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is Windows Media center worth it??

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ChadTower:

I think in his price range he needs a cable provider DVR or a Tivo.  Or XBMC.

hulkster:

--- Quote from: mcfreak on August 07, 2007, 10:06:57 am ---I love my Vista Media Center, It has 3 tuners, one HD, two analogs connected to Digital Cable boxes.  The power it gives you over a tivo/Digital Cable DVR box is the "Other" stuff.  I have Xbox 360's in the bedrooms and media room that "extend" the interface to those areas. I can watch live TV on all three TV's using a central machine.  It will also extend HD to the other rooms which is the only device I am aware of that can do that. 

I also have a 1.5 Terabyte NAS in a server closet that has all my digital media (Movies, Music, TV Shows) that are shared across all TV's in the house.  There is a great add-on freeware program called My Movies:  http://www.mymoves.name that will automatically get all the cover art for your movies, titles, description, actors, etc and you can play them from the interface.  So instead of having to go find DVD 382 in my collection, I can rip it down, tie it to my movies, and watch it by pressing a few buttons on the remote. 

Here is an example of the interface:
http://www.mymovies.name/screenshots/windows-vista-media-center.aspx

Also, don't forget about the MAME interface for Media Center  :applaud: :applaud: :applaud: :applaud:

http://www.push-a-button.com.au/products/mce/vista/emucenter/index.php


--- End quote ---

whoa dude!  thats awesome!  so you wait....you have one media center pc and you run that feed to all of your tvs in your house???  hows that possible without a pc at every tv?  are you like...hooking your wmc pc up at the initial cable feed coming into your house, and then just having all your tvs run off that?  i guess im confused as to how you can get all your tv's to display shared stuff.  or is that what you have the 360s for?  thats a crazy amount of hardware.  i only have 2 tv's and an office/gaming pc that i use.  if i could stream the wmc content to my other tv and to my pc in my office, that would sweet.  i have most of the hardware for the wmc pc cept for the tuner card (suggestions?).  but what else would i need? 

and again, is this even worth it?  i can either upgrade my tivo to an hd tivo for $299 + $199 transfer fee of lifetime subscription....or get a media center pc.  what do you think? 

ChadTower:

When all said and done, the media center PC setup will have cost substantially more than that and taken a long time to get installed, set up, and tweaked properly.

The Tivo will take a phone call and an hour of install.

hulkster:

--- Quote from: ChadTower on August 07, 2007, 10:43:26 am ---
When all said and done, the media center PC setup will have cost substantially more than that and taken a long time to get installed, set up, and tweaked properly.

The Tivo will take a phone call and an hour of install.

--- End quote ---

yes but i can only watch it on one tv.  and it would be nice to rip my movies and be able to watch them in any part of the house whether it be a pc, or tv.  if i wanted to watch recorded content from my tivo on another tv....i would have to buy ANOTHER tivo ($300) and since they did away with lifetime, id have to pay a monthly fee for subscription service. 

im not trying to defend something i know nothing about (wmc) im just trying to weigh all the options.  i want the ability to have hd broadcasts shown on my tivo, and be able to pause, record etc all at the same time.  to do that with tivo, i have to upgrade, and even then....its only for the one tv. 

so i need to know how you set it up to put all your content on all your tvs throughout your hosue mcfreak.  that will be the kicker on whether or not i keep looking at the wmc or a new tivo.

ChadTower:

Then do the same thing with XBMC at $75 a pop rather than setting up a whole WCM infrastructure that will cost hundreds more.

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