Month: May 2008

I’ve been attempting to learn about the Broadcast Flag over the past few days, and instead of focusing on what it can/can’t do I decided to look at a few other things. First of all, I want to say that I believe the issue early this month with NBC was a total fluke.  I think a lot of people are getting bent out of shape considering this has been and continues to be a onetime bug not reproducible by anyone at Microsoft, NBC, EFF, etc.  This is compounded with the lack of understanding between different technologies, mainly Copy Generation Management … Continue reading Broadcast Flag Follow-up

Brent Evans has (almost) all your answers on the HD PVR that finally has started shipping.  And remember, it doesn’t work with Media Center (yet?). Joe Wilcox has Eight Things About Windows 7 following Microsoft’s first public demo of the OS at All Things D.  Overall I think Windows 7 is going to be more like Vista Second Edition.  It really isn’t a “whole new OS” as Vista was from XP.  Nonetheless I’m excited about it, and I hope Microsoft is planning to make the transition away from the Vista name that has become a horrible brand. Ian Dixon has … Continue reading Short Bits: HD PVR, Windows 7, Media Center Show, Akimbo

No doubt that CableCARD has turned out to be a less than stellar technology from a stability point of view, but could Dell be a big reason why CableCARD seems so unstable?  As a part of Microsoft’s investigation into “Restricted Content” errors on CableCARD PCs we have learned a lot, specifically about Dell. First of all, Dell has 10x as many CableCARD PCs out then any other OEM.  That’s not incredibly shocking given the price they have been pushing them out at, but interesting nonetheless.  Second, it seems users are targeting their own issues with Dell’s CableCARD PCs, and their … Continue reading Could Dell Be Part of CableCARD Instability?

I’m not sure if I’ve posted about this before, but Ian Dixon has been doing his own “Ultimate Media Center Enthusiast Setup” contest and it is down to the voting.  As I expected there are several fantastic Media Center setups, some of which I never would have pictured in my mind.  Check them all out here and don’t forget to vote on your favorite. Wondering what Open Media Library is currently looking like?  Check it out for yourself.  This is one amazing plug-in, hard to believe it started as a clone of Niveus Media’s Movie Library just a month and … Continue reading Short Bits: Ulitmate Setup, Open Media, clipShow

We are taking our turn at The Green Button to give away an HP HDX Dragon PC ($5,000+ value), so everyone should make sure to enter.  Entering to win is easy, just tell us (at The Green Button, not here) what our next site upgrade should focus on and look like.  What are we doing wrong now, what could be do better, what type of format should the upgrade be, etc. That’s all you have to do to enter.  To enter you must have registered an account at The Green Button before 4/28/08.  Check out the rest of the rules … Continue reading Win an HP HDX Dragon PC at The Green Button

Cannon PC, LP announced its Direct OEM partnership with Microsoft and will be offering a Digital CableCARD on its Home Series and Pro A/V Series Media Centers. May 25, 2008 – Cannon PC, the award winning Media Center specialty company, announced May 25th its partnership with Microsoft and will be offering dual Digital CableCARD on its line of Media Center PCs and has plans to release quad CableCARD systems in the near future.  “We are excited about our partnership with Microsoft and the opportunity to offer our customers Digital CableCARD” said Gregg Cannon of Cannon PC.  “Cannon PC has worked … Continue reading Microsoft and Cannon PC Partner to offer CableCARD Media Centers

Niveus Media has released another exclusive plug-in for Niveus owners, this time they have got your basic weather needs covered.  Niveus Weather looks very nice based on the screenshots and I assume it is MCML also. (Via Missing Remote). Mike is back with another Life with a Plug-in review which today features BigScreen Headlines 2.  How does it measure up?  Well, it is approved for everyday use (and it’s MCML) so check out the review. Microsoft is finally hitting on one of their many content protection issues within Media Center.  Right now they are starting an investigation on Digital Cable … Continue reading Short Bits: Restricted Content, Plug-ins, XP SP3

Joining the party of Hauppauge, AVerMedia, and SiliconDust (HDHomeRun), Pinnacle has released unencrypted QAM drivers/plug-in for their PCTV HD Card (800i).  General beta driver guidelines apply (backup first!), but be aware that the first user at The Green Button to try them out had pretty poor results.

Remember Windows Live for TV?  The plug-in for Windows Live Spaces/Messenger that promised cool features like chat and voice conversations, PC-to-PC calls, and of course Windows Live Spaces access via remote has officially died.  “The project was moved to a different organization internally in the spring of last year and will most likely not come out of beta” replied a Program Manger around the product. Can’t say I’m surprised, after all it had one release well over a year ago and nothing else was ever said.  I wouldn’t be shocked if parts of this came back from the dead for … Continue reading Windows Live for TV Officially Dies

CinemaNow has launched a new Media Center plug-in available through the “Explore” tile in Vista Media Center.  Currently their library features over 3,400 feature-length movies, 3,000 TV episodes and over 2,900 music videos that can be downloaded without using a mouse and keyboard.  This includes Pay-Per-View and Download-to-Own movies, new release and catalog favorites, with titles available day-and-date of retail DVD release as described below.  All downloads are also streamable to Media Center Extenders. CinemaNow offers a variety of services now available through Windows Media Center: Download-to-own: Hollywood movies, popular TV shows, and music videos are available for purchase, providing … Continue reading CinemaNow Launches Media Center Plug-in