I am about to purchase Windows Media Center, I went to the Microsoft site and after the demo it said I can only purchase it preinstalled a computer. Yet when I go to TigerDirect its there for $139 with remote. I don't want to have a whole bunch of problems for nothing. Let me know whats the best thing to do.
most PC parts stores will sell you a copy as long as you buy a peice of hardware with it. That way they are covered under their agreement with microsoft to sell it with new PC's. If they will sell it with nothing else, then nobody will know. Its a LOT cheaper to just build your own PC and buy a copy than to go to a store and buy one of their ready made systems. I am running it on a $550 CeleronD built PC. No problems at all. Heck, I have it running on my P3 800. It just wont let you run live TV with a TV tuner. But I just use it as a media center extender anyway. My other PC is what records the live tv.
Hey Thanks alot that was real helpful. Just one more question, The video card I have now does not have the TV Tuner and few other bells and whistles, which would you suggest that would give the best bang for the buck.
Just buy a tv tuner card. make sure it has ON BOARD MPEG2 ENCODING. This way it keeps your processor power free for other things. ALso just double check that the video card you have now is supported. Otherwise you will need to upgrade that as well.
Whats the best way to see if my Video card is compatible, or would it just be best to buy all of it together.....video card with TV tuner with MPEG2 coding.
do a search. Microsoft has a list of compatible cards on their website as well. If you have the space its better to get them seperate. That way you can upgrade one or the other later on without having the high cost. You save nothing by getting them together initially. But you will lose a couple years from now when you want a new video card but need to wait for an all in one.
oh yea, be sure the tv tuner is MCE compliant.. it has to have XP MCE Ed drivers to work in mce.. good luck! i love my htpc to death!
Choosing a TV tuner for a MCE PC is a bit easier than just picking any TV tuner out there. The first requirement is that the tuner has official MCE support. You'll need a MCE driver for your tuner to work with the OS, so if one isn't available for the card that you're looking at, then you know to look elsewhere. In other words it's not just any tuner card that will work with MCE ! Here's a few you can look at that are recommended for MCE ATI TV Wonder Elite Hauppauge's WinTV PVR-250 AVerMedia M150 Those cards are approved for use with MCE (( Source :- http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2393 ))
just a quick note, before you consider buying Win MCE, I'd download and take a look at MediaPortal. Its an open source product, pretty much does everything that MCE does and loads more in the way of plugins. Recently I worked for a software company who had a full Microsoft MSDN subscription so we get to test on all the OS's and there are several down sides to MCE which made me choose the XP and Media portal combination instead. MCE is designed to promote media extenders and WMV (for license control) where as media portal supports all manner of formats, it can also be skinned to look like MCE inc auto start etc, I even have mine set to switch to HD resolutions for some options and not for others and with the variety of plugins its fully customisable. just a comment anyway, I dont dislike MCE but media portal is a cheaper alternative with more functionality IMO. cheers nico
MCE is the devil's work. DRM, proprietary recording format. Limited capture card compatibility. Nice swish and swoosh sounds though! Pick up a copy of XP home (WTF do you need XP Pro for?) on ebay, download and install GBPVR, MediaPortal, GotAllMedia, Beyond, Sage, or something, and enjoy the PVR, instead of fighting with microsofts MCE services all the time.
