Your Universal Remote Control Center
RemoteCentral.com
HDTV Reception Forum - View Post
Previous section Next section Up level
Up level
The following page was printed from RemoteCentral.com:

Login:
Pass:
 
 

Topic:
XP Media Center Edtion
This thread has 12 replies. Displaying all posts.
Post 1 made on Sunday August 21, 2005 at 20:26
stumped
Long Time Member
Joined:
Posts:
July 2004
141
Of you who are using this, do you like it? I was wondering because I'm trying to decide between XP Pro MCE2005. Would you recomend it to someone else? Thanks!
What you should choose does not end in the here and now, but how much you want to deal with it in the futre
Post 2 made on Tuesday August 23, 2005 at 19:43
Daniel Tonks
Wrangler of Remotes
Joined:
Posts:
October 1998
28,779
Trying to decide on using regular XP Pro or MCE 2005 myself. :-)
Post 3 made on Wednesday August 24, 2005 at 12:36
david_brown14
Long Time Member
Joined:
Posts:
September 2002
15
I had an ExpressVU 5100 PVR, and when the hardrive started to show signs of dying bought a HP Media Centre PC. LOVE IT! Would highly recommend it.

It occasionly miss sending channel numbers to the sat receiver via the IR blaster. But I am currently playing with the length of the transmits to see if I can clear this up.

btw - MCE2005 is XP Pro underneath.
Post 4 made on Thursday August 25, 2005 at 14:26
bcf1963
Super Member
Joined:
Posts:
September 2004
2,767
On 08/24/05 12:36 ET, david_brown14 said...
btw - MCE2005 is XP Pro underneath.

Microsoft says otherwise David! Please look under the feature that says "All the Benefits of Windows XP Home Edition and Windows XP SP2". It clearly says in the description column "Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 is the first consumer OS built on top of the Windows XP Home and Service Pack 2 (SP2) foundation"

[Link: microsoft.com]

I'd love to be wrong here. It would mean Microsoft did something right for a change. This is another reason I think It's based on home ;-)

This was being discussed in another thread, and yes some of the Pro features are there, but others are missing. Be careful that the features you need are included.
Post 5 made on Friday August 26, 2005 at 15:49
david_brown14
Long Time Member
Joined:
Posts:
September 2002
15
The following is a thread from a forum of MCE users:

[Link: thegreenbutton.com]

MCE2005 is XP Pro, but has features, such as joining a domain, disabled during install. Of course people have figured out how to re-enable them. I think I even remember a post about how to keep the domain during install.
Post 6 made on Saturday August 27, 2005 at 22:22
bcf1963
Super Member
Joined:
Posts:
September 2004
2,767
On 08/26/05 15:49 ET, david_brown14 said...
MCE2005 is XP Pro, but has features, such as joining
a domain, disabled during install. Of course
people have figured out how to re-enable them.
I think I even remember a post about how to keep
the domain during install.

If you really need the abilities of XP Pro, I'd be wary of doing this. It might work for now, but who knows when Microsoft might break this hack. I'm also a little wary, as if it was really never anything more than a registry key entry, I would think Microsoft wouldn't have gone to the trouble to disable the XP Pro features. My guess is that some of the more esoteric XP Pro features are totally broken by MCE, and Microsoft doesn't believe users who want MCE will ever need the domain features in XP Pro. So they didn't write the code to fix the issues, they just disabled the features.
Post 7 made on Friday September 2, 2005 at 22:44
Boarderbiker
Long Time Member
Joined:
Posts:
December 2003
135
To:bcf1963

Are you even using MCE?? Your post only seems to contain references to other people's info and the occasional guess. Speaking as someone who's used all flavours of XP extensively, MCE and XP Pro are very slightly different, but MCE is WAY closer to Pro than Home, no matter what the person who wrote that blurb for Microsh*t says. Nothing personal, but I don't believe you know what you're talking about. That being said, you are correct about one thing, if any of the disabled features are absolutely necessary to you, go with Pro or at least be aware that they may not work forever or you may have to find another workaround.

PS:By the way editing the registry is NOT a hack.

To:Stumped

Despite the minor issues I've had using the analog tuner on my HDTV wonder, due to the multimedia aspects of MCE, this OS is the best thing to come out of Microsh*t since day one. I can't wait for the Longhorn version of MCE!!!

This message was edited by Boarderbiker on 09/02/05 23:08 ET.
Post 8 made on Monday September 5, 2005 at 23:31
bcf1963
Super Member
Joined:
Posts:
September 2004
2,767
On 09/02/05 22:44 ET, Boarderbiker said...
To:bcf1963

Are you even using MCE?? Your post only seems
to contain references to other people's info and
the occasional guess.

Yes. But what does that have to do with this discussion?

Speaking as someone who's
used all flavours of XP extensively, MCE and XP
Pro are very slightly different, but MCE is WAY
closer to Pro than Home, no matter what the person
who wrote that blurb for Microsh*t says. Nothing
personal, but I don't believe you know what you're
talking about.

You're entitled to your wrong opinions!

That being said, you are correct
about one thing, if any of the disabled features
are absolutely necessary to you, go with Pro or
at least be aware that they may not work forever
or you may have to find another workaround.

PS:By the way editing the registry is NOT a hack.

Since changing this behaviour by editing the registry enables a feature Microsoft purposely disabled, I stand by my comment that this is a "hack" and may break at any time. If and when it does break, Microsoft will give you no help in getting this to work, as Microsoft never told you it would work in the first place.
Post 9 made on Tuesday September 6, 2005 at 17:04
Boarderbiker
Long Time Member
Joined:
Posts:
December 2003
135
On 09/05/05 23:31 ET, bcf1963 said...
Yes. But what does that have to do with this
discussion?

It's got everything to do with this discussion. He asked for the opinions of people who WERE using it, not those who read about it somewhere.

You're entitled to your wrong opinions!

You really should seek out the opinions of people more educated than yourself. Try going to some of the forums devoted to MCE. Ask them what your "opinion" is worth.

Since changing this behaviour by editing the registry
enables a feature Microsoft purposely disabled,
I stand by my comment that this is a "hack" and
may break at any time. If and when it does break,
Microsoft will give you no help in getting this
to work, as Microsoft never told you it would
work in the first place.

Point taken, but I think that you're missing an important fact: not only is MCE based on Pro, Home is as well. Home is a stripped down version of Pro.

This message was edited by Boarderbiker on 09/10/05 07:08 ET.
Post 10 made on Monday October 17, 2005 at 11:08
emuu101
Lurking Member
Joined:
Posts:
October 2005
4
I have MCE running as well. LOVE IT! It's a great complete multimedia pacakage.

It's connected to my DLP in the living room. Now I can use my TV as a computer monitor as well. :D
Post 11 made on Monday October 17, 2005 at 23:29
Daniel Tonks
Wrangler of Remotes
Joined:
Posts:
October 1998
28,779
I did end up deciding on MCE 2005, however not for a media computer but for my regular PC (which has a TV tuner that I use for recording some programs). I'm not overly thrilled with the quality of recorded TV, I honestly think my old All In Wonder had better recording quality with a smaller resulting file (I'm using an ATI 550-based tuner which is reputed to be one of the better ones).

Based on the quality I certainly wouldn't want to use it as my primary TV or DVR system, however the *rest* of MCE is quite good with a lot of nifty features.
Post 12 made on Monday October 24, 2005 at 13:52
emuu101
Lurking Member
Joined:
Posts:
October 2005
4
Really? You find that the quality is lower in MCE? I'm kind of surprised. I find the HD quality pretty good. What kind of quality issues did you have?
Post 13 made on Tuesday October 25, 2005 at 00:13
Daniel Tonks
Wrangler of Remotes
Joined:
Posts:
October 1998
28,779
HD, well that I haven't tried (my OTA antenna line doesn't come anywhere near my PC). I'm just talking about SD here.


Jump to


Protected Feature Before you can reply to a message...
You must first register for a Remote Central user account - it's fast and free! Or, if you already have an account, please login now.

Please read the following: Unsolicited commercial advertisements are absolutely not permitted on this forum. Other private buy & sell messages should be posted to our Marketplace. For information on how to advertise your service or product click here. Remote Central reserves the right to remove or modify any post that is deemed inappropriate.

Hosting Services by ipHouse