Windows Media Center
republished and updated from a vista community column/june 2006 by reader request
Windows Media Center has been a part of my life several years. I've watched functionality improve in each new version, and I'm already using beta versions of Windows Media Center in Windows Vista Ultimate as part of my daily routine. The 10-foot experience, with a restyled menu system, is now better than ever. The new interface allows more content and information to fit on the screen. You'll see examples of this new interface in the images in this column.
Windows Media Center has almost totally replaced a rack of home theater equipment in my home office and home theater third-floor loft. And a Windows Media Center wireless networked computer has added a full home theater experience to my bedroom. For me, Windows Media Center in Windows Vista Ultimate is a better quality consumer electronics experience than a collection of individual components with individual remotes that all have different menu systems.
Windows Media Center is a holistic Media experience and handles all the different types of digital Media in my environment. This Media includes live and recorded TV, approximately 300 CDs I've ripped to my hard drive, and a huge collection of digital photography images and scans of old family photos. I can view retail DVDs, watch the occasional movies I make with Windows Movie Maker, or watch movies that I download from the Internet from Cinema Now or Movielink. This is all done from within a unified easy-to-use interface from ten feet or so away. I can easily navigate everything with a single handheld remote control.
The newest version of Windows Media Center is featured in both Home Premium and Ultimate versions of Windows Vista. Nearly all computers that you see at big consumer retail stores like Circuit City and Best Buy are one of these two versions. Unlike previous versions of Windows Media Center, you can also purchase boxes at retail with full software versions as well as upgrade version boxed software. This software is what many "build-it-yourselfers" have been clamoring for.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows Vista Ultimate and Home Premium featuring Windows Media Center are available, but only Ultimate comes with both DVD's in the box. This is great news for me because I have, in addition to my 32-bit computers, both an AMD64 and an Intel 64 desktop that are taking advantage of 64-bit computing and running the newest version of Windows Media Center. I've been using Windows Vista Ultimate Edition on several desktop computers. What really excites me is that my Ferrari 5000 laptop can now travel with me as a 64 bit "Windows Media Center to go."
With this newest version of Windows Media Center, the overall navigation and menu structure has been totally revamped. Support for additional tuner cards has been added and Microsoft has included a new DVD decoder with the operating system so that anyone with the Ultimate or Home Premium Version can view live or recorded television and play DVDs without needing a third party add-on.
In this article, I'll preview:
- How the TV experience has improved
- How the Music experience has changed
- How the Pictures experience has changed
Preview the improved TV experience
New functionality and loads of "fit and finish" enhancements have improved the overall TV experience. One of my favorite new features is the new mini guide in live TV, shown in Figure 1. With the mini guide, you can check what's on TV currently (or in the future) without ever leaving the full screen TV experience.
How to use the mini guide
- Press one of the cursor buttons on the MCE remote
- The mini guide appears
- Use the up and down cursor buttons to scroll through the channels
- Use the right cursor button to view what's on next
With another new enhancement, you can display the main Windows Media Center menu as a transparent overlay while you watch live or recorded TV. No more squinting to see a tiny window from ten feet away to keep up with what's happening.
The interface that displays recorded TV shows now includes thumbnail images that Windows Media Center extracts from each show I record. This image-rich navigation also displays summary information from the metadata saved with each show. As shown in Figure 2, when XXX: State of the Union is the focus, Windows Media Center displays the summary, the channel, the day and date the show was recorded, and the duration of the recording.
Tip:
Even if you do not have the capability to record a show in high
definition, you can record HD channels as standard definition in
Windows Media Center if your set top box is a high definition
model. Many of the movies on the HD channels are in wide screen
format as opposed to pan and scan on the non HD channels. This
functionality makes watching these shows on my wide screen LCD
TV a better experience.
True high definition capabilities for US customers for TV viewing and recording is available via cable card support. You'll need to purchase new hardware such as HDCP certified monitors and computers certified by CableLabs with HDCP video cards to take full advantage of high definition support.
Preview the new Music Interface
In previous versions of Windows Media Center, viewing by Albums only displayed twelve albums at a time. In the new version of Windows Media Center, as with the TV experience, there is a much richer image-based navigation model. More of my content is displayed on a single screen. A comparison of the music experience in Windows Media Center 2005 and Windows Media Center is shown in Figure 3. As you can see, sort criteria that were selected from a list on the left side of MCE 2005 are now displayed as a horizontal menu along the top of the screen. As a result, there is more space to display the actual content so you see more of your music collection. Indexing and displaying a large collection of albums has also improved over MCE 2005. I noticed this even on my test machine with 200 albums.
Tip:
Multiple functions are available from a menu (see Figure 4) that
is displayed when you press the More Info button on your remote
control. For example, you can switch between a three row view of
your album art and a five row view of your album art using
View Small or View Large.
To change how your albums are displayed
- Press the More Info button on your remote
- A menu is displayed
- Select View Small or View Large to change the graphical view
- Select View List for a text listing
Preview the new Pictures interface
Consistent, informative, and easy-to-use navigation is present throughout the new version of Windows Media Center. The Pictures + Videos menu is the entrance to an amazing ten-foot "digital memories" experience. I can view my collection of digital images using folder view or by date taken in the Pictures Gallery (see Figure 5). I shoot a huge number of digital pictures and generally take the best from each days shooting (and editing) sessions and create a unique sub folder in the Pictures directory for each. I took the time to create meaningful file names for a group of JPEG files and Windows Media Center smartly displayed the name and the date taken and dropped the geeky .jpg file suffix. This capability provides a great visual experience, and the experience gets even better with an audio accompaniment. Launching an audio accompaniment is easy to do. First, navigate to Music and select and start playing some music. Then navigate to Pictures and start a slide show.
Improved and expanded functionality is available when your press the Info button on the handheld remote while viewing an image. This functionality provides you the ability to burn to CD or DVD and lock the current image (as shown in Figure 6). As with prior versions of Windows Media Center, I can access Picture Details and the general Settings menu.
When showing photographs, I often change the camera position to vertical to better "frame" or Center a picture. I've always wanted to be able to rotate an image while playing a slide show, and this functionality has been added to Windows Media Player as well. In earlier versions, I either had to edit outside of Windows Media Center to change the orientation or access the Picture Details menu by pressing Info on the remote. Then I could rotate in editing mode. If I'm showing off photos to friends, I certainly don't want to have to break the mood and edit while in a slide show. Now I can do it quickly and easily in the middle of a slide show.
Summary
Windows Media Center is the heart and soul of both my home computing and traveling computing experience. The digital revolution has become a mainstream way of life and there's never been a better way to organize and enjoy a huge collection of digital Media and live and recorded television entertainment. I can't wait for Windows Media Center Extender support to arrive in a future beta build as Windows Vista Ultimate Edition approaches release. This feature will enable me to extend the improved Windows Media Center experience by distributing digital Media over my wireless network to other rooms using my Xbox 360. Stay tuned, because I hope to showcase that experience here in the Windows Vista Community!
Barb Bowman enjoys sharing her own experiences and insights into today's leading edge technologies. She is a product development manager for Comcast High-Speed Internet, but her views here are strictly personal.
Article orignally published June 6, 2006.