Starting up a media centre

[KIWIKARLOS]

Hi

I just bought a new tv and surround sound system and i want to get rid of my desktop and consolidate my media.

What im thinkin of is getting anote book and a 300 gb external hardrive to use as a media centre. I've never set one us before and im just after any tips from people who have.

Basically so far my idea is
- Connect notebook to TV via HDMI and have a tv tuner in the notebook to capture record TV and play back dvds etc
-get a soundcard for the notebook with fibre out for the home theatre etc.

I have a mate who uses windows media centre but i hear its not compatable with some hardware? I was going to buy from dell and they have their own media centre program ?

Problem is notebook doesn't usually have a large harddrive, can i connect an external hardrive to it when i want to view dvds etc.

I do still have the desktop i was originally going to use the box as a stand alone media centre but if i can get around just using a notebook i would prefer it.

 

[disarray]

i set up a media centre a while ago using vista home premium but it was a buggy piece of crap and i kept having problems with drivers for my TV tuner card. i've given up trying to get TV to work for now but it does play dvd's, music and movie files no problem. the media pc is plugged into the lan so i can browse the net on tv and play all the stuff stored on my file server. the soundcard runs into the amplifier which is hooked up to the speaker system.

i know a laptop is convenient but a pc will give you a lot more options, drive space and slots. yes you can just plug a usb drive into the laptop for storage, but external drives get knocked around and can fail so you might want to consider a backup.

either way you can just run winxp if you want, it can play things no problems and you don't need to mess around with their rubbish media centre software, just use win media player and VLC and your choice of music software. if you organise your file system then you can just make links to it.

 

[Stan 101]

KIWIKARLOS,
I've had a successful setup for 2 years. I am using XP media centre 2005. Media centre edition of XP is simply XP Pro with some add ons. It is also crippled in the ability to join a domain. Apparently the original version had domain support. The only time I use the media center add ons is for showing photos. It has a good setup for that. With media centre, I have found it extremely finicky and very sensitive to signal strength on digital tv. I wanted a solution that works as well as a set top box with benefits.

I use the Digital Now cards. www.digitalnow.com.au as their software works well, is written locally and the owner often answers people's queries directly on the www.dtv.com.au forums.
I have 1 terrabyte in the media server for audio and video and have it connected by ethernet as wireless would occasionally give me grief with reception of the tv cards.
I've used the cyberlink, nvidia's purevideo and intervideo's video codecs and have found the latest cyberlink codec works best for me.
After using ATI and Nvidia cards I found the Nvidia 7 series to be the easiest to get set well and the 7300gs works well. I'm not interested in Blueray and hddvd until the dust settles on that. Specifications still aren't set for blueray as yet.
Heat is the biggest issue to overcome on a HTPC as you need fans to cool it. Fans make noise and can be very irritating. That was the reason I went for a 7300gs video card. It has the HDTV specs but is underclocked and runs with passive cooling.
To modify the cpu and case fan speeds I use a little app called speedfan. It monitors heat and adjusts the fans as required.
A good learning remote is a must. That doesn't mean an expensive one though..You can use a program called HIP to convert keystrokes into IR signals to save to your remote.
You could probably get a laptop to do the job but I would probably go for a simple setup pc instead.
I run a 3200+ athlon 64 cpu, Asus A8N-E motherboard, 1 GB ram, 2 pci tv tuners. Watching true HDTV or video my CPU usage is about 30%.
On startup my pc only uses 190mb... Keep the PC clean without any unneeded applications and you will be okay.

Once you get your machine loaded, do a hard drive image so if you do load the pc with crap, it will take 15 minutes to get you back to a clean install. If that isn't possible, at least do a system restore and name it as such.

People will tell you you need the latest of everything to have a homne theatre PC. That isn't the case from my experience. I've found those that keep updating drivers and software and hardware are forever finding new issues cropping up... As I said, I have found a simple system that just works. It's not quite like a consumer PVR but it's damn close and has so many more benefits..

If you like, you can pm me about anything regarding your system and if I can help, I'd be happy to..

Cheers,

 

[bigdog]

Re: Starting up a media centre MEZZMO

Mezzmo Media Server

http://www.conceiva.com/downloads/default.asp

The most feature-packed DLNA media server available. Stream music, movies and photos to DLNA-enabled devices in your home - TVs, PS3, Xbox 360, home theater and digital media appliances. Complete DLNA 1.5 support. On-the-fly transcoding. Multiple device support. Powerful organizing features. Extensive media format support.

It is brilliant; simple and you do not have to touch the computer, simply turn the computer on.

Setups library and playlists for videos, photos and music
-- movies on aspect 21:10

Everything is operated from the TV remote control
-- select file location/folder
-- select video/photo,music
-- stop, fast forward/back, pause and start
-- exit

The only requirement is a TV that is internet ready with connection by lan cable or wireless.

These guys are based in Notting Hill in Melbourne
-- support is fantastic

It plays files like MKV video files (blue ray quality) that my Panasonic TV can not play

If you are interested in Mezzmo, please send me a message.

The Mezzmo team (Dennis and Adric) are great responding to issues timely.
-- there are updates monthly
-- there are still issues to be completed including a wish list

There is a Mezzmo forum also
http://forum.conceiva.com/forum.php

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[derty]

Another option is to get a dedicated media player. There are a few about these days. Popcorn Hour, WDTV and Dvico are popular brands. Most of them require you to get a SATA hard drive and some use a USB drive. The pretty much all will play mkv files, are high def, handle all the surround sound audio codecs and are networkable and can stream straight from you PC.

You just put in the hard drive, copy your files across and they work. All are firmware upgradeable too.

I have an old Dvico Tvix 4130SH with a 2TB HDD in it, it's great.

 

[newbie trader]

In regards to the external hard drive you can find really cheap 1tb+ ones which I would suggest over only 300gb.

 

[bigdog]

Another option is to get a dedicated media player. There are a few about these days. Popcorn Hour, WDTV and Dvico are popular brands.

I bought a Western Digital WD Elements Play WDBACC0010HBK-EESN Media Player.

It played my MKV video files but with no sound for many of the files because it was DTS2 (2 channel only). It could not play 5+ channels of sound which many MKV files have!

I suspect the WDTV from the same stable is also DTS2 and can not play 5+ channel sound.

697

 

[derty]

I bought a Western Digital WD Elements Play WDBACC0010HBK-EESN Media Player.

It played my MKV video files but with no sound for many of the files because it was DTS2 (2 channel only). It could not play 5+ channels of sound which many MKV files have!

I suspect the WDTV from the same stable is also DTS2 and can not play 5+ channel sound.

697

That's good to know. I don't have any experience with the WD players. The Dvico player I have connects to my AV Receiver via HDMI and handles 5.1 DTS and ProLogic audio fine.

Those limitations should be detialed in the online tech spec sheet for each of the players.