Author Topic: Windows Media Center, out yet? (Read 7179 times)

Ace · « **on:** April 13, 2003, 12:52:56 PM »

Has Windows Media Center been released yet outside of having to buy a new computer? I was thinking of trying it but I can't find it anywhere

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #1 on:** April 13, 2003, 01:08:05 PM »

Erm... forgive my ignorance, but what is Windows Media Center, and how is it any better than WMP 9?

Ace · « **Reply #2 on:** April 13, 2003, 01:33:47 PM »

Opps, I think I worded it wrong. I meant Windows media edition. go to www.microsoft.com and click on windows to learn more about it

Matt · « **Reply #3 on:** April 13, 2003, 02:59:40 PM »

Hey buddy, CLICK THE BUTTON TO POST ONCE NOT FIVE TIMES

Dur

Have some patience.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #4 on:** April 13, 2003, 08:21:03 PM »

Matt, try hitting the post button more than once yourself sometime. You might be surprised. And before flaming people who do the multiple post thing, try looking into it. It's a known bug in these forums. Not his fault.

I read about it on MS's website, and I must say that I'm not impressed. It just looks to me like MS is packaging a bunch of inferior media products with Windoze, and trying to capitalize on people who don't know better....

Seriously, I would stick with the freeware products if I were you. There's nothing I can't do with media on my PC, and it's all done with freeware. Tell me what you want to do, and I'll try to hook you up with the right software.

Frozen-Solid · « **Reply #5 on:** April 13, 2003, 08:35:41 PM »

If you're talking about windows media series 9, MS's new version of Windows Media Player, it's actually really good. I only used it to begin with because my laptop has these cool buttons for mp3 and cd playing that only work with WMP9. I was surprised to find out how good it's playlist management was and how good of a DVD player it was. It easily had the best picture quality for a PC DVD player I had ever seen until I found the wonders of linux and Ogle

Now that I've gotten used to linux, i've gone back to Winamp for my windows mp3 listening (as the linux clone of winamp, xmms, kicks ass) but WMP9 is still my #1 windows dvd player. But yes, I highly recommend freeware and opensource over just about any MS product, I've been using Open Office for a good 3-4 months and it beats the crap out of Microsoft Office with just as much functionality. I also moved to an open source FTP program called filezilla for windows, and a bunch of other open source software to replace my other costly windows applications.

The only expensive software left on this thing is my copy of Photoshop and Illustrator because I love them so much (Yes, I actually paid for these two great programs)

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #6 on:** April 13, 2003, 08:43:40 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Frozen-Solid
If you're talking about windows media series 9, MS's new version of Windows Media Player, it's actually really good. I only used it to begin with because my laptop has these cool buttons for mp3 and cd playing that only work with WMP9. I was surprised to find out how good it's playlist management was and how good of a DVD player it was. It easily had the best picture quality for a PC DVD player I had ever seen until I found the wonders of linux and Ogle

I use PowerDVD for DVD playback. The sound quality I get from it is the best I have heard yet. But did you know that you must have a 3rd party DVD player installed for WMP to play a DVD at all? It doesn't ship with DVD codecs, but if you have a 3rd party DVD player installed, it will use those codecs instead. Personally I am completely unimpressed by WMP's DVD capability. I will admit that WMP is still the best Movie Player I know of, as long as it isn't DVD.

If you must use your keyboard commands for your audio playback, I would suggest searching Winamp.com for some plugins that do that for ya. It would be much better than using Microshaft's software, as it is bloated as hell.

For MP3, I have no idea why you wouldn't use Winamp (2.90). Winamp is fast loading, has a smaller executable than WMP, better playlist support, a built in equalizer, great visualization plugins, a plugin system that supports almost every audio format out there, and is fully skinnable. It does everything that you would want a music player to do, and it does it well.

In Linux, I use XMMS as well, but I am very dissatisfied with my sound drivers in Linux, as it makes all my music sound like crap. If I ever remember my root password, I will fix that though.

Frozen-Solid · « **Reply #7 on:** April 13, 2003, 09:16:08 PM »

PowerDVD sucked on our desktop downstairs, it had terrible sound quality, I never bothered to install it on my laptop. I have no farking clue what dvd codec came on this thing, but WMP9 was by default the main DVD player. It also has WinDVD installed and Interactual Player 2.0 - both of those have terrible picture quality, it's blurry and kinda pixeled when I go full screen.

The only reason I used WMP9 for DVD playback is that my laptop has these 4 DVD/CD/MP3 controll buttons on it (it's a toshiba laptop) and it only works for WMP. Winamp 2.90 kicks ass and I've gone back to using it since I got used to xmms in linux I couldnt go back to WMP9 (plus my mp3 list has gotten so big wmp is having a fit now). As for sound quality in Linux, my sound card sounds 100x better in linux then it doesn in windows. It's clearer, and can go louder with less distortion. Took a while to get it working right though, I started out using ALSA as the sound system and when I went to OSS i had a ton less problems.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #8 on:** April 13, 2003, 10:27:23 PM »

What sound card do you have? It sounds very strange to me that your Linux audio would be better than your windows audio, as most card manufacturers barely pay attention to Linux. I have a SB Live!, and using the latest drivers from Creative Asia, the sound quality is actually quite good.

I agree that WinDVD sucks, and Interactual is lacking in almost every department, but it amazes me also that PowerDVD doesn't work well. For me, the audio is excellent. I can turn the volume up all the way with very little distortion, and the 4 speaker output works pretty well for the most part.

By the way, I checked out the plugin section on winamp.com, and found quite a few plugins that support the media keys on your keyboard. You might want to give a few of them a shot.

Ace · « **Reply #9 on:** April 14, 2003, 09:04:04 AM »

Thanks for sticking up for me Ninja, I dont know why this always happens. Maybe because I'm using broadband. Anyway, this is way off topic but did u ever get Skies of Arcadia?

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #10 on:** April 14, 2003, 09:20:43 AM »

lol.... no I didn't... yet.

I am too broke to buy it right now anyways, but I have hassled all my retailers about it, and they have told me that they are getting it, they just don't know when. The Nintendo rep for Zellers promised them that they would be getting it, so Zellers put me on a wait list so that I wouldn't miss it when it came in.

As for sticking up for you, no problem. I realize that there are bugs in this forum. But I should mention that I never have the problem, and I have broadband as well. You wouldn't happen to be Australian would you?

Frozen-Solid · « **Reply #11 on:** April 14, 2003, 11:23:31 AM »

My audio card is an Intel 8100 on-board audio. I'm baffled myself at how much better it sounds in linux, but it does. I'll have to check out those winamp plugins, thanks for the tip.

aoi tsuki · « **Reply #12 on:** April 22, 2003, 01:17:14 PM »

Windows XP Media Center is strictly for new computers only. You can't buy it separately.

i can't say i don't like the idea of having a simplified TiVO/media PC controllable by remote, just i don't have a need for one. All the software (tv programs aside) that's in Media Center can downloaded from MS' site, or better yet, you can get commerical or freeware versions of similar products. If i need to edit video, i'm sure it'd be much easier and faster on PC with a mouse and keyboard than on a remote. i really want to want a TiVO; it's a nice piece of tech, but there's nothing on US television (outside of Law & Order and CSI) that i watch. Worse yet, being Microsoft, you'll be able to import various non-MS files, but it'll save them to MS's own formats. Boo.

i use Zoom player (http://www.inmatrix.com/files/zoomplayer_download.shtml) for playing pretty much everything. It works really well for DiVX and XViD video, and it plays DVDs as well. i still use Power DVD though; it came with my DVD drive, and i'm just used to using it.

And yes, Winamp 2.9 is frickin' awesome. They include the media library of 3.x, added built in media streams, and the built in video support is really nice.

With the open source scene so popular, unless you work in a specific industry, you probably don't need to buy much software. Now if only someone would come up with open source solutions to Adobe and Macromedia products...

manunited4eva22 · « **Reply #13 on:** April 22, 2003, 01:26:23 PM »

Even if it is for new computers only you can always find a vender who is selling OEM cds...

Douglas · « **Reply #14 on:** April 23, 2003, 08:13:10 AM »

If you really have the need for a TiVo-like computer, why not build your own? Put together a nice little Linux box, and then use either Freevo or MythTV for your PVRing needs.

Ace · « **Reply #15 on:** April 23, 2003, 04:19:44 PM »

I never really thought of it, although i was reading this feature on building a pc. BTW, where can i get linux? Also, how much different is it than windows, will all my old apps. work with linux? I mean i've heard of it before, but never actually thought much of it

aoi tsuki · « **Reply #16 on:** April 23, 2003, 04:20:21 PM »

When you find a place selling it, let me know. MS evidentally has a lockdown on OEM copies. If you really wanted it, i'm sure it'd be availble on one of the P2P networks, but with such limited functionality for people who already have computers, i don't see why you would.

Ace: You can find places to download various Linux distributions at http://www.linux.org/dist/ftp.html. Or you can just go to a bookstore and get a Linux mag, which usually come with the latest release of some version of Linux, if not several.

Douglas: Thanks for the heads up on those two apps. They both look amazing; easily on par with TiVO (which runs on a POSIX OS ironically). When i build my media PC, i'll definitely take a look at these two.

manunited4eva22 · « **Reply #17 on:** April 23, 2003, 04:48:15 PM »

MS sells to the government. I can get it from there VERY easily. So I told you.

aoi tsuki · « **Reply #18 on:** April 23, 2003, 05:36:35 PM »

As can i, but i was looking for something along the lines of a website. Thanks for calling my bluff though. ^_^

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #19 on:** April 23, 2003, 07:08:37 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Ace
I never really thought of it, although i was reading this feature on building a pc. BTW, where can i get linux? Also, how much different is it than windows, will all my old apps. work with linux? I mean i've heard of it before, but never actually thought much of it

Linux is intended for programmers or businesses that don't want to pay Microsoft scads of dollars for every workstation they own, or servers. However, Linux has been making a pretty good entrance into the home market recently as well.

Windows programs will not work on Linux without using an emulator, and compatability is low to say the least.

However, freeware versions of many popular Windows applications are available for Linux. You can get pretty much everything you would use on Windows for Linux, but without paying a penny. The single exception is games. Games are simply non-existant on Linux, although a few games do support it. (The only one I can think of is Unreal Tournament 2k3.)

If you are curious about how it works though, try this. It's a version of Linux that is intended to be run from a bootable CDR.
http://www.knoppix.net/

It doesn't make any changes to your system, and when you want it to go away, just take out the CD and restart your computer. It's a very good way of trying Linux out without making any real changes to your system.

Personally, I dual boot Windows XP and Linux Mandrake.

Ace · « **Reply #20 on:** April 23, 2003, 07:46:10 PM »

Thanks Ninja, I'll give it a shot and see how I like it. Thanks again for the site

News:

Author Topic: Windows Media Center, out yet? (Read 7179 times)