What’s Windows Media Center’s right to exist?
This weekend I got a Sony Vaio which came with a pre-installed version of Windows Vista Home Edition. Windows Media Center is part of it, so I took it for a spin. I’m not a big fan of Windows Vista, but I must admit: the Media Center interface is not bad at all. Recording your favorite TV show and showing off your holiday pictures is quite easy.
However, people don’t buy a Media Center to enjoy the interface. According to Microsoft, people buy such equipment because they want an enhanced entertainment experience. A friend of mine who actually owns a Media Center agreed with that.
Yet this very same friend has spend days - if not weeks - installing and maintaining his Media Center. Over the last months he had issues with its sound card, hard disk, network connections and so on (it’s not even home made - it’s a proper Acer Media Center). As if this is not inconvenient enough already, he also has to deal with a buzzing machine in his living room whenever he wishes to watch TV, play music or see holiday pictures. All together that’s not exactly my idea of an enhanced entertainment experience.
Even if it would work flawlessly, I still don’t get it. The simple fact that I have to turn on a Media Center - which takes forever, a receiver and a TV to just listen to music doesn’t appeal to me at all. Considering that a decent Media Center setup will set you back several thousands of Euro’s, I’m wondering: what’s Windows Media Center’s right to exist?
Cristiano Betta http://www.ibbydibby.com/
April 26th, 2007I agree with the fact that it doesn’t give an enriched user experience, but I think that even the software (besides the hardware) is disappointing.
You would expect a Media Center to go BEYOND the old media an maybe provide more integration with social sites.
A good example is MediaPortal that is OpenSource, and has plugins whic makes it very powerful. A friend of mine has a PC setup with this software, and he subscribed to his series using TV.com, and when a new episode becomes available it downloads the torrent, then downloads the episode, and a few hours later he can watch anything he want.
Obviously Apple does the same with iTunes but MediaPortal is much more than this. I wish they would just once make a Media Center for the people instead of just some full screen Windows Media Player with a remote.
More info on http://www.team-mediaportal.com/
Martijn Pillich http://martijnpillich.nl
April 26th, 2007In fact, I’ve tried MediaPortal a while ago, when I was considering building a media center myself. I wasn’t too happy with it. It may be smarter than Windows Media Center, but it’s still too much of a hassle to enjoy my media.
At the time, I also ran into a wifi remote control developed by Openpeak. This device makes the whole Media Center obsolete.
Another option is the Sonos system. It’s nice, but it’s too expensive and it just plays music.
Cristiano Betta http://www.ibbydibby.com/
April 26th, 2007I never said MediaPortal was easy to setup. But I guess that if you are going to deliver something with your OS then provide something that has true extra value like MediaPortal has.
My housemate spent quite some days figuring MP out, but in the end it is very impressive.
alper http://alper.nl
April 26th, 2007Things like MediaPortal and MythTV are nice for the tinkerhappy Linux types but when it crystallizes out of the box media centres built with off the shelf hardware can be resold. There are probably tons of those kind of offerings around.
But I hear that the AppleTV is also quite open for hacking. Any sense in running MediaPortal on top of that, Cris?
Cristiano Betta http://www.ibbydibby.com/
April 26th, 2007MediaPortal is build on .NET sadly enough
alper http://alper.nl
April 27th, 2007Well, won’t it work on Mono?
Reinier http://zwitserloot.com
April 28th, 2007Well, apparently the world agrees with you as sales of Windows Media based ‘multimedia players’ are abysmal.
So, just to do the test, as it were, how does the Apple TV fare?
I vaguely recall an article that mentioned that it is completely quiet, but I don’t know how long it takes to ‘boot up’. Apple TV is basically (or so I read) a modified OS X running from a harddrive, so I doubt it’s an instant bootup. Of course, apple hardware’s (from iPods to Macbooks) notorious about ‘waking from sleep’ and never really turning off, and macbooks wake up quickly enough.
LJS informed me that their supply of Apple TVs are selling quickly.
Personally I do think there’s a purpose to a media-related appliance, though calling it ‘media center’ is probably wrong: To me, the ultimate media-related appliance is a glorified WiFi to HDMI converter, with an infrared receiver, a very simple remote, and some software for a PC someplace. In essence that’s what the Apple TV is, except there’s a harddrive in there which in my opinion is a mistake, though an understandable one, as requiring 802.11n at this point in time won’t work.