Posts Tagged ‘media center’

Engadget HD posted an article that really was disingenuous, in my opinion. I’d link to it, but that would be giving them a SEO benefit for poor work. Basically, the article initially claimed that it had found out why Microsoft never released Vista Media Center TV Pack 2008 to end users. Unfortunately, when you hit [...]

I’ve already picked apart all the problems surrounding TV Pack 2008, CableCARD DRM, and all the things wrong in the world with Windows Media Center today. And, I could spend a good 15 minutes linking back to all the posts, and all the amens from all the Media Center MVPs and Experts on my blog. [...]

As it stands right now, Windows Vista Service Pack 2 still won’t include TV Pack 2008. I haven’t heard official word from Microsoft, but I can confirm that TV Pack 2008 is absent from SP2. It’s not clear why the Media Center team didn’t add this. Microsoft has confirmed to me that TV Pack 2008 will [...]

That’s right. Even if you use Boot Camp, you’re stuck at Bluetooth 2.0 on your Windows-powered MacBook. I didn’t realize this until I considered getting one of those nifty MacBook Air units now that they have reasonably good graphics. Not that this would really tip my decision either way… but Microsoft added support for Bluetooth [...]

Just when the first article, criticising Microsoft over this was about to fall off the front page… Microsoft did an about face. If you look at the very-ancient Expert Zone homepage, you’ll now see that Media Center Expert Zone chats have resumed. I’m sure myself, like many others, will enjoy re-re-re-asking key questions… and getting [...]

I went to attend a Media Center Expert Zone chat, at its regularly schedueled time (once monthly, on the third Thursday of the month)… only to find that the Expert Zone web site had removed the Media Center chats from their schedule completely. I can’t blame them, really. The chats weren’t aimed at true Media [...]

Users with CableCARD systems have confirmed to me that Windows Media Center TV Pack 2008 (Fiji)… does nothing to fix the CableCARD DRM problem. I’ve beaten to death the problem in prior posts, just run a quick search on CableCARD to see all of them. But, safe to say, that if you were holding out [...]

Newegg is offering the KWorld 340U TV Tuner for only $14.99 after a $20 mail-in rebate. This USB stick-style tuner is compatible with Windows Media Center, and can do both cable and over-the-air programming. There aren’t QAM drivers available for Media Center (something that will hopefully be fixed by TV Pack 2008… Microsoft still hasn’t [...]

Monday, I have a private conference call with the Media Center team at Microsoft. And, there aren’t really any limits on what I can ask… and hopefully, get answered. So, I’ll turn to you. What would you ask the team behind Windows Media Center? Post your questions in the comments, and I’ll try to get [...]

Looks like my war with CableCARD might be over. CableLabs has gone official in saying that CableCARD no longer has to DRM all recordings made on a PC… even those that have not been copy-protected by the provider. As I’ve covered in-depth on my blog, again and again, it made absolutely zero sense that TiVo [...]