http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/ Engadget HD Comments for http://www.engadgethd.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadgethd.com en-us Copyright 2008 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
44 countries in the world use the DVB-T, however Media Center's support of this well established standard is patchy, to be precise no support for broadcast EPG, interactive services, subtitles, multiple audio streams, radio channels.

Then take something as simple as the music library. If you have two or more albums with the same album name, but different album artists, then the albums appear as separate entities but the track list contains all the tracks from all albums of the the same name. Oops!

I bought Vista because of Vista's Media Center, now I wish I'd spent the money on something more useful!]]>Sep 28th 2007 11:00AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/My biggest complaint about the extender on the 360 is there's no way to access the HD-DVD Player (or even the regular DVD Player) through the extender software. You have to exit media center and access them through the XBOX 360 interface. Other than that I REALLY wish they'd allow cable cards on home built PCs. Also, I'm hoping when using the 360 as a set top box for U-Verse, it can be done flawlessly through Media Center. ]]>Sep 28th 2007 11:15AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
I hope they pull it together, because it is unique in the industry.]]>Sep 28th 2007 11:17AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Sep 28th 2007 1:02PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Sep 28th 2007 11:51AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Sep 29th 2007 10:55PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
Perhaps a company like Apple could do better. Look how well their Desktops, iPods and new TV boxes work together.

-Roger

(BTW, for those of you who cannot detect overt sarcasm in an email - I know that I am talking about only Microsoft here when I refer to "many companies")

]]>Sep 28th 2007 1:31PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
The lack of HD / Blu native support is almost a deal breaker for me right now. Even having MyMovies automatically open Cyberlink's PowerDVD HD to play HD content is a pretty bad compromise. There is no way to get a digital 7.1 signal to a receiver. Optical / Toslink can only handle 5.1. Most HD content is only 5.1 now but even if you wanted to get that HD, digital 5.1 signal to your receiver, you are out of luck. Cyberlink PowerDVD has to downsample HD audio to no higher than 48 kHz 16 bits-per-sample before sending to the audio driver.

Until MCE supports HD or Blu content natively (and does not downsample audio) OR Cyberlink decides not to downsample HD audio *AND* someone comes out with a way to get a digital, non downsampled, 7.1 signal to a receiver, the whole HD HTPC concept is self-defeating IMO.]]>Sep 28th 2007 3:03PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
With that said, I certainly don't see this as "make it or break it" for the product, as another poster said. Microsoft rarely throws in the towel this quickly and as long as they stick with the product, keep gathering support and keep evolving it, they will be in perfect position to be the defacto standard for media center setups when the mass public is ready to catch on.

I do wish cablecard support was easier, but that's not really their fault. ]]>Sep 28th 2007 4:02PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
Media Center is a great Idea, and it could be the #1 device in People homes if everything would just come together. Having just 1 PC being able to dish out all your Music, Pictures, TV, Videos, Movies, etc and have Cheap Media Extenders placed where you need them that can also access all the same content at any time is Great. With the way things are now with DRM I don't see it happening any time soon. Music at least is starting to go DRM free. ]]>Sep 29th 2007 12:46AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Sep 29th 2007 1:12AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Sep 29th 2007 11:55AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
Now consider the fact that most of these companies compete with one another directly and indirectly.

Now consider that with all the lawsuits Microsoft has faced, they can't just go the Apple route and jam their system straight to the consumer. That would be anti-competitive and monopolistic.

So, what we get is what we have. A system that works, but really doesn't satsify all the consumer's needs because a bunch of industry players are too busy bickering to care.]]>Sep 30th 2007 7:17AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Sep 30th 2007 10:02PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
All that and I can tell the cable company to screw their 70 bucks a month fees with their sucky DVR.

The complaint oer hd-dvds is valid, as is not being able to stream DVDs to the xbox, but you can in fact stream wmvs to the xbox. So an application like DVD-WMV makes the possibility of creating an archive of DVDs on the Media Center possible. ]]>Oct 1st 2007 1:29AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
Cablecard is something I dont really see taking off. I mean the cable companies dont push it and the TV manufacturers arent putting it in their tvs. I'm fine with my setbox box.

HDTV does worry me a bit, I wish they would come up with a way for us to use our hd enabled set top boxes the same way we use our SD STB's

And yes; someone needs to slap DirecTV now and make them get on this VMC deal business. I actually got DirecTV thinking somewhere along the line this was going to happen. That and the new HD channels.]]>Oct 1st 2007 9:51AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/
MS has injected dinosaur genes into their DNA.

DOOMED!]]>Oct 1st 2007 6:48PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Oct 22nd 2007 7:16PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/28/does-media-center-have-a-future/Is it possible to get the Media Center to "speak" to my network hard drive? i have loads of music and videos to watch but i can only do this if a drag them to the "my Docs" folder. ]]>Oct 24th 2007 2:50PM