Are there two Vista Media Center updates due this year?
The little birdies that clued us in about the upcoming Vista Media Center update a few days ago are at it again, but this time with some potential good news. When the recent Windows Media Center TV Pack release candidate 0 was released to testers and was missing all of our favorite features, we were quick to assume that this would mean no new features until Windows 7. Well, based on some recent information received by our sources, the reason H.264 was cut was because it was too complex to add -- because of all the dependencies involved -- in time. You see, evidently this tuner update was promised to be released to OEMs by the end of July. Now our sources seem to be optimistic that there is another update in the works, and that it might just include both H.264 and DirecTV tuner support. More about the Windows Media Center TV Pack after the jump.Gallery: Leaked Fiji Screen shots
The update expected this month is mainly focused around International support, which has evidently really been lacking up until now. The Japanese can expect ISDB-T and BML support, while the Europeans can look forward to new support for DVB-T and DVB-S tuners as well as MHEG for interactive television; and finally as we mentioned before, the US is finally getting native clear QAM support. At the same time every country can expect to see improvements for; TV viewing, recording, and playback. The biggest features in the update we're looking forward to though is heterogeneous tuner support, which was explained to us as the ability to use any combination of tuners (NTSC, ATSC, QAM, CableCARD, DVB-T, PAL, or DVB-S etc). The other big sigh of relief is they are going to loosen up on the tuner limitations. With the update, Ultimate edition will officially support four tuners of each type, while premium stays at the current limit of two.
So while it doesn't appear that the update will have any ground breaking new features, we have to say that all-in-all we're pretty excited to get our hands on the new features. But we still really want to believe that there is indeed another update in the works, that we will see it this year and that it will finally bring us DirecTV support. But man would we really would like to know what is taking so long.
So while it doesn't appear that the update will have any ground breaking new features, we have to say that all-in-all we're pretty excited to get our hands on the new features. But we still really want to believe that there is indeed another update in the works, that we will see it this year and that it will finally bring us DirecTV support. But man would we really would like to know what is taking so long.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Peter F @ Jul 8th 2008 4:29PM
No ground breaking new features?! I'm totally stoked about native QAM support!!!! All those tv tuner companies have got to be upset having to make work arounds for QAM
Brad M @ Jul 8th 2008 4:47PM
So, am I reading that Ultimate will support FOUR Cable Card tuners with the update without any hacks?
skx @ Jul 8th 2008 4:43PM
Can somebody explain a European why DIRECT TV is so important?
Mike @ Jul 8th 2008 4:52PM
DirecTV is a direct broadcast digital TV service that's been around for almost 20 years now. They have over 16 million customers in the US. The integration of DirecTV with any kind of PC based DVR has been promised off and on for the past few years now. While it has nothing to due to Europe, many DirecTV customers would love to integrate their DirecTV service with a home based DVR. Sage TV is one solution today but Vista Media Center with extender support would be a great solution.
thecount @ Jul 8th 2008 6:11PM
I'm hoping that DirecTV support will also allow for other NDS encrypted services (Sky UK, Sky Italia) to be available with VMC
Mike @ Jul 8th 2008 4:46PM
Hmm, so people who have HDHomrun and use it as a dual tuner OTA HD solution today and want to add DirecTV tuner support will have to upgrade to Vista Ultimate to get to the four tuner support?
Ben @ Jul 8th 2008 4:51PM
No, but if you wanted to have two HDHomeRuns then you'd need ultimate (offically). No word if the old registry hack still works.
But with ultimate you could have 4 ATSC tuners and 4 CableCARD tuners and have ABC show up on channel 28 for all 8, then set a recording preference.
Z @ Jul 8th 2008 4:53PM
"With the update, Ultimate edition will officially support four tuners of each type, while premium stays at the current limit of two."
Come on MSFT, just casue Bill left doesn't mean you get to bend us over even more! There are no differences between the two versions of Vista that would limit premium to TWO tuners but yet allow Ultimate FOUR.
Maybe I should look at apple or possibly a linux box from now on.
ElimGarak @ Jul 9th 2008 3:48PM
LOL - good luck getting any of this to work on that piece of crap Apple TV.
xemumanic @ Jul 8th 2008 6:45PM
I'm most interested in the DirecTV, and, as a direct result, H.264 support. Hopefully they will see fit to add audio track and subtitle switching as well. That'd be great for MKVs.
Hellman109 @ Jul 9th 2008 2:08AM
DirectTV is a US thing, as they have most of the features they already need thats what they are now interested in.
What isnt mentioned is over the air EPG support for DVB-T Cards along with teletext, which is DAMN important here in Australia. We get an EPG sent with our digital TV, but VMC doesnt do anything with it, while other media centres (media portal etc.) use it well.
The TV pack is all about making TV better for the rest of the world, which is an important step for me.
PS: returning things like a list view and removing the postage stamp video to the alpha blended background would be a nice feature to add/migrate to all of media centre!
The Fuzz 53 @ Jul 9th 2008 4:28PM
There's an update for my tuner on Windows Update, but the two times I've tried to install it, I end up getting a BSOD and have to use a system restore to get the tuner to work again. I believe the tuner is an ATI Theater Pro 650 (came with the PC) Anybody else have this issue?
Marco @ Jul 10th 2008 9:06AM
Hello to all, if I want to know how Windows Media Center TV Pack is support for satellite TV.
Thanks
JimmyBalboa @ Aug 12th 2008 3:21PM
Not yet Marco, did you read the article at the top of the page?