)
Bring your Lawyers! (Score:5, Funny)
Before you can proceed in the program guide setup you have to scroll through the 44 pages of the Terms of Service and select agree. Once again, this is done fairly quickly using the remote just by holding the down-arrow and then hitting ok.
That's good, sound advice there. Don't bother reading it.
44 Page EULA (Score:5, Funny)
From the article:
Before you can proceed in the program guide setup you have to scroll through the 44 pages of the Terms of Service and select agree. Once again, this is done fairly quickly using the remote just by holding the down-arrow and then hitting ok. (Emphasis added)
Reading 44 pages is hardly a quick task, no matter if you have a remote control, scrolling mouse, or whatever. Unless it reads like 44 pages from a Dr. Seuss book. Then I wouldn't mind so much.
You may not reverse engineer on a train, you may not reverse engineer in the rain. You may not share files with a fox, you may not let files leave this box...
Re:44 Page EULA (Score:2, Insightful)
So, basically, they didn't read it at all. If the reviewers can't be bothered, will the users be?
For all we know, it might say in there that you need to give your first born to Bill G.
Re:44 Page EULA (Score:3, Funny)
It's not exactly Seussian, but it does rhyme =) (taken from the actual Win2K Pro EULA on my system):
More cliches (Score:5, Insightful)
We need to develop some sort of global cache list so we can add the following from the article:
Isn't this a bit of an exageration? Obviously, they can't be "infinately" more powerful, but are they even considerably more powerful? I'm not too familiar with the spec's on PVR's, but I would bet they aren't that weak.
Re:More cliches (Score:2)
Re:More cliches (Score:2)
Biggest downside of a PC from my perspective is the noise. I put together a MythTV box for my apartment, but had to go find some new fans to quiet the sucker down..
Re:More cliches (Score:2)
no, it's a lie.
unless your in marketing, then there are no lies, only sales numbers.
Please help us compete! (Score:5, Interesting)
I must admit, we were pretty surprised with this version of XP. It looks really cool (we haven't tried it though).
It made us realize we have to speed up our work on DAVE/DINA. So we're planning our first ISO-release this month.
It will include:
- Watching TV
- RECORDING TV (only europ i think)
- Playing/grabbing music
- Music Database
- Photo gallery
- playing/grabbing DVD
- playing DIVX
but a lot of work needs to be done. We hope to lure some contributors with this release.
But you can already start to help us now: Visit our website [apestaart.org], and comment on our plans (so we know what we're doing right and what we're doing wrong), or make us a cool new logo
Cable Boxes (Score:5, Interesting)
Does anyone make IR blasters that will talk to those boxes that can be made to work?
Re:Cable Boxes (Score:4, Informative)
It's actually pretty easy.
-Jay
Personally I now prefer the integrated solution (Score:4, Interesting)
Basically, having a set-up like this 'just works'. You press pause and TV is paused. You select the program you want to record out of the program guide or program search and it records it (you can choose to protect it, to prevent other recordings overwriting on a full HDD, and you can choose to start recording 1 minute early). You can go back and watch something that you recorded while it records something else. Every time you change the channel it begins buffering again automatically (up to 1 hour I think). It can hold 30 hours of programming. It can IR-Blast the VCR if needed also.
I'm a PVR addict. Now I'm sure you can accomplish all of this and more using a PC with WMCE or whatever, but it's nice to not have a computer hanging around the room or having to show my wife how to get everything going. Sure I can't share with other PCs and I don't think it can really perform every trick that PC software or a TiVo can right now, but it does have an upgradeable BIOS. It is not hooked up to the internet or the phone line (if I ever bother with PPV then I'll have to use a phone line). I can tell the unit not to upgrade its BIOS without asking.
Basically, a home theatre setup often borders on messy anyways - throwing a PC into the mix just further confuses things.
And I definitely don't need a MS solution - don't need a BSOD messing up my TV viewing!
Re:Personally I now prefer the integrated solution (Score:2)
Re:Personally I now prefer the integrated solution (Score:2)
the watch one show while you record another is a bit deceptive: you can't say, watch something on channel 100 and record something on channel 200 as one might be led to believe.
Man I'd be raising hell with them if I were you. All this digital TV they plug and they can't even duplicate the functions of ananlog TV and a VCR.
Is there any digital server that will alow you to tape a broadcast from one channel while watching a broadcast on another channel?
Re:Personally I now prefer the integrated solution (Score:5, Informative)
You can get double LMB dishes, that provide two cables from the dish to the STB. None of the Bell STBs support two inputs, but you can buy another decoder for the second line for ~$99. Then you can record one show on the PVR and watch another on the other STB.
(STB=set-top box)
Re:Personally I now prefer the integrated solution (Score:2)
- The interactive weather isn't just Canadian cities, it's international
- One of the great features in the BEV PVR, and missing from the MS box is the UHF remote, which means my PVR can be in my basement, away from my TV.
- The IR thing that made you shit your pants
- I didn't know the 5100 was discontinued
Now
I was almost thinking they might've won me over (Score:3, Interesting)
Even with our reinstall, there have been cases where the Media Center application crashed, requiring a full system restart before functioning properly
I've got 2 Tivo's, both hacked, and neither has ever crashed or spontaneously rebooted on me (save one hang during first upgrade because I didn't disable write verify on the disks first.. my fault, I cut corners). There's no way in hell I'd trust a box that's not completely reliable to replace my trusty Tivos.
Ummm... But... (Score:2, Funny)
"ATI's latest All-in-Wonder line comes extremely close; closer than any previous attempt, but ATI is still bound by the tragic flaw of a PC based PVR - the Windows interface."
This doesn't take a rocket scientist to add 2 and 2 in this case, does it?
Neat, Cool, So what..... (Score:2)
TiVo (which I love, love, love) and ReplayTV aren't exactly setting the world on fire in terms of sales, so its not like there's a HUGE demand for these things. Also the price seems a hell of a lot higher than buying a functional computer and a TiVo seperately. How many people live in apartments so small they can't have both? College students are always bandied about for potential buyers, but my sense is that most would rather have a laptop. Plus, how many parents are going to plunk down that kind of money right after signing that check for school so their kids can record TV? I just don't think the cost would be justified (my dad would have laughed at me 'til he was blue in the face).
Nice tech, tiny market. MS better watch out. There only so many "these'll change the world" ideas that don't pan out that hardware companies are willing to subsidize.
Do I really want this? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think so! I have a 3.06 P4 with an ATI 9700 and its pretty much maxed out while playing UT 2003. I bet them same will be true with the upcoming Doom title.
I'd much rather have my Replay 4500s doing their recording thing while I'm doing my computing/gaming thing.
You can get two or three Replays for the price of a Media Center PC, I think. You can hook them up to your network and share programing between them, your PCs and friends on the net. And they won't steel CPU cycles from your PC.
Need faster processors? Whatever... (Score:5, Informative)
"Whenever AMD or Intel release a new CPU, everyone asks the question what we need faster processors for? The most common response for that is "to enable future applications" and a couple of years ago, there was enough processing power in a cheap enough form to finally give the VCR a brain - the idea of a set-top Personal Video Recorder (PVR) was born."
"Although MCE is by far the best first attempt at a PVR we've seen from any company, it isn't without its very noticeable flaws; the most serious of which happens to be this issue of performance. On a 2.53GHz Pentium 4, CPU utilization hovers around 30 - 40% while simply watching TV; note that this is with a hardware MPEG-2 encoder card and a very fast Pentium 4 CPU. We tried performing our own clean MCE install on the setup, updated all of the drivers and walked away with nothing better. There are clearly some issues with MCE as it shouldn't require such a high speed CPU to perform simple MPEG-2 decoding and writing to the disk. The CPU utilization drops to below 20% if MCE is closed and it's just recording in the background, which isn't too bad but still higher than you'd expect for a hardware MPEG-2 encoding engine that isn't relying on the host CPU.
The Tivo uses a 75Mhz PowerPC, which was available many years ago and is a joke of a processor right now. It's also what enables Tivo to not cost $1000. The fact that this windows media center slows down noticable with a 2.xx Ghz P4 is embarassing. Tivo rarely exhibits any slowdown, and it's not only using a alledgely more inferior PowerPC processor, but one from several years ago running at 3% of the speed of this thing.
Re:Need faster processors? Whatever... (Score:2, Insightful)
You ever try to reorganize 34 season passes? It takes about 10 minutes.
Re:Need faster processors? Whatever... (Score:2)
Re:Need faster processors? Whatever... (Score:2, Informative)
Tivo uses several DSPs to handle the audio and video.
MCE does everything through software which, in technical terms "sucks ass".
This is just another way ms shoots themselves in the foot by forcing everything through windows.
Re:Need faster processors? Whatever... (Score:3, Informative)
>in technical terms "sucks ass".
RTFA. Microsoft specifically requires MCE PCs to come with a dedicated MPEG encoder hardware. It is not "doing everything through software". In fact, according to the article ATI and nVidia are having fits precisely because of the outrageous hardware requirements Microsoft has slapped on these systems.
Sounds to me like yet another case of crappy, bloated code from Microsoft. What a surprise. Would never have seen that one coming.
What a shameless MS plug (Score:2)
They also skip right over any discussion of ease of use, setup, cabling, access to guide data, fees, etc. I'm assuming that the author simply read some releases, watched a couple of Simpsons episodes and then decided to write a review (mostly of the Simpsons, as it turns out).
Oh, and I'm assuming that the assertion that this will be WindowsXP/Pro + MCE is a joke. I can't imagine that MS won't lock all of the "server" features in this, just like they do with XP/Home.
Only works with 2 cards (Score:2)
The ASF wrapper also currently prevents transcodin (Score:5, Insightful)
No it doesn't [geocities.com] :)
Nothing like cutting each page into 5 paragraph's (Score:2)
Any particular reason this story couldn't of been 5 to 8 pages at the most?
Do Not Remove (Score:3, Interesting)
Obviously the GeForce is a better card, but... why use a board with onboard video, just to cap it off? Seems like a hack to me; perhaps a driver conflict caused concern, so they disabled it in the BIOS and capped it off.. but it's very unprofessional IMO.
Just a nitpick I guess...
But... (Score:5, Informative)
MythTV [mythtv.org]!
This product is a joke.. (Score:3, Interesting)
So, a 2.53 Ghz P4 can't handle opening the guide and scrolling through it? I have to make sure I'm not recording anything important while using the guide? Can M$ possibly get any more inefficient? Don't forget, this is with HARDWARE MPEG2! I wondered at first why cards without hardware MPEG2 codecs weren't supported.. now I understand.
Re:New standards?? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:New standards?? (Score:3, Interesting)
Comparing these is like apples to oranges.
People seem to forget that most Linux distibutions come with HUNDREDS of "third party" applications that you may or may not have installed. Redhat provides these emails based on your current system profile they have of your system. When is the last time MS put out an alert for an Eudora, PC Pine, Pegasys, or Norton Antivirus update that all run on Windows?
Re:Your absolutely correct (Score:2)
What ever that is...
Re:New standards?? (Score:2)
Re:New standards?? (Score:2)
Yes, my RedHat box has a flashing ! every few days too. Programmers are human last time I checked, and humans come in all varying abilities and disciplines. Not all OpenSource projects are written by l33t ub3r cod3rs, and every closed source shop (like Microsoft) is not a bunch of community college flunkies.
I'll gaurantee you any decent sized company has a whole bunch of programmers just like the average slashdotter (or ARE the average slashdotter), that live to code, love what they do, create elegant routines and would seriously not appreciate anyone saying everything they do is weak, trojan-infested, closed-source satan code, just because they work for a business model that keeps proprietary development private.
Lay off our programmer bretheren.
Re:No so fast there (Score:2, Funny)
Ah yes, the typical consulting way of doing things, making a decision before knowing any facts.
Re:No so fast there (Score:4, Funny)
- bla bla bla
- bla bla bla
- I have an iPod
- bla bla bla
- Microsoft sucks!
- bla bla bla
Suckers!
Re:No so fast there (Score:2)
Mod +3 Vorpal
Re:No so fast there (Score:2, Informative)
Second, and yes, this is pricey, but if your looking for a media PC, this will do the trick, and you shouldn't have trouble hooking up your ipod or any other media device to it.
Alien Ware Media Center PC [alienware.com]
Third, You didn't mention it but others did, this is extremely hardware limited, ATI can't even get on because their cards don't do all the encoding in hardware. You also must have a remote so the lazy people can operate this from their couch.
Finally, I know anytime MS is mentioned, it will get torn apart. And i know this has DRM in it, but it will only be months before that is broken. In all honesty, XP is alot better than their previous efforts, RIAA and MPAA ass kissing aside. So lets drop the nothing from MS will ever be good enough, because we all know that the majority of people that use Slashdot are browsing from IE.
Re:No so fast there (Score:2)
That Alienware box looks suspiciously like the Shuttle barebone PCs [shuttle.com] which you can buy at newegg.com [newegg.com] for less than $400. Do-it-yourselfers could save more than a few bucks making these into an equivalent media PC.
Re:No so fast there (Score:2)
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"Wagner LLC Consulting Co. - Getting it right the first time"
If you want to get it right the first time as your sig states, I would suggest _taking_ the time to read the article before commenting....
Just a suggestion
Re: linux troll? (Score:2, Informative)
I grasp the 'notion of a reputation', but I also know that it doesn't relate to the real world.
Linux also has a reputation for poor hardware support and second rate performance when it comes to the video/gui arena.
Acclaim earned a reputation for making really shitty games back in the NES days. So what?
Comparing the latest linux build to NT 3.51 is getting really old.
My 7 year old analogy applies perfectly. She uses a TV as her primary display, and watches DVDs and a small library of cartoons in divx off my fileserver (which runs linux, btw, because that's what I find linux appropriate for) I find this much closer to the function of these machines than an ecommerce server.
And people pointing to Tux Racer as if it validates linux as an entertainment/gaming platform *is* a joke.
Yikes! Huge file sizes! (Score:5, Insightful)
Any TiVo owner will immediately spot this little issue [anandtech.com]: namely, that 93GB of disk space equals 5 hours 8 minutes of record time at best quality. Even if the space available for PVR functions is 75% of 93GB (as implied in the screenshot), that's still about five hours for 70GB of disk space.
Maybe MCE's definition of "best" quality is dramatically higher than TiVo's, but TiVo can store about 9 hours at "best" quality on a 30GB HD. On a machine with 70GB of disk space, it would easily be able to record over 20 hours at best quality. Why can MCE only squeeze a quarter as much video onto the same amount of space?
Also, I find it ironic that MCE has such grievous hardware requirements. It requires a TV tuner card with hardware MPEG-2 encoding, yet still requires a really fast CPU, fast RAM and a fast, big hard drive. Admittedly, TiVo's aren't sharing their hardware with other apps (in most cases), but first-generation TiVos managed to squeak by with a 50MHz PowerPC and 4400RPM hard drives. Surely, MS can squeeze stutter-free performance out of moderately powerful CPUs and HDs, can't they?
Re:MS wins again (Score:2)
Re:MS wins again (Score:2)