Members Adventures

Windows Media Center Cumulative Update for Windows 7

2010-02-23T23:45:00Z

Microsoft released on Feb 23rd, Revision 1.0 of their Cumulative Update for Windows Media Center for Windows 7 (x86/x64). As is usual with these patches, it rolls up a number of previously released updates and this release is no different targetting the followiing issues :

Improves the overall experience for systems that are configured by using digital cable card tuners.
Resolves backward compatibility issues for some legacy Windows Media Center extensibility applications.
Resolves an issue with how recorded TV shows are managed when switching to a user locale that is based on the Hijri calendar.
Improves the overall experience when you use Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting (ISDB) tuners. ISDB is a Japanese standard for digital television and digital radio.

My experience in the past of these updates is that its better to let the dust settle for a few days watching the forums and blogs for 'new' and 'unexpected' issues that sometimes pop up from their installation.

If you want to dive in feet first, the update is available now from Windows Update, otherwise you can snag it from the links below.

32bit version is available here : Download the update package now.

64bit version here : Download the update package now.

Mediabrowser 2.2.2.0 (ThunderBlade) Released.

2010-02-23T19:07:00Z

Last night MediaBrowser 2.2.2.0 quietly slipped out a few days earlier that most of us where expecting and includes a long list of fixes and enhancements. Thunderblade provides support all of the latest versions of the themes including the latest Diamond Preview ( 0.3.07).

You can snag the latest release directly from here.

Sam has also created a donations page to help ensure development continues.

2010: The Year AACS and HDMI Kill Off Component Video

2010-02-19T23:47:00Z

Clint DeBoer over at AudioHolics as written an excellent piece on the AACS analogue sunset rules that come into effect on Dec 31, 2010.

The rules effectively say that no AACS licensed device can have any analogue outputs that will deliver anything greater than 480i/576i output ( yes thats right , not even 480p/576p ).

'Ah' , i hear you say ' but i already have my Blu Ray player', well heres the rub, Blu Ray disc creators will have the option to include a flag that turns off any HD component video, forcing it to drop to 480i/576i.

Clint goes on to point out in the article why this is going to be a nightmare for installers and hobbyists with their component HD feeds getting effectively getting turned off over night.

Check out the full article here

Plug Computing.

2010-02-16T22:36:00Z

Lets face it, anyone visiting this site has an interest in smarter ways of consuming information, and often if your a real hobbyist you wind up with a 'system' over here to run this , and box there to run that, all taking up space , raising your electic bills , reducing WAF and increasing home admin duties.

For me , the need to leave a workstation or a laptop running to download something , run my VOIP PBX or some other 'always on' task, results in large amount of computing power to do the simpliest tasks. Or put it another way , a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. The good news is that a new wave of more powerful and flexible 'plug' based computers are appearing on the market place with offerings from Tonido and from Marvell .

These low cost ($99) plug in units can be put to a wide range of computing tasks and because they use only 5-13watts, and are arguably one of the smallest practical form factors , keep those energy bills down and WAF levels up.

Highlights for the Tonido unit include :

Energy efficient green device

Convert your USB drive to Network Attached Storage

Extend your TonidoPlug with new apps from Tonido App store

Access your TonidoPlug using own URL (http://yourname.tonidoid.com) via Dynamic DNS

Share and sync files, photos and music without uploading

Drag-and-Drop file and folder uploading to your TonidoPlug from Windows

Listen to your MP3s from anywhere

Download Torrents to your USB drive from anywhere

Search and download your files

Manage your calendar, contacts, and tasks

Keep a personal blog, capture and store web snippets

I'm going to be trialling a unit in the next few weeks as an always on replacement for my VOIP PBX, so watch out for a following posting of how well that goes.

Read more on these devices and the uses people are finding to put them to over at plugcomputer.org

WHS ' Vail ' early version leaked.

2010-02-13T22:43:00Z

Zack Whittacker over at ZDNET is running a story on an early 'leaked' version of the new Windows Home Server codenamed 'Vail' CTP4. Overall features are sketchy, but its clear that it comes in two versions with the system requirements for this leak as a 2 GHz x64 processor, 1 GB of RAM, and a 120GB+ hard drive.

Another feature which has made an appearance is the introduction of an 'app store' ?!? Still an early build but its a taste of things to come.

Check out Zacks article here http://blogs.zdnet.com/igeneration/?p=4025, which has links to screen shots and a link to a brief demo on Youtube.

See what you guys think..

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Why is SkyPlayer PPV content inconsistent across platforms?

2010-02-03T15:07:00Z

This has been annoying me ever since SkyPlayer launced on Windows Media Center and on Xbox360. Anyone familar with using an Extender with WMC will now that that SkyPlayer isn't available, you have to be using a computer with WMC, so for us having SkyPlayer available on the Xbox360 is great. Well no it isn't because as non-Sky subscribers the Pay-Per-View (PPV) content is not the same. Here is a screen shot taken from WMC on my netbook:

Episode 4 from Season 8 of 24 available via PPV on SkyPlayer through Windows Media Center

Now if you take a look at what is available for PPV on the Xbox360 there is nothing but reality TV amongst a few other non-mainstream programs that get shown on Sky1. Why isn't the same content available? It seems rediculous for this to be true but it is (if I could take a screen shot of our Xbox360 I would). You can watch every previous season of 24 on WMC SkyPlayer yet none are available via the Xbox360 SkyPlayer.

The media make such an issue over illegal downloads while at the same time putting hurdles in place to stop content being access legally. I'm not going to commit to a Sky contract in order to watch one or two shows but I'm happy to pay around £1 to watch each episode. So come on Sky, I have my money waiting you just need to find a way for me to give it to you.

Apologies for the ranting nature of this post but it is something I feel quite passionate about and has been troubling me for some time. I feel much better now.

CPU and Network utilisation with DVBLink network tuners

2010-02-03T13:57:00Z

In my previous post Why all the excitement over network tuners? I went into what DVBLink can do and why I think this is so great for the Windows Media Center (WMC) enthusiast. I said I would do a follow up post showing the CPU and network utilisation and this is exactly that. I would emphasise that these are taken from my live Windows Home Server (WHS) so there are spikes in the CPU graphs as normal WHS process start and stop (I'm also running a virtual machine on my WHS which also causes CPU spikes.

This is the hardware in my WHS which is very similar to our HTPC since the parts were mostly cheap:

Motherboard: ASUS P5LD2-VM
CPU: Intel Celeron D 352 3.2GHz
RAM: 2GB of memory (Corsair TWIN2X1024A-6400)
2 x Hauppauge Nova-T-500 PCI Hybrid Dual Tuners

When you install the DVBLink software this adds some virtual tuners which you can see here along with the two Nova-T-500 physical tuners:

Device Manager showing DVBLink virtual tuners & Nova-T-500 physical tuners

As I have the two dual tuners this gives me a pool of four that can be used by the other computers on the network. When you have these configured you can use Windows Media Player (WMP) or any other UPNP complient media player (PS3 for example) to view live TV. If you want to use WMC on the client then you install the DVBLink client onto the computer and you get the same virtual tuners added into device manager.

I'm going to get all four tuners recording and will show the CPU and network utilisation as I increase the number of channels being recorded. I'll start off by showing the WHS without any live TV or recording active:

CPU & Network utilisation with no live TV or recordings

Now I'll start recording one channel at a time to show how the CPU and network utilisation changes:

CPU & Network utilisation with one recording active

CPU & Network utilisation with two recordings active

CPU & Network utilisation with three recordings active

CPU & Network utilisation with four recordings active

I thought I'd also include a screen grab from WMC showing all four recordings active:

WMC with BBC1, BBC2, ITV and Channel4 being recorded on my desktop

I believe that these figures are low, especially the network utilisation, and when you consider that the CPU in my WHS is an old Celeron single core that 40% when recording four channels is good. I do think that those running low powered Atom based servers might have some issues. Anyone that has a Core2Duo or newer CPU would no doubt see less CPU useage. There is also an option in the release candidate to use RTP instead of UDP for slower network connections. I should stress that all these are based on standard definition DVB-T sources. It would be great if someone could provide information on high definition useage.

Hopefully this gives people an idea of the CPU and network requirements when using the DVBLink network tuner software. I haven't included details of the client since apart from the network useage WMC is working the same as if the tuners were physically installed so I'd expect the same CPU & disk I/O as you are used to on your HTPC. Please ask any questions using the comments or you can follow me on Twitter.

Why all the excitement over network tuners?

2010-01-29T21:04:00Z

Anyone following me or Garry Whittaker on Twitter or reading his blog here on TDL will have seen us singing the praises of some software created by DVBLogic (website / twitter). I thought I'd do a post on what this software actually does, as most information seems to focus on getting it working, and also why Garry and myself are so excited about it.

I think that most people would agree that Windows Media Center is a superior solution over a standard Digital Video Recorder (DVR) for a number of reasons:

The interface is easy and simple to use
It provices a single interface for viewing TV (live and recorded), music, pictures and video
Unless Digital Rights Management (DRM) prevents it recorded TV can be viewed on many other devices
- Another computer with Windows Media Center (even easier with Windows 7)
- Any computer with Windows Media Player (even outside the home using network streaming on Windows 7)
- A Windows Mobile device
- The Zune (only available in the US)
The core Windows Media Center experience can be available on any TV using an Extender (Xbox360)

This is in contrast to most standard consumer electronics (CE) type DVR that you might pick up in an electical retailer or indeed the Sky+ DVR which generally only allow you to view live TV or recorded TV on that device. There are ways to get that content onto other TV's but not any computer in the way Windows Media Center does.

There is one limitation of Windows Media Center that only an extender device, like an Xbox360, can solve and this is getting live TV to other TV's in the house or computers on the network (unless you install a TV tuner card within each one). This can be expensive and also means that computer is tied to a cable, not ideal with a laptop, and may not even be situated near a TV point. If you consider that Windows Media Center can only simultaneously record as many channels as there are tuners it seems a shame that all those tuners are installed in seperate computers.

Wouldn't it make more sense to install all tuners into a central computer, perhaps the Windows Home Server that you have (you do have one right?), and allow any computer on the network to use those tuners as if they were installed on that computer. Now there is at least one hardware solution that I know of which allows tuners to be used in this way and that is HDHomeRun but there are some drawbacks:

It can't utilise your existing investment in tuner hardware
As you require more tuners you need to purchase extra boxes which need to be powered
Currently there is no DVB-S or DVB-S2 version of the HDHomeRun (although we have been asking for them)

Now what if there was a software solution you could install that could allow any number of tuners (PCI, PCIe, USB, DVB-T, DVB-S) into a network tuner? Well as of 3:44 pm on Tuesday 12th January 2010 there is thanks to DVBLogic. The software consists of four components, three of which you install on the server (this could be a desktop computer) and one that gets installed on the client.

Server installation
- DVBLink Server
- DVBLink TVSource
- DVBLink Server Network Pack
Client installation
- DVBLink Network Client (You can watch live TV using a UPNP (Windows Media Player, Sony PS3) without installing this)

I'm not going to cover the installation process because there is already an excellent guide here (note that the 1st release candidate (RC1) is now available and should be downloaded from here) and on the DVBLogic forums.

The software is still in development, it has just reached RC1, so is not a fully released product but I have found it to be very stable to the point that I have now converted to using this instead of having a tuner installed on our Home Theatre PC (HTPC). I did some initial testing with an Hauppauge Nova-T-500 (this is a hybrid dual DVB-T PCI card) taken out of a desktop PC and installed into the WHS. I then installed the client onto the desktop PC and my netbook and after the setup process I am able to view, pause, or record live TV even though these devices have no local tuner. The quality is excellent on both devices which are receiving the TV signal through different paths:

Desktop - Connected to the WHS via a 1Gbit wired network
Netbook - Connected over 802.11n to my ADSL Router/AP which connects to the WHS via HomePlug (100Mbps)

I have since moved another Nova-T-500 tuner card from our HTPC into the WHS to give me a pool of 4 tuners. This means we are now able to record up to four channels on our HTPC but still enjoy live TV on the desktop or netbook so long as tuners are available (in the RC1 version of DVBLink you are able to specify a "master" client and the software will cut off other clients in order to ensure a tuner is available should all four be in use).

I'm currently using only DVB-T tuners but you can use all DVB-S or any combination. There is one limitation and that is the "virtual" tuners on the client emulate DVB-S only so even if you have DVB-T tuners you will be unable to use "red button" services currently available on Freeview. I don't have any DVB-S tuners so I'm unable to test if this has the same limitation.

This is an excellent solution for my setup because it opens the possibility of having an HTPC directly connected to the TV again. Without the need for tuners on the HTPC it means that the box can be small and it doesn't need an outlet for the TV signal. It also means I can consider installing an all-in-one nettop in the kitchen or even enjoy live TV outside in the garden on my netbook. If I were to setup a VPN I could even enjoy live TV from another location although I should point out that DVBLogic didn't design this with that in mind).

Live TV on my netbook playing in Windows Media Player & Media Center

Hopefully I've covered exactly what the DVBLogic software does and why Garry and I are so excited by it. Please post any questions in the comments section and I'll do my best to answer them. I'm already planning a follow up, with some screenshots, to show what devices get installed on the server and clients, the configuration tools and Media Center add-in, along with the CPU & network useage when recording up to 4 channels simultaneously.

A niggling sleep problem fixed (but not by me)

2010-01-25T16:21:00Z

This post is about a problem I tweeted about sometime ago but no amount of searching has located that tweet. I'll start by detailing the hardware that went into our HTPC:

Motherboard: ASUS P5LD2-VM DH
CPU: Intel Celeron D 352 3.2GHz
HDD: Maxtor DiamondMax10 SATA2 300GB
RAM: 2GB of memory (Corsair TWIN2X1024A-6400)
Case: SilverStone LC11S-300
Graphics: XFX GeForce 7300GT 256MB DDR2 PCIE (now removed as you will read)
Tuner: Hauppauge Nova-T-500 Dual DVB-T PCI (moved to the Windows Home Server)

When we first started using Windows Media Center, the version that came with Vista, this machine sat under our TV and served its purpose without too many issues including going to sleep and waking up for recordings or whenever we wanted to use it.

Then in 2008, after swiping my visitors badge at the Server/SQL/Visual Studio 2008 product launch in Birmingham, I won an Xbox360 so we switched to using that as an Extender and moved the HTPC into a back room (it had always been just slightly too noisy and we also wanted the TV in a location which had no TV points within easy reach). At that time I turned off sleep because, when setting up an Extender, Vista prompts you to turn on "Away Mode" to ensure the machine is always available for use.

Last year I got into Twitter where I started getting more involved with other HTPC users and Windows Media Center MVP's. This is a great community filled with really helpful and knowledgeable people. I learned the Xbox360 could send the "magic packet" required to wake up a sleeping HTPC which meant that there was no need to keep the machine on 24/7 anymore. When Windows 7 was released I decided to try and re-configure the HTPC to sleep and this was when I ran into problems. I discovered the HTPC would not enter sleep correctly, it was doing everything right but the machine wouldn't actually power down. I knew it was partly working because when I pulled the power cable out and replaced it the machine restored from the hibernation file. I tried removing the now redundant graphics card (since no monitor or TV is connected), to just use the onboard Intel graphics, but that didn't work. I even did a full CMOS reset on the motherboard in case I'd changed a configuration setting which was causing the issue. In the end I discovered a notice in the Windows 7 "Action Center" telling me that the computers BIOS was causing conflicts with sleep. Since there were no BIOS updates available and no money to replace the motherboard I just gave up. I should add here that the HTPC could not be shutdown correctly either and the power always stayed on after the OS had finished shutting down.

Now, digressing slightly, I've spent the last week or so reading about and playing around with DVBLogic's new network tuner software and succesfully moved our Nova-T-500 tuner from a desktop PC and installing it in our Windows Home Server (WHS). I then decided to move the tuner from the HTPC and put it into the WHS to fully switch to network tuners. Last night I shutdown the HTPC ready for the hardware changes and to my surprise it turned off. This is something it hasn't done for months. I carried on with the plan to move the tuner into the WHS and then re-configured the HTPC to use the network tuners.

When all the hardware and software changes were done I got the HTPC running again and tested live TV and also that I could record which all worked as per my expectations from the tests I'd performed with the desktop PC. We are now able to enjoy live TV on my netbook, the desktop, and the HTPC using the pool of 4 tuners on the WHS. With that I then tested out sleep by pressing the power button on the HTPC, which is set to send the HTPC to sleep, and after some disk activity (I've got hybrid sleep turned on so it saves the contents of RAM to disk in case of a power failure while in S3 sleep) the power light started flashing to indicate the S3 sleep state. As I said before this hadn't worked no matter how much I tried before. I then went into the living room and pressed the "Media Center" button on the Xbox360 remote control and after a slightly longer wait I was presented with the Windows Media Center interface. I'm ashamed to admit but the techie inside me was grinning at this point. I retried the test and again it worked although this time the Xbox360 didn't connect the first time, even though the HTPC had woken up, and I had to try again by pressing the button on the remote once more.

The next test was to just leave things alone and let the HTPC go to sleep naturally and see if it would wake up for a scheduled recording. This happened today and everything worked perfectly including recording using the network tuners. This has also worked again this evening with other shows that are scheduled to record. I can only imagine what has changed to suddenly make this work, I don't make changes to the HTPC if I can help it as we rely on it for all our TV, but it would seem that sometimes the best way to fix something is to do nothing at all.

There is a great guide on Missing Remote here for configuring your Windows 7 PC for sleep. I've included screen shots below of the sleep settings that I am using on our HTPC but I'm unable to capture the BIOS settings. The first thing to check is your network adaptor hardware settings.

In "Device Manager" look at the Power Management settings for your network card.

The remaining power options you can get to by pressing the "Start" menu and typing "power" into the search box.

There is no seperate sleep button on our HTPC so you might also see "When I press the sleep button"

With the "Power Options" settings open select "Change plan settings" next to the active plan (Balanced in my case) and then "Change advanced power settings".

These are the advance settings. You can turn off hybrid sleep to speed up the transition to S3 sleep (since contents of RAM are not written to disk)

Scroll down for these other advanced options. I choose "Allow the computer to sleep" because media is on the WHS.

Commercial skipping in Windows 7 Media Center for UK users

2010-01-23T19:19:00Z

When WTV became the default container for Windows Media Center recorded content it broke all of the methods of skipping and cutting commercials from our recordings. Since those early days many have worked hard to include WTV support in their applications and several have fallen by the way side.

Finally Jere Jones of DragonGlobal had a breakthrough and updated his ShowAnalyzer software to support WTV. I am a supporter of ShowAnalyzer, I have it installed, fully registered, keep it fully updated and test my recordings with it regularly. It is a great tool and in conjunction with DVRMSToolbox and it 7MC addin makes commercial skipping in Windows Media Center an effortless process for the most part. Unfortunately I am based in the UK and even with tweaking and tinkering I simply cannot get ShowAnalyzer to accurately find my commercials.

This has led me on a quest to find the next best alternative to easily identify commercials with as little user interaction as possible. The only other major player in commercial skipping software is Comskip which comes bundled with DVRMSToolbox and I have found it to be extremely accurate at identifying UK commercials but unfortunately it has yet to be updated to work with WTV. Luckily Microsoft had the wisdom to include a 'WTV Converter' executable in Windows 7 that will happily convert your Mpeg2 WTV files into DVR-MS format. What happened next was an influx of DVRMSToobox profiles and standalone applications that tried to solve the problem.

I tried 'WTV Watcher' that automated the conversion to DVR-MS and breathed new life into 'LifeXtender' . This method introduced it's own problems for me (LifeXtender would fail constantly and randomly) so I decided to look at DVRMSToolbox to emulate the whole process and use only one tool instead of two. One gentlemen that has put a lot of time into create various elaborate profiles in an attempt to automate is much of the process as possible is Anthony J. Buttino or 'Abuttino' over at the DVRMSToolbox forums and his profiles can be found here.

All the above solutions did the job but I still wasn't happy for several reasons:

1) These processes CUT commercials from your files. If the cuts are not accurate you will lose part of your recording.

2) At least in my experience 7MC does not like DVR-MS files! I use extenders exclusively and DVR-MS files take a couple of seconds to start playing audio where WTV files audio is immediate for example. I also find that Media Center slows down when DVR-MS is used.

3) It is overly complicated. Files have to be converted, then scanned for commercials, then renamed, then replaced, some deleted etc. All this is a drag on your system resources.

I have found that the simplest method is to utilise DVRMSToolbox and the 7MC commercial skip addin but use Comskip to scan temporary DVR-MS versions of your recorded content.

What you need:

DVRMSToolbox

DVRMSToolbox 7MC commercial skip addin

The DVRMSToolbox profile attached to this post. - place 'Commercial Skip - temp dvr-ms v2.dcp' into the DVRMSToolbox 'profiles' folder

note: the profile is set to point to 'H:\TVScanFolder' as the temporary folder where most of the work is done. You need to change this to point to a folder of your choice or create this exact location on your system.

How it works:

Simply, a copy of your WTV recording is converted to DVR-MS and then scanned by Comskip to create the xml file used by the DVRMSToolbox commercial skip addin. Your original file never moves!

1) WTV copied to temp folder

2) WTV file converted to DVR-MS file

3) DVR-MS file scanned by Comskip, commercials identified and xml file created

4) Copy of WTV file and DVR-MS file deleted from temp folder

5) Commercial skip addin skips your commercials!

You will need basic knowledge of DVRMSToolbox if you need to edit the profile. The software and advice can be found here. I used the standard Comskip settings in the version bundled with DVRMSToolbox with one exception. I changed the 'detect_method' setting in the 'comskip.ini' from '127' to '111'. I would say I get about 95% accuracy with these settings.

Since changing to this method I have found the stability and speed of my system have noticibly improved. If you have any questions please follow me on Twitter.

post edited on 30/01/2010

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:

The above article had previously been removed from publication at the request of Mr. Abuttino because he had claimed that I had stolen his profile and renamed it as my own. He even made his accusation public before I had a chance to contact him and resolve the matter and his post can be found here.

I have responded to the accusation both publically and privately with the following statement:

"Sir,
It was not my intention to steal anything. I am guilty of not crediting you by name on the article for your profiles (I did mention that people had been working on some). Yes, I tested your profiles in the past but could never get them to work 100% to my satisfaction which led me to experiment with those methods. The profile was written from scratch not copied from your work directly but I must admit your work and articles did give me the ability to be able to understand how to compile these profiles, the syntax to use etc and for omitting to mention this I do sincerely apologise and I am most grateful for your efforts. It is true that i would not have had the ability to product any DTB profiles without researching yours and others' work.

As you can probably tell from the post I am not a professional blogger, I am not involved in the computer / IT industry at all, in fact I am probably what you may describe as a blue collar worker and just an enthusiast and in my enthusiasm that the solution was working well for me I have failed to follow 'nettiquette' as it were.

I have nothing to gain, just trying to help the community that has helped me so many times in the past."

It was not my intention to imply that my profile was anything unique or that I am the first to 'discover' this method. This is my mistake and I hold my hand up to it. Perhaps this can be accreditted to Mr Abuttino, perhaps not. In my inexperience as a blogger I assumed that because it was so simple I did not need to state this, coupled with the fact it only uses built in DVRMSToolbox commands. There are probably people out there using the exact same instructions to perform this task because it cannot by done differently as it is so GENERIC. My only intention is to help others in the Media Center community who may have similar problems with skipping commercials, nothing more.

I have since edited the above article to make it perfectly clear that I did test Mr. Abuttino's profiles specifically in my search for a suitable solution. The crux of the misunderstanding seems to stem from the use of a directory name in my profile that has the same name as one in Mr. Abuttino's profiles, specifically 'ProcessingShow'. There is a very simple explanation for this. The directory was created for use with Mr. Abuttino's profile and when I discontinued using his profile I simply carried on using the directory as it had a perfectly sensible name!

Anybody familiar with DVRMSToolbox will see that the profile I knocked up is a very BASIC profile (as I will illustrate later) and to perform the function it is designed for it cannot be very different when put together by one individual or another and there is no basis for copyright infringement. The basic commands are built into DVRMSToolbox.

Example 'A'

The original profile:

Every line in this profile are standard DVRMSToolbox commands strung together to perform the task required and do not contain any proprietary 'code'. As indicated earlier it uses a directory name that was included in Mr. Abuttino's profile. Line 5 runs the external program 'wtvconverter.exe' written by Microsoft.

Example 'B'

The revised profile:

I have removed the offending reference to the directory used by Mr. Abuttino and replaced it with the directory named 'TVScanFolder'.

I would like to end this article by crediting individuals who have inspired me. Andy VT (the maintainer and owner of DVRMSToolbox), Ben Drawbaugh of Engdget HD who has written some very helpful articles and profiles for DVRMSToolbox, Andres Echevarria of the My Network Project blog and of course Mr. Anthony J. Buttino.

Can network tuners make a virtual HTPC possible?

2010-01-22T14:07:00Z

Any regular reader of Garry Whittaker's blog here on TDL will have seen his posts on DVBLogic's DVBLink TVSource V2 which allows any tuner (DVB-T or DVB-S) installed in a computer to be used by another computer (client) on the network. If you follow me on Twitter or have read my post here on TDL (I'm A Windows Media Center PC...) you will know that I have the view that Windows Media Center should be integrated into Windows Home Server (WHS). Now as soon as I read Garry's post the first thought I had was "I can put my tuners into my WHS and create a tuner pool for other computers to use" followed closely behind by a second thought "I could run our HTPC as a virtual machine on the 'always on' WHS and reduce our energy useage".

A slight digression; I have also been feeling quite dissolusioned with the "extender model" (the HTPC is locked away and not used directly) since Microsoft (and it's hardware partners) seem to be moving away from using extenders to get Windows Media Center into the living room. As you might well know there are features of Windows Media Center that do not work on extenders:

Full DVD rips (with menu's, subtitles, etc)
Flash streaming used by catch-up TV services (TunerFreeMCE for example)
The new SkyPlayer*

* Although SkyPlayer is available on Xbox360 for non-subscribers like myself the Pay-Per-View content is non-existent on Xbox compared to Media Center.

There are people moving away from extenders and instead using the HTPC directly connected to their TV. That isn't easily accomplished in our house because 1) the HTPC was built on a budget and so isn't as quiet as it could be and 2) since changing to extenders we have moved our TV to another location on an internal wall where there are no TV signal outlets.

Now to bring this back on track, the announcement of DVBLink TVSource V2 means people can have a HTPC directly attached to the TV without the need to have tuners or indeed a TV signal outlet anywhere near. It also means that portable machines (netbooks, laptops, nettops, etc) can also enjoy the benefits of live TV using the DVBLink TVSource Client. The most exciting prospect for me was being able to centralise the tuners into a pool on the WHS. I should explain that I have two Hauppauge Nova-T-500 which are hybrid DVB-T dual tuners and one is installed in the HTPC and the other is in the desktop PC. Ideally I'd have both cards in the HTPC but the desktop PC is used for watching live TV often enough that this wasn't feasible.

The first step was to get DVBLink TVSource V2 up and running on the desktop PC with the DVBLink TVSource Client installed on my netbook (ASUS EeePC 1000 running Windows 7 Home Premium). I followed the instructions provided in the post on DVBLogic's forums and after hitting a few dead ends I had live TV running simultaneously on the desktop PC and netbook. I should say that the dead ends were my fault for missing out some of the more unobvious steps but DVBLogic were amazing and provided support to me via Twitter.

Next thing was to do some research about installing a Nova-T-500 card under Windows Server 2003 (the operating system that WHS is built on) and was relieved to discover that the card can be installed. I moved the tuner card from the desktop to the WHS and restarted it. The tuner card needed to be installed manually so I pointed it to the latest drivers I had downloaded and then went through the steps required to install and configure DVBLink TVSource V2. After removing the software from the desktop and installing the client I had two live streams running and recording. The CPU useage on the WHS was about 10-15% with around 1-2% network useage of a 1Gbit port.

Now to the burning question and the real topic of this post. Could a virtual HTPC running on the WHS perform the same tasks as the physical HTPC we are currently using? The only barrier is the fact that some hardware isn't available inside a running virtual machine and this is most certainly the case with Microsoft's Virtual PC and Virtual Server products. Now that we have network tuners that barrier has been removed. I set about installing a Windows 7 VM onto the WHS (CPU: Intel Celeron D 352 3.2GHz / RAM: 2GB) and after completing the installation of Virtual Machine Additions and the DVBLink TVSource Client. The end result was the virtual DVBLink Tuners and a set of channels within the guide:

Editing source information for BBC One

The Guide populated with all the channels fed from DVBLink TV Source

[Note: The text below is copied from my own post I made on the DVBLogic forums here]

The next step was to re-configure our Xbox360 Extender to use the new virtual machine which was almost incident free. I had to increase the RAM allocated to the VM to 1GB as the initial 512MB simply wasn't enough and setting up the Extender kept failing. I only have 2GB in our WHS and 512MB of that is already allocated to another VM that runs our DNS and Email server and currently our WHS utilises just 512MB of RAM. After making that configuration change I got the Extender configured and was able to browse around Media Center via the Xbox360. Then the final hurdle, could I watch Live TV via the Extender using the Windows 7 virtual machine as the host? There really should be a drum roll here...

No I couldn't. Using the Virtual Server Administration it would seem that CPU wasn't an issue, the VM was using about 50% CPU, although I could be wrong. I suspect the real issue is network traffic (Virtual Server only emulates a 100mbit network card even though the server has a 1Gbit card) given that the network statistics were jumping rapidly. The VM is trying to pull in the DVBLink feed and pump it back out to the Extender and at the same time the physical server is trying to send data to the VM via the virtual network card.

This is a project without budget so I can't try and resolve this by throwing a better CPU or more RAM at it in the hope I can get it working (I would if I was sure of success). I am going to try running the VM using Windows Virtual PC on another desktop to see if that makes things any better. I suspect that this sort of setup needs an improved VM solution capable of near physical hardware performance. I'd ideally try this using Hyper-V but that would mean converting our WHS into a VM too

Blog Post: Using Windows Home Server Power Pack 3 and Media Center Integration

2010-01-04T19:42:00Z

I know Power Pack 3 has been out for a few months (late October), but I have yet to see any good posts talking about the Media Center Connector. I've seen posts on the increased functionality of PP3, better backup, Windows 7 support and a few new features. But nothing about the Media Center Connector.

In this post I'll go through all the new menus that are added to Media Center, what they mean and what the settings are for.

Read the full post Here (from NEDMUG.com)

Ripping, Storing and Playing Blu-Rays in Media Center

2010-01-04T14:37:00Z

I've been ask many times "How do you rip Blu-Rays?". So, I wrote a guide on how I do it. It's not the only way, but it works well for me.

You can read the post Here

What Windows7 Media Center Plug-In items do you use ??

2009-12-20T09:19:00Z

It would be interesting to read about what other Media Center users are using as enhancements and plug-ins to Windows7 Media Center, listing your items here can have many beniifits, for new users they can find out what is working and what is not, for yourself to look back if a re-install should ever have to be undertaken and for us all to see what we might or might not have missed as a worthy addition to our systems

i will get the ball rolling and list what is currently installed on my Windows7 Home Premium dedicated Media Center machine

i am a UK Media Center User

Sky Player ( very stable )

Sharks007 Windows7 Codecs ( must have for ripped Blue Ray )

My Channel Logos ( stable )

Media Browser ( Stable )

Heatwave weather app version 1.3 ( Not always accurate but stable )

Vista Audio Changer ( Must have for room audio switching )

Tunerfree MCE ( stable must have )

Freeview TV card ( occasional signal issues but mainly stable )

All of the above are installed and used daily with no issues which is what i need, stability brings ease of use, reliability and time to actually use Media Center rather than repair it which in turn means an easy life

So what are you using ??

Mike

Windows7intouch.com

Remote scheduling via email

2009-12-01T23:52:00Z

Whilst we wait for a 7MC compatible replacement for WebGuide, is this a viable alternative? It's a program that you schedule to run periodically on your 7MC machine and it will download emails sent to a specific account then schedule recordings based off the content of the mails. It's based off the Radio Times website so folks in the UK should have no issue getting it to work. Not sure about everyone else. It was also built around using a really expensive phone, but regular email should work.

Take a look and feed back with your experiences with this.

http://frommanchesterway.com/scheduling-media-center-recordings-remotely-with-an-iphone/

Found via TGB.

Are you seeing duplicate recordings? Microsoft seeking feedback.

2009-12-01T20:57:00Z

Over on TGB there is a post from Microsoft asking if you've seen duplicate recordings. I thought it deserved wider awareness, so please go and vote. Even if you're not seeing the issue please vote and say so, as that way MS will get the fullest picture possible.

When you schedule a series recording for a show that airs frequently: for example "Modern Marvels" on The History Channel do you get multiple copies of the same episodes recorded at different times sometimes on the same day? Have you looked in the list of episodes scheduled to record and noticed that it has tagged the same episode multiple times, even when you already have it on disk? Have you seen an incident where there is a season premier for a series and you get four copies, two in SD and two in HD?These are the sorts of incidents I am interested in ...

http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/t/82413.aspx

Windows7 Media Center LEARN MORE

2009-11-24T19:16:00Z

LEARN MORE

A nice recent addition to Windows7 Media Center is the ability to Watch and Learn about Media Center. By selecting the “ Learn More “ option on the “ Tasks “ line, Videos and Text inform the user of what Media Center is and can do. The first short advert about Media Center found under the “ All your favourites “ Tab is excellent and shows Media Center in a well put together clip, one thing i will say though, the speed in which the Interface operates in the clip is perhaps a little fast, i have a quad core that is more than enough for Media Center but even that doesn't allow for the super fast speed the Clip shows but that aside its a great advert for Media Center, on the right hand side of the Clip window you can also read about what Media Center has to offer, scrolling through you learn you can “ Watch TV Shows and Movies Instantly “ “ Turn you TV into a Broadcast TV** “ Your PC can be your DVR ” and on and on , there are many many possibilities with Media Center

Also in the “ LEARN MORE “ section there are tabs that are listed as “Whenever you want”, “Wherever you want”, “Getting started ”, “Record TV ” and Extenders , each section has its own informative “How To” video with the ability to read about your options, again on the right hand side of the screen

I have been wondering what the Ehome team were going to do with the Learn More button … and now we no, i think its a great idea to have these option available within Media Center and it would be an even better idea to have access to this information outside of Media Center somewhere in the Windows7 Start bar, many users of Windows7 and previous versions of Windows simply did not no Media Center was on there systems, making this part of Media Center available easily from the desktop would certainly bring more awareness to this great piece of invaluable software

Originaly Posted by Gadgmeister on the 24/11/2009

The Gadgmeister Blog

Windows7intouch.com

SkyTV Sky Player Integration Within Windows7 Media Center ... hmm

2009-11-22T20:27:00Z

Originaly Posted by Gadgmeister on 22/11/2009

Windows7intouch.com

Below is a List of what is available in Windows7 Media Center from the UK ( BSkyB ) SkyTV Sky Player integration, what is listed below is the first view you will see of the various packages on offer from Sky but the list below is only the tip of the Iceberg and does not show details on all Programmes, some programmes that are covered by your current Sky Subscription are NOT free and it is impossible to list every programme available, a good rule of thumb to gauge whether the program will be available for free with your current subscription is .... If its a popular program it will cost money. Examples like Sky1`s Futurama , Dom Jolly Happy Hour , Buffy , Relic Hunter , StarGate Atlantis , 24 , Brainiac and many many more programmes are NOT free even if your Sky TV subscription covers them , cost per programme varies on a per program basis

In a perfect world

The whole confusion of which channels are free and which are not could be easily resolved by allowing the Subscribers current TV subscription to cover the exact same channels within Media CenterThis cannot be achieved because Sky Launched the Multiroom option long before the Media Center integration and charge money for the privilege, if they were to allow Media Center users to have all of there current SkyTV subscription available it would effectively give Multiroom capability for FREE to Media Center users and this is something SkyTV will not do, they SHOULD but wont .... Plain and simply its down to Money money money

It Just wont do

SkyTV have made the Sky Player integration almost unusable as an every day way of consuming there content within Media Center, it is the most frustrating thing to find a channel or program you normally view now asking for money before it can be seen, here at my house I would dearly love to only use Media Center as a single interface for all Digital Content but the lack of proper Premium Tv content integration means that Media Center remains second place and unused by the Children and the Wife who are the main consumers of Tv...... The UK remains devoid of proper Premium content integration within Media Center and this is a terrible shame, what is needed and has been needed for a very long time is a PROPER SkyTV Pc card, a One off yearly payment for its usage that covers ALL of your current subscription

Integration

Sky Player IS a fine integration of a Tv system, the interface is well laid out and responsive BUT despite this the fact that a large percentage is NOT free no matter what subscription you have means that it will probably become a item to delete from the Control Panel, it might be visible in the Media Center interface but removing it is no issue, simply go to Start>Control Panel>Programs and Features and scroll down until you see SkyPlayer for Windows Media Center

Other Tv alternatives exist that are Free such as adding a cheap FreeView PC card Tuner, adding in TunerFree MCE and many more options besides, have a look at this article from Sarah Perez on Channel9 to get ideas for alternative methods of watching Tv content in Media Center

Unfortunately theDigitalLifestyle is a tad narrower than my own web site where this is displayed For the Full size List visit Windows7intouch.com

Originaly Posted by Gadgmeister on 22/11/2009

Windows7intouch.com

Sky Player in Windows Media Center

2009-10-21T21:53:00Z

It has been known for a while that Sky has teamed up with Microsoft to bring their Sky Player to the Xbox 360 Platform. Well now there is even more good news for Media Center users in the UK, Sky has announced that they will be bringing the Sky Player to Media Center.

Techradar.com is running with this excellent news and US users should note their correct use of the word centre!

It has been confirmed as an SD service at the moment but Sky have not ruled out a HD service.

Here is the link:

http://www.techradar.com/news/software/operating-systems/hands-on-sky-player-on-windows-media-centre-643942

http://www.techradar.com/news/software/operating-systems/sky-player-coming-to-windows-media-centre-643937

Thanks to Techradar.com

My Set Up and Backing Up DVD's and Blu Ray to MP4 or MKV

2009-10-19T16:04:00Z

If I was to add up the amount of time I've spent in the last few years on encoding, muxing and generally getting audio and video into the format I need, it would probably scare the life out of me!

The good news is I'm now at a point where I'm in a generally happy place. And as a result I thought I would share. I'll start by briefly describing what I have, primarily to highlight what my requirements are. I'll then get swiftly into the detail. Before I do any of this, I'd like to say right from the outset that these techniques are for backing up media that you legally own, for personal backup and easier distribution around your own home and on your own media devices. In no way do I condone the copying of copyright material or material that you don't legally have the right to.

OK, that said here is my set up.

My Set Up
I have an HTPC (with built in DVD/BluRay/HD-DVD combo drive) in the bedroom connected to a 32" LCD Toshiba TV. In my living room, I have an XBox acting as an extender, a (new) Samsung 40" Internet / DLNA enabled TV, Sky HD and an Apple TV. In the study, I have a Windows Home Server. In the kitchen I have BT Vision, but currently that sites pretty much standalone, as does the sky HD box in the living room. For audio only, I also have a Roku Soundbridge in the kitchen and an Apple Air Tunes express in the dining room. For travelling, I have an Apple MacBook and an iPhone.

Given my use of Apple devices throughout the set up, my video container of choice has to be MP4. Audio wise, MP3 or AAC is fine but again I tend to go for AAC - my ears aren't so tuned that I can really tell the difference and AAC tends to come in a little smaller (file size wise).

So I have iTunes 9 on my WHS and that is my home media hub (in fact general home information & data hub). I have the Media Center connector set up to my HTPC. iTunes lets me sync content with my Apple TV and stream what I cannot fit on the 160GB drive. It's wired in, so streaming works really nicely. For audio, again the WHS serves up content to the Roku soundbridge perfectly. And iTunes again serves up audio to the airport express, which I can control via my iPhone really nicely. I also have Spotify and Airfoil on the WHS to stream this to the airport express, the soundbridge, the Apple TV and my iPhone either independently or in multiples simultaneously. So as long as I add a video file in MP4 format to my video folder on the WHS and then into iTunes, and audio files as MP3 or AAC to my music folder and into iTunes, I'm all set. I should also mention that having the xbox as an extender and having a DLNA server on my WHS means I can stream MKV, WTV and DVR-MS and AVI files to my living room via the Internet TV or XBox.

So there it is, movies and long term TV shows tend to get converted to MP4 and made available from the WHS to the HTPC (which supports MP4 under W7) or the Apple TV. I can also push to my iPhone (or Macbook) when travelling - sometimes if the MP4 is too high res I need to create a lower res copy for this, but iTunes or other tools do this pretty simply. The Apple TV interface and access to the iTunes store mean this is beautiful to use for movies and TV shows I want to keep. TV shows that I've recorded on the Media Centre that I may only watch once, or files I have recorded on my Vado HD camcorder (AVI) get streamed via the XBox extender or directly to my TV via DLNA.

So now I've described my set up, here is how I get things into this structure.

DVD's
For my DVD's, I generally use Handbrake. This is a great utility for (Mac or PC) that will take a DVD (and other files come to that - flv, avi - although I've had no success with mkv) and convert to a great looking MP4 file. There are presets you can select for Apple TV, iPhone or iPod touch, amongst others. Or you can set the settings such as bitrate, resolution, frame rate, etc specifically if you prefer. Quite often I will use Media Info to establish the settings of a particular file and use those to create as accurate a copy within an MP4 container as possible.

HD-DVD's & Blu Ray's
For Blu Rays, if they are copy protected you will need to find a tool that can help with this. For my non-copy protected material I use ripbot264, written by Atak_Snajpera. A pretty straightforward tool, I open up the largest file within my bluRay folder (typically 25GB+). Ripbot then pieces things together and provides you the details of the main movie file. I set the picture size properties down to 720p, the sound to AAC-LC 6 channel and the output format to MP4. Then leave it to do it's thing. A few hours later depending on your hardware) you will have an MP4 file of the main movie approx 3GB in size. I then move this to my video folder on the WHS, add to iTunes, sync to my Apple TV and possible have iTunes generate an iPhone version as well if I may need it when travelling.

All in all, a great solution for me.

I still have a way to go as it's not perfect, but it keeps my file sizes pretty manageable and pretty good flexibility around where I play my content.

Microsoft to Deliver New Generation of Windows Phones on Oct. 6

2009-09-01T16:54:00Z

Sept. 1, 2009 — Microsoft Corp. today announced that Windows^® phones will be widely available at retail stores worldwide on Oct. 6, 2009. The new phones will be the first to feature Windows Mobile 6.5, the latest version of Microsoft’s mobile phone software, and will deliver new customer experiences through an improved, easy-to-use user interface, better browsing capabilities and access to valuable services, including Windows Marketplace for Mobile and Microsoft My Phone.

“A Windows phone gives people a single phone that works for their whole life, keeping them connected to the people and information they care most about by harnessing the power of the PC, phone and Web,” said Todd Peters, corporate vice president of the Mobile Communications Marketing Group at Microsoft.

Industry Players Rally Behind Windows Phones

Partners from around the globe are committed to updating or expanding their portfolios to include phones with Windows Mobile 6.5.

•	In North America: Mobile operators AT&T, Bell Mobility, Sprint, TELUS and Verizon Wireless, and phone manufacturers HP, HTC Corp., LG Electronics, Samsung and Toshiba Corp.
•	In Europe: Mobile operators Orange, Deutsche Telekom AG and Vodafone Group Plc, and phone manufacturers Acer, HTC, LG Electronics, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and Toshiba
•	In Latin America: Mobile operator TIM Brazil, and phone manufacturers HTC, LG Electronics and Samsung
•	In Asia Pacific: Mobile operators NTT DOCOMO Inc., SOFTBANK Mobile Corp., SK Telecom, Telstra and WILLCOM Inc., and phone manufacturers Acer Inc., HTC, LG Electronics, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and Toshiba

One Phone for Work and Play

Windows phones are ideal devices for work and play, giving consumers the confidence to get things done with mobile versions of the software they recognize and expect from their PCs. The redesigned Internet Explorer Mobile browser includes a new engine and built-in Adobe Flash Lite support for better rendering and completion of tasks, so it’s easy to do more from a phone, such as check in for a flight, get directions or pay bills while on the go. Microsoft Office Outlook Mobile delivers a familiar, consistent e-mail experience across the PC, phone and browser, while Microsoft Office Mobile allows customers to open and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents right from their phone. With Windows Live on their phones, users can keep track of friends in one place, no matter which social networking sites they belong to — Facebook, Twitter or MySpace Windows Live.

Powerful Mobile Services

Windows phones will debut with two new powerful mobile services so that the information, contacts and applications customers want are always at their fingertips. A wide variety of approved and certified applications will be available for direct download to Windows phones from Windows Marketplace for Mobile, and an easy return policy lets customers buy with confidence. The free My Phone service allows customers to automatically back up and sync photos, music, contacts and text messages from their phone to the Web, making it easy to access and manage them from their phone or PC or restore the information in the event of a lost phone.

A Customized Experience, From Keyboards to Widgets

Windows phones give consumers the choice of a broad selection of form factors from sleek, touch-screen devices to full QWERTY keyboards to make it easy to find a phone that fits their needs. Windows Mobile 6.5 provides easy access to third-party applications such as Facebook, Netflix and Zagat, and an improved, touch-friendly user interface that allows customers to tailor their phone to suit their individual style. With the new version, users can change the look and feel of their phones with designer themes or a personal background and customize their home screen with widgets so the information they need is always easy to find.

Video skip feature in Windows 7 Media Centre

2009-09-01T14:34:00Z

I mailed this tip to the Entertainment 2.0 podcast recently and got some positive feedback from it, so I thought I’d post it here as well.

When watching a video (recorded TV, avi or whatever) you can quickly jump forward or backward. Just enter a number of minutes and seconds then press fast forward and the playback will instantly skip forward by that amount. For example, to skip forward an hour and five minutes in a film, enter 6500 (65 minutes and zero seconds) and press fast forward. You’ll instantly be 65 minutes further forward in your film.

There is a similar feature using the skip buttons on the remote, but it’s not quite so useful: Enter a number and press the skip forward button. This will then move the playback forward by that number multiplied by the skip amount (30 seconds). For example, enter 10 and press skip forward and it’ll move by 5 minutes (10x30 = 300 seconds = 5 minutes).

Both of these features need Windows 7 and also work on extenders.

----------IMPORTANT EDIT----------

Thanks to this thread on TGB I've seen that there is an even more useful skipping feature: Just type in a number of minutes and press Play. Then, regardless of how far through the video you already are, the playback point will instantly go to that number of minutes from the start. So, enter 65 and press Play and you'll instantly be a hour and five minutes from the start of the video. Wow!

DoubleTwist

2009-08-07T12:01:00Z

Many of us, myself included, have a large music library and sometimes managing this can be a real pain, especially when you have multiple devices from different manufacturers. For those with an Apple device you are stuck with using iTunes to manage and sync your library. Other devices may use Windows Media Player to sync the library. Help is now at hand. An application is available called DoubleTwist and this allows you to take your iTunes and / or Windows Media Player Libraries and sync your music, pictures and video to your chosen device. If you are familiar with the iTunes interface then you will instantly recognise it.

The real strength in the software is the ability to synchronise your music to many different devices. The doubleTwist web site details the current list of devices. Here is the current list from their site:

BlackBerry - We have many happy BlackBerry users and support all the recent BlackBerry models such as the Curve, Pearl, Storm, Bold and Flip.
Sony PSP - Use doubleTwist to automatically convert your videos and sync them to your PSP; sync your iTunes playlists and photo library.
Palm Pre - automatically convert your videos and sync them to your Palm Pre; sync your iTunes playlists and photo library.
Archos 605 - sync your videos, iTunes playlists and photos. Other Archos models should work as well.
INQ1 by INQ
G1 and Magic Android phones - automatically convert your videos and sync them to your Android phone; sync your iTunes playlists and photo library.
Nokia N & E Series phones, including the N95, E61i, E62, and many others such as the 5800 XpressMusic- automatically convert your videos and sync them to your Nokia; sync your iTunes playlists and photo library.
Sony Ericsson Walkman & Cybershot phones
Windows Mobile 5.0/6.0 platform (e.g. Treo, HTC, Samsung) -- currently PC only, will be available for the Mac very soon - automatically convert your videos and sync them to your Windows Mobile; sync your iTunes playlists and photo library.
LG Viewty and Shine - automatically convert your videos and sync them to your LG; sync your iTunes playlists and photo library.
Motorola (V9 and V3xx) and most Razr phones
Sansa View and Sansa e200 series
Amazon Kindle - sync audio files to your Kindle
iPhone with 2.0 firmware - load your iPhone with movies and let doubleTwist make the necessary conversions; iTunes playlists are also supported (PC only but Mac coming soon, 3.0 firmware not supported yet)
iPod - load your iPod with movies and let doubleTwist make the necessary conversions; iTunes playlists are also supported (PC only but Mac coming soon)
Nintendo DSi - coming soon! Load your DSi with music and let doubletwist do the necessary conversions
Most digital cameras
Most flash-memory-based camcorders are supported

At present I have tried this with my Skypephone S2 mobile attached to my PC as a USB device. I was able to transfer music to my phone and then play it back via the music player on the phone.

There are also many other useful features in the software. You can share media with friends, import / publish video on YouTube, publish pictures on Flickr etc.

There are at least 2 phones that are coming out in the UK in Q4 of this year that will have doubleTwist support built in from the start. These are the INQ Chat 3G and INQ Mini 3G (http://www.inqmobile.com/media/press/#1443). Hopefully many other devices will deliver the same support.

I’m sure that over the coming months there will be more features added to the application. Personally I would like to see support for iTunes servers and allow content to be synchronised from the server. This would make library management even easier. Even without this feature the application still solves many problems.

DoubleTwist was shown on BBC Click on 24th July 2009 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/8165001.stm)

Edit: I've now plugged in my iPod into DoubleTwist and I was able to pull files off of my iPod.

Questions to DrFlick

2009-08-06T22:02:00Z

i can think of no one more qualified than Dr Flick for answers to questions that have been on my mind lately regarding DLNA and i wonder if Derek has 5 minutes he may like to shed some light on a few things if possible please, the answers may also help others with questions that are the same or similar

1. If i request a Video file to play from my windows7 Pc to my Nokia N95 Phone from the N95 phone why does Windows7 not stream the video file to the phone ? , my understanding was that Windows7 transcoded any or most file formats, if the phone requests a file that is ?? AVI or even Mpg 2 should Windows7 understand that the phone can only playback Mpeg4 and Transcode the file in that format, i wonder if Derek can understand what is happening or not happening, perhaps, due to the N95 being 3 years old the DLNA standard it uses is not fully compliant to the DLNA Windows7 standard Therefore not telling Windows7 that it is only happy with Mpeg4

to brake this down a little i will simplify : i use my N95 to browse my Home Network via Wifi, it sees and connects to my Windows7 Pc and sees my video files but when i request a Video file to play on the device ( N95 ) it simply replys " selected device does not support this operation " so perhaps the N95 is not talking to the windows7 Pc in the correct DLNA way ?? .... its all a bit confusing but trying to understand why this is happening would perhaps solve other issues that may arrise in the future with other devices and situations

2. The Device ( N95 ) will happily take streams or data from my Windows7 Pc that are Mpge4 standard, as above i browse my home network , find the Windows7 machine, locate my Mpeg4 video files and then request the file to be played back on the device ( N95 ), this works fine but only after a delay of at least 10 minutes ?? would this be because the Phone is actually not accepting streams but simply copying the file to itself and once it has copied the file into a buffer of some sort, begins playing or is it because Windows7 is just very slow at deciding what to do ?? and perhaps another option which has just sprung to mind, is Windows7 re-transcoding a file that will play fine without Transcoding, i seem to remember reading somewhere that Windows7 does transcode files that sometimes dont require transcoding ??

i do appreciate that Derek is not a Nokia engineer but any insight or thoughts as to why these issues arrise would be greatly apprecited especially as i believe they are DLNA based questions , it would be nice to simply find a file with my Phone and have it play instantly back no matter what file format

Thanks for any input anyone has on these matters

Regards

Mike ( VMCEGadget ) Twitter

Microsoft: No browserless Windows 7 after all

2009-08-01T07:16:00Z

Microsoft: No browserless Windows 7 after all

by Ina Fried Cnet News

Microsoft's proposed "ballot screen" that would let users in Europe choose which browser they want on their PC.

(Credit: Microsoft)

It looks like there won't be a browserless version of Windows 7, after all.

Microsoft said late Friday that it won't ship the Windows 7 "E" version of Windows even though Europe has yet to sign off on its revised plan. The plan calls for the company to ship Windows 7 with Internet Explorer, but present a ballot screen in which users in Europe can decide whether they want Internet Explorer or another browser.

The software maker had originally proposed shipping Windows 7 in Europe without a browser at all--the so-called "E" version of the operating system. However, European regulators indicated that might not satisfy its concerns.

Microsoft announced last week that it was open to the "ballot screen," but said that it would wait to can the browserless "E" version until European regulators approved its plan.

The software maker said late Friday that it decided to ship the same version of Windows 7 for Europe after PC makers complained that having to use the browserless version of Windows 7 for a short period of time would be a pain.

"In the wake of last week's developments, as well as continuing feedback on Windows 7 E that we have received from computer manufacturers and other business partners, I'm pleased to report that we will ship the same version of Windows 7 in Europe in October that we will ship in the rest of the world," deputy general counsel Dave Heiner said in a statement.

The commission had said it "welcomed" Microsoft's move, also giving the software maker some confidence that it could ship Windows 7 with the browser included. If the commission accepts Microsoft's proposal, it will fully implement that proposed ballot screen to Windows 7 buyers in Europe.

"One reason we decided not to ship Windows 7 'E' is concerns raised by computer manufacturers and partners," Heiner said. "Several worried about the complexity of changing the version of Windows that we ship in Europe if our ballot screen proposal is ultimately accepted by the Commission and we stop selling Windows 7 'E'. Computer manufacturers and our partners also warned that introducing Windows 7 'E', only to later replace it with a version of Windows 7 that includes IE, could confuse consumers about what version of Windows to buy with their PCs."

The move also solved a challenge for Vista users in Europe, who under the previous plan would have had to do a clean install to move to Windows 7. It also allows Microsoft to sell an "upgrade version" of Windows 7 in Europe. Microsoft had previously said it would only sell a full version of the OS, though it had said it would sell that at the upgrade price, at least for a time.

Those who pre-ordered Windows 7 "E" through a recent discount offer will get the full version, as Microsoft had promised. However, Microsoft plans to now sell Windows 7 upgrades in Europe and also offer a higher-priced full version (for those without an earlier copy of Windows)--similar to what it is doing in the rest of the world.

Future wish for a wifi screen

2009-07-25T14:57:00Z

So my phone can accept streams from a Wifi network , it can play music , show pictures and play films all via the Wifi network

What i want in the future
A Wifi Touch screen or Tv , that connects to my network and streams all my content , simple ... why not !! my phone can do it and that is so small it sits in the palm of my hand

Hang it on the Kitchen Wall and the job is done , it does not have to be a monster size, it should not have a seperate Pc running it , it should be an all in one unit

As an extra add on , it could have wifi speakers, the screen looks at the network, connects and plays back on itself or to wifi speakers .... again this is exactly what my phone can do , i can play all media on the phone or i can tell the phone to play audio files from a wifi connected speaker such as the Philips WAS700

Connecting Nokia N95 to Windows 7 issues

2009-07-25T10:13:00Z

Connecting Nokia N95 to Windows 7 issues

For a reason I do not understand fully my Nokia N95 wifi refused to connect to Windows 7 properly ?? The problem is now resolved but the workaround is odd

Some background
A previous install of W7 on a different machine had no issues, the Wifi part of the N95 connected to the Pc which is on a lan and running from a Linksys wired/wireless router , the phone searched for a network location , found the Pc running W7 and connected with no issues . A new and later install 7100 has not had the same success on a different computer running W7. All I wanted to test was the ability to remote control the media player in W7 and to see if I could stream to the phone any video file. The oddity came about because W7 was happy to see the N95 as a media device in the network pane, but W7 simply refused to let it connect when I searched for a network location from the phone

Poking around
Some reading was in order as I was getting frustrated, this should work straight out of the box thats the point of W7 , ease of use which this wasent, I tried many things and read many things but stil the phone could not connect to W7, It could see the Pc running W7 and all other networked devices but each and every time I tried to connect the phone the n95 returned the usual `selected device rejected the operation` ?? Somewhere on the net I read that disabling homegroup was the answer and may well be in other circumstances but this did not help me in the slightest , firstly I lost the ability to share my content and secondly the phone remained rejected

The solution
The solution was finally found in the Network and Sharing Center, I selected on the left hand side at the bottom ` Homegroup ` and this then displays the Change homegroup settings page, I then selected half way down the `Stream my pictures,music, and videos to all devices on my home network` check box and saved the changes with the `save changes` at the bottom, after that I selected in blue `Choose media streaming options` and deselected everything I didnt want to share with, selected ok at the bottom and finally my N95 could connect to the Pc running W7

The odvious
Now after doing all the above you would think that the reason the N95 could not connect was because it was blocked in the streaming options but infact the issue here is the N95 dosent show in the streaming options, there is no sign of it even if i select All Networks in the `show devices on:` drop down box, however as I said above putting a tick in the box for `Stream my pictures,music, and videos to all devices on my home network` and saving has had an affect on the N95`s access ?? Also dont be fooled into thinking the `allow all` button has an affect in the Media streaming options panel , this did not give the N95 access

I am not a Cert M/soft user so my knowledge of why this happened is limited, at a guess the allow all and stream my pictures .... Tick box to all devices enters information differently into the registry or at the very least into different locations but whatever the reason I now have access to the Pc running W7 from my Nokia N95 wifi 8Gb phone

My Media Centre setup

2009-07-14T22:08:00Z

i have been meaning to detail my Media Centre setup for some time now but due to me creating a new web site time has been short in the evenings ... the web site is now live so i have a bit of time on my hands to take a breather from web design and get back to what i really like, media centre chatter

So my setup, i guess i`m quite lucky, i have a room right next to my Lounge that is large enough for 2 decent sized corner desks ( his and hers ) plus cabinets plus computers, from here all our media is shared throughout the house. My desk has 3 screens, 2 keyboards and 2 Pc`s reside underneath the desk quite happily, one is a quad core HTPC machine and the other is my tempermental 3.2 ghz Hyper thread machine which is my main access to the interweb, on a side note i am so looking forward to putting Windows7 on it, Vista drags it down badly.

My lounge has amongst other things a 50" LG HD Tv that is unusually hung from the side, we had no choice on this as one wall is basically glass ( patio doors ) and to put the screen directly infront of the glass would have been horrible, looking out and in, so a special bracket was purchased, some large holes were drilled right through the wall to the other side where plates and bolts were used to secure it and then the Tv was gingerly hung... at first it was pretty scary seeing the Tv just kinda hung there as the brackets dont show it looks like its floating, a year later we take it for granted and it has never moved a millimeter...thanfully , and all cables are chased into the walls, i hate seeing cables

My sound system was another conundrum, the wife did not want to see speakers, i researched for quite while on what to do and how to overcome this small annoyance being a guy i wanted to see my speakers big and bold but she who must be obeyed insisted so the hunt was on for an answer, at first i looked at in wall speakers but due to my house construction this wasent possible and nor were in ceiling speakers due to kids in bed above, Infact i found the answer in America, Orb speakers, if you look closely at the pic above you can just make them out, one is top left amd you can just see 2 more down the end by the curtains ( drapes ) on the left and right hand side, the Orbs are great speakers, round unassuming and very good for movie playback as long as they are coupled together with a decent sub which i already owned to help with music i have 2 Mission floor standers in the room as the orbs dont cut the mustard quite so well for music, together with the 5.1 Orb sub and mission mix my sound during movie playback is ..good enough

The whole lot comes together ( HTPC, Tv, Amp, Xboxs ) very well, i gave up on the Xbox as a main source of Media consumption in the lounge as it has to many drawbacks to being a viable main viewing area device, at least for me it did, i wanted reliability and ease of use which i found in a well specd HTPC Medion computer, it has a Freeview Tv card, S/Pdif output, duel screen connectivity, a TB drive, card slots, High def + blueray combimed drive and a RF remote control all as standard for that machine, it made it the near perfect choice for what i needed

The Pc itself sits under my desk with a Pc monitor conected and also it has a 5 Mtr DVI-HDMI cable running from the HTPC to my TV, control is Via the RF remote which is brilliant, sound is carried in 2 ways simultaniously which is pretty unusual as most people struggle with sound output from a HTPC , i have audio Via the HDMI cable to the TV and also audio to my amp at the same time, this was achieved by taking the S/pdif from the HTPC motherboard and spliiting it via a homemade cable to the TV card internal s/pdif in and to a homemade female RCA connection which then is connected via digital coax to my amp, i dont have to switch audio devices if i want the amp on or the Tv on , they are both on all the time

The Xboxs live in the kids rooms and they love the media centre interface at bedtime, no more hunting out dvd`s from our collection, they are all now stored on the HTPC where they can pick and choose at liesure, the xboxs have wired connections not wireless as its just to flaky for reliable playback especially over a distance

All in all our media Centre setup works very very well, i wasss , i say was because i`m not any more always tinkering and testing add ons for that extra wow factor but to be perfectly honest there are few WOW add ons that work reliably, the ones that suit us and work well are

1. Heatwave weather add on

2. Radio Time

3. The latest Media Browser

4. Tunerfree MCE

5. Google Earth for media centre ( which actually is a great WOW to show friends and family )

6. and i nearly forgot ... Ians own Media Centre add on for the RSS digital lifestyle feeds , it seriously works brilliantly and i so wish other web sites would use the same format and let there information into media centre as well as Ians does

i hope my cobled together mishmash gives some insight into Media Centre Home intergration, it has taken time but in all honesty 90% of it is out of the box stuff , a decent specd PC and some xboxs and your there , the rest of it is just down to hiding the cables and doing work whilst she isnt looking

So we can't see Internet TV here in the UK?...... well actually...

2009-07-09T12:23:00Z

As we all know, we media center users in the UK are the poor relations with regard to content compared to US users-specifically we lack the Internet TV option(s) on our media center setup.

Well actually that might not really be true, while experimenting with my set up, I've managed to enable the Internet TV 2.0 Beta option on my W7 MC setup and be able to view the content. Now it has to be said that the content itself is somewhat less than stunning but so what? it's the principle that counts.

Now before we start this does involve making a couple of (minor) registry changes and as we should all know messing about with regedit can lead to a completely non-functioning PC requiring a complete re-install, but if that doesn't scare you off then this is the procedure that I've used on both my W7 PCs and it works every time.

Firstly a little preamble. I clean built both machines with version 7137 and when I initially installed W7, I told them I was in the US, i.e. all of the regional settings were set to US. Now this might or might not be relevant to the process working properly and I'd really need to do some more experiments to check this.

So having built the PC with Windows 7 set as being in the US, I did notice a few extra features had appeared, MSNBC News.com among others (which actually worked), I added my single DVB-T tuner and ran the setup. I told it I was in the UK, set my postcode etc. and the TV section was then properly setup. I naturally then lost all of the extra features.

So I fired up REGEDIT and navigated to the following sections

HKLM / Software / Microsoft / Windows / CurrentVersion / Media Center / Settings / MCE.GlobalSettings

and changed the value of systemGeoISO2 from GB to US (which is the old trick of getting Vista media center to show the DVD library and movies search features which were also a US only option)

Then navigated to

HKLM / Software / Microsoft / Windows / CurrentVersion / Media Center / Settings / ProgramGuide

and changed the value for strCountryCode from GB to US

We then need to force a full media center update so I opened an administrative command prompt and typed in

c:\windows\ehome\mcupdate -uf

and lo and behold the Internet TV Beta 2.0 tile appeared along with the MSNBC News.com tile both of which work without having to mess around with VPN tunnels to a US IP address, I even have the extra Internet channels listed at the top of my TV guide.Annoyingly I also have a tile for the older Internet TV 1.1 (which I used to be able to get working fine in Vista if I used a US proxy) which doesn't seem to work at all - it pops up a message saying that there is no content available for the UK.

All seems perfect however if you check the update log, you will see an error related to downloading the guide data which is fair enough as it now thinks you are in the US and the headend IDs no longer match up. Basically unless you reset the strCountryCode value back to what it was, your guide data will not update but once you do change it back then when the next update happens, the Internet TV tile will vanish again.

So what I have done is to export two versions of the ProgramGuide registry key-one with strCountryCode set to US (called US Settings.reg) and one with it set to GB (called GB Settings.reg)

Next I have created a windows cmd file (which is similar to a standard batch file) which contain the following commands;

regedit /s "c:\utilities\GB Settings.reg"

start / wait c:\windows\ehome\mcupdate.exe

regedit /s "c:\utilites\US Settings.reg"

start /wait c:\windows\ehome\mcupdate.exe -uf

regedit /s "c:\utilities\GB Settings.reg"

exit

which does the following

a) load in the registry settings for GB where c:\utilites\GB Settings.reg is the location of the exported registry key with strCountryCode set to be GB. The /s runs regedit in 'silent mode' so it doesn't prompt.

b) Runs the standard mcupdate which updates my guide data ok (at this point the Internet TV tiles will vanish)

c) loads in the registry settings for the US

d) run mcupdate and force a full update of media center which gives me the tiles back. You will see an error in the update log here saying that the headend data is invalid-and this part does take a while to complete.

e) Just to tidy everything up, reset the registry settings back to GB.

All I need to do each morning is to right-click on the command file, run it as an administrator and watch it all happen automatically. What I intend to do but haven't gotten around to it yet is to schedule this command to run overnight in place of the built-in mcupdate task. As both my machines are 'live' media center computers, I'm loath to make too many changes too quickly less I break something and suffer the wrath of my family!

This procedure has worked everytime for me on both W7 media center computers I have at home. I presume it will also work for anyone else who wants to give it a go unless it is only working for me because of some fluke when I originally built the machines. Please give it a go, as long as you are happy playing around with registry settings and see if it works for you. Hopefully this technique will still work with the RTM and shipping versions of W7.

John

Be carefull when choosing a graphics card for your HTPC

2009-06-23T15:55:00Z

Be carefull when choosing a graphics card for your HTPC

I say that because dependant on your needs you may take the wrong path when choosing a graphics card for your HTPC and miss out on a golden oportunity of having 2 audio outputs at once, this can be a massive bonus if you use a TV and its audio for your Media centre front end but occasionaly want to have audio from your surround amp when the mood takes you without having to switch default audio devices in MCE/VMCE or W7MC

How is it done ! , well there are a couple of things you need to check and 1 thing you need to make, this may be a bit off putting but once done makes life very comfortable and easy

Firstly check to see if you have a S/pdif "out" pin header on your motherboard as this is essential, either check your mobo manual or take a good look at your mobo with a magnify glass and look for a 2 pin header with s/pdif writen alongside it, if the answer is yes i have this move down to the next line, if not stop here coz you cant do it

Now check to see if you have a s/pdif 2 pin header on your graphics card, this will be a s/pdif input, if yes continue to the next line, if no stop here coz you cant do it

right now we have to make something , a fly lead, we need to connect the mobo s/pdif output to the graphics card s/pdif input but not only that we also need to make the fly lead a Y type fly lead, one end will be a 2 pin header destined for the graphics card the other end a female RCA connector which we can then connect with the aid of a coaxial lead to our surround sound amp, i have looked all over the internet for a lead ready made but i never found one , this type of lead would be very welcome but as far as i no one dosent exist pre made ( go figure ) so you have to make one, i wont post any pictures of mine because ... well its not pretty , it works perfect but just isnt good to look at

Ok if you have done all of the above and connected your mobo to your graphics card and a coaxial lead to your female RCA connector just change your default audio device to HDMI and Tada ... audio from your HDMI cable and simultanious audio to your surround sound amp without having to loose or change either one

Which graphics cards have s/pdif input then, may be your next question if you havent fallen asleep reading this

well it seems that a large selection GEforce cards have the s/pdif 2pin header which is required but be carefull as a graphics card that has "on board" sound processing will not be suitable for dual s/pdif useage this is because a graphics card with "on board" sound processing has its own drivers and these have to be selected from the default audio device panel and not what we want to do , we want simultanious s/pdif out selected by choosing one option "HDMI audio"

Its odd to me that this hasent been spoken about elsewhere in the HTPC world as dual s/pdif output is a must have in most Home entertainment circumstances, i mean seriously who enjoys changing inputs constantly and loosing the Tv audio if its switched to motherboard " HDMI Audio" and vice versa, not me thats for sure

a good resource and a much beter way of explaining all this is to be found here which i discovered last night , the writer is a lot more elequant than me

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/600/

Good luck with your duel S/pdif output, it may seem a bit convoluted but once done makes life so much better

Back to Vista, Tesco is a Yardstick and Sky is the limit

2009-06-22T16:33:00Z

Back to Vista

Windows7 is nice, it has some new features, its allegidly faster but in all honesty the user experience is .... Vista

Anyway i`m a Media Centre fan and the new Windows7 Media Centre front end was to me at least a step forward, the new background of album art when playing music is a welcome change, the new way it handles TV/Sat tuners is great, the list is quite extensive as to the changes made from VMCE to W7MC but now i`m back on Vista. The programes i use to help my dedicated Media Centre machine run smoothly and do what i want just didnt work with Windows7, is it Microsoft fault ?? no of course not, its a matter of 3rd party software developers catching up and making there software Windows7 compatible, so as nice as Windows7 is .... its back to Vista for me, and maybe i`m just lucky but i have never really had any issues with Vista, its always been reliable for me and on my latest quad core machine is definately faster than Windows7 was when it was installed

Tesco is a yardstick

For anyone outside the Uk, Tesco is the name of a giant Supermarket chain in the Uk, in the States i guess its like WallMart, so for the second time this year i trundled down there with the wife who needed some shopping, she nearly fell over when i said i wanted to go, (its not a place i normally like to visit) but as i dont own any BlueRay films and so couldnt test some new codecs on my HTPC, i needed to go and buy one, Now bearing in mind this is a massive Multi million Supermarket chain there collection of BlueRay titles extended to a total of 20 Films, the top 20, thats it, no more anywhere !!! there collection of standard Def films was large and extensive but BlueRay, the winner of the HD war was resigned to a small display that frankly looked pathetic. So i then got to wondering why this is, it isnt the pricing thats for sure, most titles in the pathetic BlueRay section where around £14 to £17 which, whilst not being giveaway isnt exactly earth shatteringly expensive either.

The answer to the lack of BlueRay choice was to be found in the Electrical goods section, i had a shufty around, up and down isles of DVD recorders for less than a good night out, DVD players for £20 and £30, Upscalers for next to nothing and Divx players which quite frankly you wouldnt want unless you were really desperate untill finaly i found a BlueRay player...... £186, and incase you feel your eyes misread that i`l type it again ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY SIX UK POUNDS. Amazed, you bet i was and its not as if BlueRay just won the HD war either, HDDVD manufacturers threw in the Towel back in early 2008, late 2007, so BlueRay has had the road all to itself for over a year now and in 6 months time it will be 2 years, so there lies the reason why the BlueRay format is still less than popular, the manufacturers of BlueRay players are utterly and completely taking the consumer or trying to take the consumer for a ride, its shameful and its counter productive, times move on very very, very quickly and before you no it, BlueRay will be a thing of the past superceeded by the next digital media

Sky is the limit

So what is stopping Media Centre becoming popular in the UK, i mean really popular, in the States its gaining popularity all the time, in Australia its gaining popularity, these countrys use it or are trying to use it as PVR`s, as fancy front ends for there televisual pleasure, they have installer conferences, and intergrater alliances but what does the Uk have apart from the Digital Lifestyle, a few dedicated developers and enthusiasts and some intrapeneurial installers ??? very little is the answer, so why is this !!!

Well, the answer comes from a few hundred miles above the Earth and a man called Rupert, BskyB or simply Sky Television. For the unintiated Television in the UK in the main is delivered from geosyncronus Satellites to small dishes attached to millions of homes courtesy of an American company called News Corporation chaired by Rupert Murdoch , Sky Tv supply us with the worlds most advanced PVR/Satellite reciever ever produced for next to nothing or even nothing in some cases and charge us a monthly subscription for the pleasure, it rarely brakes down, it has an easy to use and understand guide listing, it has live pause and rewind, it can record 2 channels at once it even has an ever increasing amount of High Definition channels, it outputs in 5.1 audio and has multi room functionality, it is well designed including the remote which even your grandmother can use and which also can be set to control your Tv if so needed.

Now answer me this, can your grandmother ( for example ) easily control and use your HTPC ??? No is the answer and thats why Media Centre in the UK will never become as popluar or as prevalant as it is in other parts of the world, it dosent mean Grandmothers have a higher IQ outside the UK, it simply means that here in the UK we dont need to have Media Centre as a PVR, Joe Blogs just wouldnt no what to do with it, he is more than happy with what he has already got.. Sky Tv and if its not needed by the majority then development due to need just dosent happen.

Sky is the limit in the Uk, it limits Media Centres popularity due to lack of main stream Tv support but it dosent stop us Media Centre enthusiasts from trying to enroll the whole lot into one, if that were to be the case one day there would be some very happy Media Centre users in the UK indeed and of course Pigs would fly !

Sky Tv on the Xbox dosent count by the way because it never got included in the Media Centre interface, but man it was close

Media Browser 2.1 released says Adam Thursby

2009-06-19T02:27:00Z

Adam Thursby has reported on his blog that Media Browser 2.1 is soon to be released...

Good luck to Sam and Jas, i`m sure it will be a fine addition to the Media Centre interface

Adams blog

http://thedigitalmediazone.com/2009/06/18/media-browser-21-released/

Media Browser forum for information and downloads

http://www.mediabrowser.tv/forum/

The definitive guide to creating an audio library across Windows Media Center, Windows Media Player, ITunes and the iPod.

2009-06-18T14:00:00Z

See the article at:

http://www.brianfrost.com/misc/sortingmusic.htm

Ah! Got you!. Yes, I too have Googled up forum and down blog to locate how to get my extensive music library integrated into the above software and hardware tools and yes, there is a lot of information out there but too much of the hits contain unanswered questions. There are a few nuggets, but naturally they did not answer all my needs.

What did I want then? Easy. I love the iPod (AIP) working together with iTunes (Apple ITUNES). I love its design and the flat simple view of Apple ITUNES. I prefer the sound that comes out of Windows Media Player (Windows Media Player) but I can’t use it with my iPod. I have four Windows Media Center systems, a Windows Home Server and a music library of some 8000 tracks all neatly tagged. In addition, I’ve around 2000 tracks of spoken word stuff taken from BBC Radio using FreeView on Windows Media Center and converted from either DVR-MS or more recently WTV format.

I’m a geek too and love perfection. I also know that whatever technology I nail my colours too will fade. Early adopters often board sinking ships (Betamax anyone?). So, I rip my CD’s first to WAV and then from WAV to 320k MP3 using Lame encoding. The WAV is kept (as you’ll see below) to ensure that one day I’ve got the original lossless data if I need it. And I will. Some tracks don’t have a WAV equivalent, I’ve bought tracks in 128k mp3 online and these sit by themselves, but you’ll see how this is handled later.

So, what are the rules for setting up your library to work with these software tools? Here goes.

First, you must tag your files properly. If you don’t, you’re at the mercy of Windows Media Player or Apple iTunes just looking at the file and folder names and guessing. Sometimes they may even get it right but if you have lots of poorly tagged tracks, expect to see a train wreck when you look in Windows Media Player or Windows Media Center. You may also not realise that the Windows Media Center music features are simply a layer wrapped around Windows Media Player and in Windows Media Center there is relatively little control over how your library is imported. Read on and I’ll show you how to do this. Some of you will have also noticed that having imported some music into Windows Media Center / Windows Media Player a while ago and then ‘sorted out’ incorrect tags, these changes just don’t get noticed by the software. Again, read on.

So, step one – Locate the best audio source material. If you have only mp3, locate the highest encode rate. Choose at least 192k, ideally 320k. If you can only get 128k, so be it.

If you have a CD, use a program like CdEx or any other ripper to generate a simple WAV copy of each track. Do not use Windows Media Player or Apple iTunes to rip the CD unless you are happy to lose control. If you have ripped to WAV, use a decent encoder to convert the WAV’s to MP3 at 320k. Have some structure to the created ripped track file name, e.g. “<artistname>-<title>”.wav (or mp3). Don’t worry about other tags at this stage. Keep all WAV and MP3 files together in a single folder. The name of this folder will NOT be used by Windows Media Player or Apple iTunes but it needs to allow you to browse the file system, so use the full album name e.g. ‘Genesis – The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway’. Be tidy and consistent too, use title case and a <ArtistName>-<AlbumName> structure – one day something might need to process the folder name.

So by now you should have a named folder with at least one MP3 and possibly multiple MP3’s and WAV’s. Now you need to sort out the tags.

Use a decent bit of software to get the tags correct. I use Tag&Rename (Tag&Rename). This is like an Excel spreadsheet for tracks and tag and allows you to quickly assign tags to entire groups of tracks by album or by anything you like. There are two killer features of Tag&Rename that make it indispensible for me. First, it can take a typed artist and album name and go to Amazon to get the cover art and album tags. This gives you a great start although I find that it is easier to use my existing track file name to get the ‘title’ tag and let Tag&Rename get everything else from Amazon. The second killer feature is its ability to generate tags from the track file name, for example if you have a track called “When I get home – Billy Rae.mp3”, working in the Tag&Rename ‘Get tags from filename’ preview with the code ‘%1 - %2’ pulls out and writes the title (%1) and artist name (%2) into all selected files. It can also rename files from the tags allowing you to set up decent tagging and then to have consistent file names as well.

So in a couple of minutes you can have all WAV and Mp3 album files written with the correct tags (yes even the WAV files too – more later).

These are rules for tags, but there are some general rules. Be consistent with case and characters. Avoid using characters other than letters or numbers.

· Name the folder containing the WAV and MP3 tracks using the form <ArtistName> - <AlbumTitle>. For example Genesis – The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. If the album is a compilation, use ‘Various’ for the artist name e.g.’ Various – Sounds Of The Sixties’.

· Artist (or ‘Artist name’), should be just that e.g. ‘Genesis’

· Album Name should be ‘The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway’.

· Album Artist – This is important and is the reason that Windows Media Player and Windows Media Center get confused. If the album is by one artist, use the same data as you’ve got in ‘Artist’, e.g. ‘Genesis’. If it’s a compilation, use the phrase ‘Various Artists’.

· Genre – Be as consistent as possible, e.g. ‘Popular’, ‘Jazz’, ‘Classical’. Try not to use more than a single word. If this tag is filled in from Amazon it is likely to be anything and often plain wrong. Retype it. The less genre words you’ve used the cleaner will be the options facing you when you choose a track on your Windows Media Center or iPod.

· Covert art and file art. Unless Tag&Rename found this automatically from Amazon (which it usually does) you should obtain a picture in jpg format, size between 20kb and 1Mb , rename it to be called ‘folder.jpg’ and put it together with your track files. Now tell Tag&Rename to use this ‘folder.jpg’ to write it into each track. (Most software is happy to work with the single ‘Folder.jpg’ file it finds, but if you ever copy a track file to another place you’ll be glad the picture was in the file too).

Now you have a nice set of tagged tracks. Do the following. Right-click the properties for the album folder and mark all files in this folder read-only. This doesn’t guarantee you won’t crash, but it’s putting on your seatbelt. Now mark all the WAV files ‘hidden’. This is a neat trick because this way, when you add the folder to Apple iTunes and Windows Media Player / Windows Media Center, they all ignore the WAV versions (which they cannot currently handle), yet you have not lost your traceability. (Interestingly, Tag&Rename has also tagged the WAV files too).

Next you can place this album folder where you need it to stay. I put mine in the ‘Music’ folder of my Windows Home Server. (Make sure you have a decent backup strategy too. What? You like folder duplication? Hmmm. I wait with bated breath....).

Before you add it to the software, do the following. In Apple iTunes and Windows Media Player turn off the ‘get album info from internet’ options. (Apple iTunes it’s in preferences, Windows Media Player it’s on the library tab of ‘options’).

If you already have a train wreck of tracks in Apple iTunes or Windows Media Player, you should follow the steps below before adding your new folder.

· In Apple iTunes, working in the ‘music’ page, select all incorrect files and press ‘delete’. Confirm deletion from library but say ‘KEEP’ to the second confirmation about removing actual files.

· In Windows Media Center and Windows Media Player, do the following to clear the library. Exit Windows Media Center and Windows Media Player. Using the ‘services’ button on Task Manager or the services page obtained by Right-clicking ‘My Computer’ and selecting ‘Manage’, identify the ‘Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service’. Right-click this and stop the service. In Windows Explorer, type the following address into the address bar at the top:

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Media Player

This will open a folder showing a bunch of cache folders and the actual Windows Media Player database file which is used for both Windows Media Player and Windows Media Center. Select and delete all of these files and folders. This will cause Windows Media Player to re-generate the entire library, something that does not seem to be possible from within the software. Finally, re-start the service that you stopped above.

Finally, add the folder to the software:

· In Apple iTunes, drag the folder and drop it on the ‘music’ page. Apple iTunes will do the rest over the next few minutes. Syncing with the iPod should be painless.

· In Windows Media Center, point the music library at the share containing this folder. If you leave the ‘You can wait while....’ prompt up, you get a faster scan and you can see it happen, otherwise prepare to wait a couple of hours.

· In Windows Media Player, drag and drop the folder into the ‘library’ pane. If Windows Media Player is on the PC that your files are on, the action is almost instant. (These additions will show up in Windows Media Center too).

If you are working with Windows Media Center, go into the Music screen and select ‘Albums’. You should see decent cover art and information. If you see ‘Unknown album’, this is a sign that one or more file tags are still not correct or may be missing. Deal with this as follows:

· Go into ‘unknown album’ and make a note of the track names. Go back to Tag&Rename and work on these files (and probably the albums they are in) to insert the correct tag.

· REPEAT the LIBRARY CLEARING described above to accept your tag changes. In Apple iTunes you can simply mark all files, choose ‘Get Info’ and press OK for it to re-read all files and their tags, but Windows Media Player has a very persistent database which I think is causing many headaches. Anyway simply delete the files as described above and Windows Media Player will re-index them again.

Have fun with a nicer music database!

HDDVD playback possible within W7 media centre easily

2009-06-15T22:38:00Z

this is a follow on from my other blog post about HDDVD playback in Windows7, the caveats of the format good or bad have already been mentioned so i wont mull over them again, instead i am going to show all the HDDVD lovers how to play HDDVD films within Media Centre for windows7 , this might even work for Vista with the right codec pack but as i no longer run a Vista test rig i cant be certain

HDDVD playback with Media player and or Media Centre

1. go here http://shark007.net/win7codecs.html scroll down until you see majorgeeks.com , this will take you to the shark 007 w7 codec pack download location, download them and install them ( a massive thanks to shark007 for his work on the codec packs )

2. find a programe that can copy your HDDVD to your hard disk an example would be anydvd hd , basicaly any programe that can copy the disks contents to your hard disk

3. locate the directory where you copied the file to and delete anything that isnt the feature.evo file / files , some have feature.evo feature_divide.evo , it all depends on the main film evo structure , each disk is different , you decide which is the main film part , usually the 2 biggest files

4. merge the 2 files with a DOS prompt batch file , which is easy to do , create a new txt document and type

copy /b (nameof1stfeature).evo+(nameofsecondfeature).evo (filmname).evo and real example from my harry potter film would be copy /b feature.evo+feature_divide.evo mainfilm.evo

once you have the copy command typed into the new txt doc , save it as a .bat file , run the .bat file and this will merge the 2 files into 1 with the output name (mainfilm.evo)

5. ok we now have a single evo file

6.put the file where you keep your movie library in a directory of the file name

7. fire up Media centre , use the Video library to find your chosen film and play the file

let me no if it works for you :)

Windows7 has limited HD DVD playback with help from Sharky

2009-06-15T15:16:00Z

Yes Yes , i no , HDDVD is dead, but the fact remains alot of us still have HD DVD titles and apart from the fact that Windows7 does not presently support any HD playback from DVD or BR, it dosent mean its a bad format, infact in some ways it was the best format but that aside i was surprised last night when i got an HDDVD to play in Windows7 RC media player

in all honesty it wasent brilliant playback infact it was downright rubbish as media player just dosent understand the HDDVD file structure but it was playback with surround sound

I made it happen with the help of Sharky 007 Window7 codecs, according to sharky his codecs can decode .EVO files and BR files, i had no luck mounting an ISO and making it run but i had limited success with inserting a HDDVD into my drive , waite for autoplay to open, select windows media player and then waite again , eventually my HDDVD film played, all be it unorganised, the file structure of the HDDVD is read and can be seen in the right hand panel in media player where you can select the feature files which give surround sound and playback of the HDDVD film ...

My point to this post is there is hope, its early days agreed but i would be so happy if someone would come up with a way for all of us to enjoy proper HD material from either format, winner or looser

Build a DIY Windows Home Server...

2009-06-14T21:35:00Z

I like building things. I get exactly what I want and I have fun and learn by doing it. Sometimes I get hassle, but hey, that’s how you learn. This project was actually very easy and you can follow these steps too to get a home server solution at low cost. Until I built this unit I had an old, noisy and hot Windows XP box that I used as a server – it stored lots of files and ran MControl to control the house automation (lighting etc) using X10. So far, so fine. Over time though, the storage increased to around 4TB (all USB disks) and since I’m passionate about backups I always seemed to be overflowing from one disk to the next and then having to backup the changes. That said, the solution worked fine allowing me to store my extensive DVD collection and saved video files in one place and have them available around the house on my Media Center PC’s in the lounge and bedroom, an X-box for TV viewing in the kitchen and any laptops on my wireless network.

Then Windows Home Server (WHS) came out. Nice, because Microsoft (MS) had thought about how to make it easy to add drives to increase a storage ‘pool’ using any type of drive that you could connect – even USB drives. The result would be a ‘virtual’ huge disk. No more running out of space between disks. Nice but I’m glad I waited. Exited early-adopters took a hit with the early version when a few of them suffered a data corruption bug, and although I listened with interest to the Home Server Podcast, We Got Served and Ian Dixon on The Media Center show, I held out.

Read the article and see the photos at:

http://www.brianfrost.com/mce/homeserver/home.htm

Brian Frost

No X10 remote control in Windows7

2009-06-13T23:27:00Z

After a night / day of playing with W7 it was getting late so i thought i would settle down and watch a DVD from media Centre , i fired it up with my mouse, grabbed my remote and ...Zippo, nothing, it failed completely to contact W7 ??

Its an X10, 0R28V RF Vista remote and the most invaluable bit of kit i have but it dont work !!!! aarrhh !!!! some searching on the tinterweb has produced no info, a look into the remote settings in control panel dosent help alot , when the wireless remote control option is selected i get the error message " wireless remote settings is not properly installed on this system " ?? how i overcome this as yet i`m unsure so if any of you have any thoughts on he problem i would be most interested to hear from you, maybe M/s simply havent added the X10 remote features yet, but as its an RC release its hardly likely ??

Media Centre on my lounge Tv is now useless without a remote to control it..... annoying !!

The X10 0R28V RF Remote , works from anywhere in the house

* UPDATE *

And no sooner had i posted the blog, i found the answer, WM7 does not natively support X10 by the looks of things , it still needs an outside driver , i found it on the X10 web site , just install reboot and tada , all is well in the remote control world

link

www.x10.com/.../support_soft1.htm

grab the X10 USB Wireless Remote Driver, it has Windows7 compatability

Finally installed Windows7 - good/ok and oh well

2009-06-13T21:23:00Z

Finaly got around to installing Windows 7 RC , hmm , ok its early days and it is a Beta but so far i have found a few issues that on the most part are probably my own fault

1. it took over 4 hours to get a desktop to display

answer: remember that your TV is also connected and maybe check to see if the desktop is on there instead of your Pc monitor , this would cut down the swearing factor a fair bit

2. configuring duel monitors so far with Nvidias freshly downloaded new driver is problematic , when i run the advanced config for the display the W7 default screen sets itself to single ?? a little messing in the Nvidia control panel overcomes this

3. explorer keeps shutting down and has to be restarted , not sure why

4. Ultramon had issues to begin with but a reg hack cleared that up , now my Ultramon shortcuts work as before which is a huge bonus to us duel screen users

as for startup times, my quad core was quick already even with Vista so personaly i see no speed increase, the machine is running as a dedicated Media centre Pc so it is has no heavy loading software nor do i run a Virus progy with it

i took the upgrade path instead of new install , the amount of movies and music i have on the main drive made it impossible to backup so i bit the bullet and prayed , no issues and everything works as it should

play 2 on my xbox360 is very choppy with the single video i tested with , no doubt due to kids using the available bandwidth

all early findings but on the most part W7 is nice

also i have found device manager does not appear when asked for from a Media Centre screen ??

with regard to the above task manager issue , i think it may be a bug , looks like it does start but dosent get brought to the fore , it stays hidden , when restarting it is seen briefly

using Windows Media Encoder on Windows 7

once encoding starts it appears to hang with an occasional flash on the screen of the file being encoded , call task manager and the encoder front end appears , cancel task manager and all seems to be doing well in WME and the encoding is continueing fine !!

even on a quad core the encode will take a while so the final output is unknown yet

Nope , Windows Media encoder failed , seems it isnt compat with W7

Multiple tuners, Windows 7 RC and channel merging

2009-05-14T06:41:00Z

I have been running the Windows 7 since some of the earlier builds became available and I am have been a proud user of the official RC build for a little while now. I was delighted when I heard dvb-s support had been added to Windows 7 and it was the main reason I switched to it as my main Media Center. Using a Nova-HD-S2 dvb-s card to receive satellite TV transmissions via 'FreeSat', no longer did I need to mess about with a bulky Sky box attached to my PC and I had no issues at all with this great card.

Being a tinkerer and enthusiast I knew it wouldn't be long before I would want to try and expand my options when it came to live and recorded TV so I began to consider a dvb-t solution to augment my setup. My home has an old TV aerial on the roof that I haven't used for 10 years and I had no idea if it would be suitable to receive 'Freeview' over dvb-t, so for this reason I didn't want to spend a fortune on tuner cards. Popping into my local Maplins I spotted a cheap USB stick dual tuner device 'KWorld Plus 399U' for £24.99. I noticed that it was Vista and Media Center certified so I took a chance on it.

Before installing the tuner I decided to take a look at my aerial socket since my recollection of the quality of reception I used to receive through it was pretty poor. The socket was very old and as I had suspected the coaxial cable was badly installed in it. Since I needed to extend the cabling into a diferent room anyway I decided to cleanup and replace the socket first.

Time to install the USB tuner! Of course I ignored the included instructions completely, including the driver disc as I wanted to see it Windows 7 would recognise and install drivers itself. To my delight both tuners were recognised straight away (as dvb-t2 tuners no less!) and drivers were found and installed in no time. I started Media Center and was told that new tuners had been found and to get them working I would need to setup ALL tuners again. Not a major problem, if a little annoying as I had got my dvb-s tuner setup perfected by then. Setup was pretty quick and it was great to see channel after channel being added to the setup!

To my surprise I was getting pretty good reception from my old antenna and it picked up most channels in 100% quality. I was lucky as I doubt I could justify (to my wife!) the cost of replacing the antenna. The only issue I did notice was occasional pixellation in the transmissions but this didn't happen very often and from observation it seemed to occur when I could hear a gust of wind coming from the chimney so I guess the old antenna was moving slightly in strong wind.

Now I had a guide full of TV channels and radio stations and of course a lot of replication. I had read previous posts on channel source merging which I found to be a fantastic idea. It is a pretty tedious process to do but it is very worth while. At first I was struggling to get it to work as each individual channel did not seem to recognise that there was another channel of the same name from a different source. After a while I stumbled on how to get this working:

For example BBC ONE on dvb-t is channel 1 and on dvb-s it is 101.

Select channel 101 BBC ONE and 'edit channel'.
Then 'edit listings' and choose the listing for channel 1 BBC ONE.
Media Center will then see they are the same channel and offer to merge them into channel 1, deleting the guide entry for channel 101. Do this.
Now select channel 1 and 'edit channel' and go to 'edit sources' and you will see both your dvb-t and dvb-s tuners are available.

Now you can set the tuner priority by moving your prefered tuner up or down the list. This is very useful if as in my case the dvb-s tuner is slightly more reliable reception wise so I can set that to be the main 'recording' tuner and have the dvb-t tuners kick in when there is a recording conflict and for live TV when recording another channel. Unfortunately Media Center doesn't give you a 'universal' way of setting tuner priorities as far as I know, so you need to do this for every channel manually.

I have now cleared out most duplicate channels and I am now in the process of disabling channels that I simply won't ever watch just to simplify the guide a little. As well as now being able to record up to 3 channels at once I now have access to channels only availabe via 'FreeView' and not on 'FreeSat' and vise versa!

To summarise all I can say is that Windows 7 continues to surprise me with how easy it is to add and changes things. It's driver support is beyond belief for beta / RC software. If you are looking for a cheap way to expand your TV recording options I would hestitate to recommend these tuners.

Windows 7 RC - what's good and what still needs to be done?

2009-04-30T06:30:00Z

I have been using Media Center the RC build on Windows 7 for a little while now and I have been able to test it various ways so I thought I would pass on my findings.

Due to recent reorganisation in my home I am now using Media Center both directly from the PC and with an Xbox 360 acting as an extender where previously I was getting my content exclusively through extenders. This has allowed me to test and use areas of Media Center previously unavailable to me. My Media Center PC is a modest system comprising of a mid range Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB of RAM and getting TV content via 'Freesat' via a DVB-S card.

Overall, it is a step in the right direction but there are still some serious issues.

The Good Points

The UI is more responsive and less glitchy. The startup 'fanfare' is a lot smoother as are most of the transitions, especially the 'fade out' when stopping playback on a recording or live tv TV which used to stutter quite a lot. There is a very noticable improvement via extender especially.

Divx / xvid playback via extenders is totally seemless and glitch free in this build. No longer does the video look like it is being transcoded and it looks identical to the native dashboard output.

AC3 output on 360 extenders is fixed. No more dropouts.

Issues still to be addressed

I am still having issues with mpeg2adec.dll with this build it just doesn't work when outputting ac3 5.1 via spdif from the PC to a receiver. I have had to replace the file with an older Vista version to get 5.1 audio to pass through on channels such as BBC HD for example, if I don't all I get is white noise. Not heard much on this from others lately so maybe I am alone is this? UPDATE: It must have been me. After a re-install (to clear out old codecs) all seems to be well!

.h264 playback on extenders is still not up to par I'm afraid. There are various solutions floating about but all require some sort of remuxing / converting to achieve results as MKV file (although recognised by the extender) playback issues have not changed from previous builds. Converting the files to .M2TS with TSMuxer improves playback (and they play flawlessly directly on the PC) but at least for some including myself it creates it's own set of problems. M2TS files cannot be paused on extenders. If they are it crashes the entire playback ability of the extender session. This includes recorded TV and every other file format. A restart of the extender session is the only thing that can be done to resolve this.

New Issues!

The Xbox 360 extender I am using in my system is networked wirelessly via 802.11a using a VGA output running at 1360x768 resolution setup via the 360 dashboard. Having run Vista Media Center in the past and even previous builds of Windows 7 I have had no major networking issues and it has been very stable.

For some reason build 7100 overrides the resolution I have set my xbox to when starting an extender session and will change my resolution to 640x480 which is VERY frustrating. There is no option to override this as far as I can see. Some have speculated this may be an attempt to 'optimise' and 'compensate' for bandwidth issues when networking via wi-fi and others have confirmed that no such 'downscaling' is occuring when connecting a 360 via cat5.

In my opinion this is a serious step in the wrong direction and I hope a fix can be found or this issue can be sorted out by official sources.

Conclussion

It is fair to say progress is being made and the majority of remaining issues seem to be extender based with a serious new issue cropping up on that front. All said and done, it is a very stable system and the improvements that it has giving us outweigh most of these issues for me so I have now problem staying with windows 7 as my main Media Center. With the great community feeding back so much to MS I am confident these issues will be addressed before official release.