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Now that I have a Windows Phone I was looking at Remote Control apps so I downloaded one we haven’t talked about on the blog before called Smart Potato. Smart Potato works with the Remote Potato backend (as do many phone remotes). I already have Remote Potato installed so I downloaded the app from the Windows Phone Marketplace and installed the a trial of the full version which has no restrictions and works exactly as the paid version except for ads at the bottom of the screen.

Once the app is installed you enter the name of your Windows Media Center PC and provide the logon details, that all the configuration you need.

From the app you can stream recorded TV content, browse the EPG, set up recordings and view TV meta data. Browsing the EPG is a pleasure, the app makes good use of Windows Phone Metro UI, but strangely the start screen don’t and it looks a bit odd compared to the nice layout of the other screens.

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I managed to set some recordings and stream the TV show back to my phone.  When you stream recorded TV you have the choice of streaming quality, Normal seems pretty low and was blocky but Extra High seemed really nice.

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I did encounter a couple of connections issues, if the phone went to sleep and then I powered it back on and tried to continue the app would generate an error .  Also Remote Potato seemed to crash completely but I don’t think that was the app, it looks like its a problem with my install of Remote Potato.

If your looking for a Remote EPG and TV streaming app for Windows Phone 7 this is a great option, the trial works great and like the app but don’t like the ads you can pay £1.99 and have the ads removed.

Download from the Windows Phone Marketplace

Smart Potato is a remote client for a Windows 7 computer with Windows Media Center and Remote Potato installed. It allows you to view the TV Guide, Channel Listings, Recorded TV (including Remote Streaming), Scheduled TV, Search and Schedule new one time and series recordings.
Additionally support for the ability to remote control Media Center with your phone and browser your picture library.  Watching TV from remote includes the ability to preserve your last watched position and a list of last watched episodes for quick resume.

Trial mode allows for viewing of all data and is ad supported. 

Smart Potato 2 is a major update including the following new features:

* Wake on LAN/WAN
* Main Screen Panorama design with Servers and Recent list
* Deeper TVDB integration with banners, fan art and series details.
* Works with Windows XP and non-Media Center hosts
* Search for new series using Premier search

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