Happy Birthday, Windows XP Media Center Edition!

While Windows XP might be celebrating its 5th
Birthday, Windows XP Media Center Edition is celebrating its 4th Birthday
today!  It’s been a long ride, but it all
started on October 29, 2002 when HP started shipping their first Media Center
PC.

It launched with the help of this goofball (pictured below)
and sported features such as use of a single analog tuner and DVD recording
only on high end machines (which you couldn’t do from within the MCE UI).  Price points on the very few machines offered
with Media Center at the time ranged from $1300 to
$2000.  Single tuner, no HD anything, no
widescreen anything, nothin.

A few images courtesy of Paul
Thurrott (or some equal person with the name “Paul” as their Windows User
Name).

Sorry Paul, there is your link back.  However, I find it a bit ironic you are
looking for link backs.  I think this
story about you published by Ed
Bott might be interesting reading. 
Peace!

I’ve compiled a screenshot history of Media
Center below including a screenshot of
the upcoming Vista
Media Center
release.  Interesting to see where the UI
design has been and where it’s going now. 
Enjoy!

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