New MCE build - does anyone do these anymore

Coconut Joe

Hi all,
I've been a Windows Media Center user now for nearly a decade (starting with XP) and am really reluctant to leave it – paired with MediaBrowser 2 and now 3, a NAS and Shark007 codec pack it plays everything I throw at it and is very wife friendly once configured correctly. The time has come to do another build (it’s been at least 5 years I’d guess) but I have a few questions first as I’ve not been keeping up to date on my options, either SW or HW.
1) TV capture – Live TV support is non-negotiable, we use UPC and can never go back to their UI, it’s far too slow in comparison. Currently I only get SD but would like to get HD. Does Horizon box play nicely with HTPC’s? Can anyone recommend a capture card with HDMI in and MCE compatibility?
2) Will also need a graphics card that support 3D Bluray, any recommendations?
3) When I last built HD audio was very new and was either not supported at the time or was crazy expensive – can’t remember which but this time I’d like it.
4) Lastly SW – my plan is Win 8 with Media Center add-on, but does anyone suggest anything else? It has to be remote friendly and play rips, discs (including 3D), recorded TV, live TV and music from the same UI, if app switching is involved it won’t fly with my wife.

I think that's it for now, thanks for reading at least.

Johnboy1951

4) Lastly SW – my plan is Win 8 with Media Center add-on, but does anyone suggest anything else? It has to be remote friendly and play rips, discs (including 3D), recorded TV, live TV and music from the same UI, if app switching is involved it won’t fly with my wife.

I suggest putting Openelec (which is built for XBMC) on a USB stick and booting from that in your present set up to see if it would suit.

It might not but very little lost to find out .....

It is only a couple of hundred MBs with a second partition for settings/fan art etc etc.

www.openelec.tv

Wheeker

Coconut Joe wrote: »

1) TV capture – Live TV support is non-negotiable, we use UPC and can never go back to their UI, it’s far too slow in comparison. Currently I only get SD but would like to get HD. Does Horizon box play nicely with HTPC’s? Can anyone recommend a capture card with HDMI in and MCE compatibility?

Not sure how you are currently using UPC with your WMC, but here's what I found:

Wheeker wrote: »

Here's my experience:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=81311966&postcount=3

Wheeker wrote: »

You could probably find a work-around to record the "live TV" feed from a UPC STB. I too looked into getting a TV Tuner card with an HDMI input but all I could find were (expensive) video capture cards. But, as per my post I linked to above, unless UPC STB's have changed back again so as to allow an IR Blaster to change channels via your HTPC, then you won't be able to schedule recordings. :mad:

In the USA, there are indeed HTPC "Cablecards" which you can actually cheaply rent from your Cable TV company instead of a STB which is a totally legal way to use a HTPC with Cable TV, but AFAIK this service is not available in Ireland (or UK).

IMHO- Freesat & Saorview is the way to go............ oh and it's free

It's been a couple of years since I switched from UPC to Freesat + Saorview, but I would assume that the UPC Horizon box will not play nice with WMC. As regards HD content- with my current DVB-T & Dual DVB-S cards I can get RTE 1 HD, RTE 2 HD, UTV HD & Channel 4 HD (all for free of course). I am about to try a reinstall of a Dual DVB-S2 card which would also give me BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4, CBBC & CBeebies all in HD from Freesat (free also).

colossus-x

If the main focus of your HTPC is TV as is the case with me and your on a Microsoft machine then the only satisfactory option is to use MEDIAPORTAL ( MP ). I have played with many HTPC software especially WMC but nothing is as satisfactory as MP.

For TV I have one dvb-t one dvb-s and one dvb-s2 cards in the machine giving me all saroview and freesathd channels with multiple recording options. There is a plugin for MP which downloads the very same TV guide used in official sky tv boxes which works brilliantly in comparison to wmc's awful messed up guide data.

The is no messing with shark filters. MP uses Lav filters with plays all video and audio codecs and works flawlesslay. Just don't' even need to think about codecs works so well.

MP is in constant development and is much better now than it was a couple of years ago. If will do Blu-ray as well with the right addon's where WMC has no blu-ray support. You are aware that WMC hasn't had any significant updates to it in years and feels all but defunct? Hack7.com is a graveyard now. I'm surprised it's stills supported by Microsoft.

One last thought. Are you updating to HD/3D from a SDTV CRT setup? If that's the intention I don't think you can get the tv picture from your UPC box to you HTPC in a satisfactory way ( could be wrong ).

Alun

People still use WMC? It's effectively, despite MS now having the cheek to charge for it, been all but abandoned by them, with not a single significant update since the W7 version was first brought out. Add to that constant disappearing EPG problems, a satellite transponder / channel list that bears no relation to reality necessitating hours of fiddling to get all the channels correct, means I abandoned it long ago for Mediaportal. There's a lot of fettling involved in getting that working as well, but at least there's an active user community you can turn to for advice.

Wheeker

Well I know everyone has their preferences, but I've had WMC running solidly for a couple of years now & I kinda subsribe to the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" view.
Here's what my UI looks like:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9uaiamca3crkoli/WMC%20Menu.png
https://www.dropbox.com/s/10sa4il8qq5tafu/WMC%20Guide.png
https://www.dropbox.com/s/wjhj4wgb9108o0n/WMC%20MB.png

It did indeed take some fettling, MediaPortal looks good but I would be apprehensive learning a whole new world of fettling!:o

Coconut Joe

Thanks for the replies, gives me something to think about.
At the moment my only issue with WMC is missing guide data has been getting more frequent as UPC make changes, however with the One guide now releasing in Ireland for Xbox One I'd hope they update the MCE guide as they're obviously paying for the data anyway.
I've not had any issues with it ir blasters not working with either of the UPC boxes I have.
The move to HD channels is not that big a deal to me as it's my wife who uses live TV really (it uses composite in at the moment and she doesn't complain), HD just would have been a nice to have if I was doing a new build.
Need to look into Freesat + Saorview option Wheeker/Colossus-x, this could be my best option (Sticking with WMC if I can), are there any issues with multiroom using this route (I run 2 WMCs at the moment and don't want to give up one), will the initial outlay for HW make UPC a better option for me?
Still going to give openelec/xbmc a go at some point.