🚀 go-pugleaf

Arny Krueger wrote:
> "Romeo Rondeau" <eveyone@ease.com> wrote in message
> news:FAn7j.77129$YL5.8985@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net
>> Arny Krueger wrote:
>>> "David B." <brooks.dj@nomail.com> wrote in message
>>> news:uO0Gx22OIHA.4912@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl
>>>> Do you even know what Media Center is/does?
>>>> It's been around for 5 years and is used by many people
>>>> as a PVR/cable box replacement, does a great job, it's
>>>> also available in Vista.
>>>
>>> Compared to running any of the PVR software packages
>>> that are sold with video tuner and capture cards, it
>>> really doesn't seem to do anything that is terribly
>>> unique.
>
>> It does look cool on an HDTV, and that's what it was
>> designed to do :-)
>
> Yes, but the PVR software/hardware does the same stuff. If you're in
> the market, ADS cards come with what seems to be the best software.
> I picked up a pretty functional HDTV package for XP by ADS from
> Amazon for about $60.
>
> If you want to expunge what the PVR software does to your system 
> from
> your system, you just uninstall it. So far I haven't found that it
> creates any big black holes while installed, other than creating a
> lot of I/O when you are recording or playing video, or when you are
> time-shifting.
>
> One other thing is that the third party software that comes with the
> TV tuner and video capture cards seems to have a fair amount of
> cross-vendor compatibility. For example, I've inter-operated PVR
> software and cards from ADS and ATI.
>
> If you run Windows MCE your tuner/capture card needs to provide
> special software for running with Windows MCE.  I've run cards that
> came with MCE drivers with other vendor's PVR software. So MCE
> reduces your options.

However if MCE came bundled with the machine then why pay extra for a 
third party package?
MCE was never sold as a consumer product, the only way you could get 
it was with a machine or as an OEM System Builder product, so there's 
no scenario of going out and buying MCE to get PVR functionality.

And none of those third party packages let you view the secured HD 
content on cable--for that Vista is the only game in town.

-- 
-- 
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)