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Windows Media Center
My New SuperRig (AKA the gaming/media beast)
Oct 11th
At home I’ve had a homebuilt P4 3.2GHz desktop for a while now, it’s done me well but new video cards, faster multi-core processors and ofcourse Vista… it was time to build a new box.
Recently Scott Hanselman posted about his new Ultimate Gaming Machine he had built up and I was inspired to build my own super quiet super-rig but couldn’t bring myself to drop the $2500 it was going to cost to build a box just for fun… So what does a cheapskate do?
So enters SlickDeals.net.
One of my favorite websites on the Internet is slickdeals.net, here you can find all the best ‘slick deals’ everything from super cheap promotions to amazing coupons and rebates. Everyone that knows me teases me because I check this site 3-4 times a day for that slick deal.
Last week, the need for a new machine hit me again and slickdeals delivered this little morsel:
HP Home has a new $400 off $1000+ coupon DT4115 valid customized HP Pavillion Desktops. Thanks Selma
A well-equipped HP Pavillion m8100y Media Center/PVR desktop PC for a base price of $899
- Click here
- Click "Customize"
- Select the following options (or choose any other upgrades for $100 or more):
- Intel Core 2 Quad processor Q6600 (2.4GHz) [add $150]
- FREE UPGRADE! 2GB DDR2-667MHz dual channel SDRAM [add $0]
- FREE UPGRADE! From Xtreme Audio to Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer or FREE UPGRADE! From integrated to Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio [add $0]
- Checkout, apply $400 off $1000 coupon DT4115
- Your total will be $650 + applicable taxes with free shipping
Specs:
- Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium (32-bit)
- Intel Core 2 Quad processor Q6600 (2.4GHz)
- 2GB DDR2-667MHz dual channel SDRAM (2×1024)
- 64MB NVIDIA GeForce 7500LE, DVI-I, TV-out, VGA adapter
- 250GB 7200 rpm SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
- LightScribe 16X DVD+/-R/RW SuperMulti drive
- 15-in-1 memory card reader, 2 USB, 1394, video
- ATSC-NTSC TV tuner with PVR, FM tuner, remote
- Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer or Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio
- Norton Internet Security 2007 – 15 Months
- HP keyboard and HP scroller mouse
- No Monitor (unless additionally selected)
Alternative upgrade options (choose one)
- Intel(R) Core(TM) 2 Duo processor E6850 (3.0GHz) [$50 less, $600 total]
Now how anyone object to: A Quad Core CPU, 2GB memory, a 250GB SATA drive, a sound blaster sound card and a TV tuner with PVR, FM and remote control and to top it off Windows Vista Home Premium (which includes Windows Media Center) for $650!!. It was simply a score, So I went for it.
Unfortunately it did have a couple shortcomings that kept it from being a super-rig:
- Only 1 SATA drive (and only 7200RPM), ideally RAID 0 or RAID 10 – fortunately the motherboard supports this.
- The video card options were weak.
- The 350W power supply was no doubt going to have to be replaced with something else.
Certainly not showstoppers and nothing that couldn’t be resolved.
Bring Forth the Video & Power
The box arrived yesterday and upon looking in it, it was questionable if a large video card would fit in there. A quick trip to the local CompUSA and $450 later we have a 8800GTS Video card and a 600W PCI-E ready powersupply. Those others wondering if the 8800GTS series video card will fit in a HP m8100y can be happy to know it’ll fit, you may never be able to get it out, but it will fit!
Here’s The Numbers…
Before the video card and power supply swap we had this:
After the video card swap out:
We went to 5.9 across all the video scores with only RAM & Disk I/O keeping us from a perfect 5.9.
What’s next?
Getting 5.9′s across the board ofcourse!
The RAM and Drive upgrades will come in a couple weeks as I’m also still debating if I should make the jump to Vista 64bit or stick it out with 32bit and will have to decide that first. Ofcourse, many wll argue it’s not a super-rig until it’s the ideal super-rig (Like Scott’s) with two video cards with SLI for video and dual monitors but I don’t have space in the new box for a second video card and the current card can support 2 DVI monitors as well as HD output.
My super-rig will be used as a media pc / gaming pc more than anything else so giving up the second video card for a TV-tuner/PVR card is acceptable.
But thanks to slickdeals.net I managed to build an almost-complete super-rig for about half of what I would have spent building the entire machine myself and probably 1/3rd what I would have spent if I spec’d out a similar machine through Dell, etc.
Now I just need to find a slickdeal on a 30" LCD monitor!
The final outcome
And here’s a little screen shot of what was going on last night:
Stream DVDs to your Xbox 360 from your Media PC (part 2)
Oct 3rd
This blog article was initially just one large article and in an attempt to make it more enjoyable I’ve broken it down into 3 parts. This is part 2, using My Movies Catalog. My Movies Catalog is an add-on tool for Windows Media Center which allows you to connect to a webservice and pull down information such as box covers, a movie synopsis, cast and crew biographies and such. My Movies also allows you to categorize your movies. My Movies is available from http://www.mymovies.name
Adding the Movie to My Movies catalog
This is the cool stuff. The application My Movies adds a new item on your Media Center screen labeled “My Movies” (imagine that) and you build a catalog of all your movies using it.
After installing My Movies we’ll fire up the My Movies Collection Management and it will look something like the below image (minus all the information the first time you run it)
How cool is that, it’s got details on the movie, a description, a front box cover shot and back box cover shot and all the names of the people involved in the film. Best of all, all this information is going to show up on your Xbox!
I just finished ripping Lucky You so we’ll add that to my collection. Select the Add Titles icon and select By Title and enter your movie title and click search (it recommends scanning the barcode through your webcam but this works for me) and you’ll see something like the below:
Select the correct version for your DVD and click on Add Online. It will prompt you for where your DVDs are stored (mine are all in a folder called DVD and then each is in it’s own folder from there and since this app adds some images and information to the folder I recommend keeping things organized like this as well):
Click OK and then click Add Titles and let it do it’s magic!
It will probably prompt you about adding some new actors and what not (I just click Yes) and then start adding them:
When it’s done the Collection Manager will look something like this:
The new movie is in there and you can update it if you like. There now all movies are indexed in My Movies and all this movie-phile information is loaded in too.
Accessing your My Movies collection
Now it’s time to impress your friends and family. Let’s fire up the Media Center (or the Xbox 360).
Here’s the My Movies option in Media Center:
Selecting it we see the Movie Collection
You have the ability to sort your movies, store them in sub catalogs and do all kinds of cool stuff. The best part is you get to see the DVD box cover right there! Let’s click on one of my movies, “The Condemned”
We get to see the box cover, the rating, if we’ve watched it already and read the synopsis of the film. Maybe you want to see who’s in the movie, clicking on Cast & More we get:
Hey I wonder what other movies Vinny Jones has been involved in? Click on Vinnie (Yo! Vinnie!) we get his biography:
and clicking on Movies we get to see what other movies we have that’s he’s in:
This app is definitely one of the coolest programs I’ve come along in a long time. It’s also pretty slow (both on the Xbox 360 and running in my media center window on the desktop where I took these snap shots) but it’s so cool that we can live with it being a little slow.
Oh and if you’re wondering what’s stored on your hard drive to make all this possible it’s a couple images and an XML File:
Now to watch the movie
So there you have it. We’ve ripped the movie, cataloged the movie and even impressed our friends and family with cool box snapshots and info about the film. The last thing to do is watch the movie and you can do that right there in My Movies.
I was hoping to post some pics here and let you see the movies running on my screen but that’s just going to have to wait until another time. I can definitely say running over the wireless mesh network the Xbox streams fine from the PC though. streaming while ripping is a bit choppy at times but it seems to still stream fine. I was worried streaming from the USB drive wouldn’t cut it but so far so good. I’ll do a few test streams though and post about it.
Stream DVDs to your Xbox 360 from your Media PC (part 1)
Sep 26th
I’ve spent the past few days looking for the easiest method to rip a DVD and stream it to my Xbox 360 from my Windows Media Center (or Vista) PC. There’s many different methods for this and most of them involve ripping the DVD to a single VOB file, renaming that file as a .MPG running it through some sort of AC3 filter and then streaming the large MPEG file to your Xbox. The problem with each of the methods I found for this has been that they are time consuming and require you running 2-3 different programs before it’s completed. My goal was to find a way to do this with just one or at most two programs involved and in as short a period as possible. This is how I’m doing it.
NOTE: I do not endorse, encourage or recommend anyone rip/stream/copy any DVD they do not legally own. My project is strictly using DVDs that I purchased myself and that (as I understand it) I have the right to make backup copies of for my own personal use and how this information is used by you is up to you, I am not liable for any misinformation.
The Tools Needed
I’m using the following applications
- AnyDVD, from www.slysoft.com — This is used to defeat the copy protection on the DVD so you’re able to copy it. It’s works on almost all of the DVD’s I’ve tested.
- CloneDVDmobile from www.slysoft.com — This is used to actually RIP the DVD from the DVD to a Windows Media file (.WMV).
- and occasionally DVDfab from www.dvdfab.com. — This is really only used because it’s my preferred application for backing up DVDs, it’s never failed on a DVD yet.
- MyMovies for the Xbox 360, a free application from www.mymovies.name. — This is used to index the movies on my drive and access them easily through the Xbox.
- A Large DVD Collection. I own about 250 DVDs and the goal of this project is simply make managing and accessing my collection of DVDs easier.
The hardware I’m using is a Sony DVD+/-RW USB drive and a Maxtor 500GB USB drive to store the movies. I know ripping from a USB drive and writing it to a USB drive is slowing things down but it’s the hardware I have and it works for me. The average time for a full rip varies from 30 minutes to 70 minutes so far.
Part 1. Ripping the DVD
This is really straightforward and should be pretty easy for anyone to duplicate.
1. I loaded AnyDVD and run it in the background.
You’ll see it running from the taskbar on your desktop (it’s the little fox, get it sly as a fox 
):
And when you first run it you’ll see it doing it’s magic:
I just leave it running in the background, make sure the little fox is there and let it do it’s thing.
2. Start CloneDVDmobile.
The reason I’m using CloneDVDmobile is that it supports ripping directly from the DVD to WMV file (this is tagged as experimental in the app but with half a dozen DVD’s done in 2 days it’s been pretty good).
When you first start CloneDVDmobile select the option *Generic WMV/WMA (experimental)
3. Select the movie chapter you’re going to copy.
My DVD drive is F: so I browsed to F: and it did the rest. It generally picks the correct one automatically. You’ll notice we’re only ripping the main movie and not all the special features and such. From what I’ve read the Xbox can’t handle the menu and hey if you ripped the whole thing then all those DVD’s would be useless!
4. Set the Audio and Subtitle settings.
From reading the slysoft forums it seems subtitles aren’t handled very well by this app but then I don’t use them so I haven’t checked. I always pick English Dolby AC-3/6 and disable the subtitles.
5. Output Method and Settings
Okay here’s the part where a little experimentation will be needed. For the widescreen videos I’ve been picking 852×480 for the resolution, for the regular format videos I pick 720×480.
I set the output file by the name of the movie, in this case e:/away-from-here.wmv (I’m writing to my USB drive E:\, I don’t know why it wants to use forward slashes(/) instead of backslashes (\) perhaps it has to do with the mencoder.exe app it uses in the background. and I set a Label for the movie but it usually picks this correctly itself.
6. That’s it the Movie is ripping!
In about 60 minutes I’ll have a WMV file ready to stream to my Xbox but we’re not done yet.
You’re probably wondering why I’m using WMV files instead of MPEGs or DIVX or whatever. The WMV files give me the ability to fast forward and rewind the movies and are natively supported. DIVX requires (from what I’ve read) a transcoder and MPEGs don’t support the fast forward and rewind (from what I’ve read and experienced so far).
Amazon Unbox Videos on the Xbox 360
Sep 23rd
Since I have my wireless mesh network setup in the house, I have OUTSTANDING wireless access throughout the entire house. Now with good latency and no packet loss it’s time to start making the best of the network in the house.
The first thing I did this weekend was enable my Xbox360 to connect to my Windows Media Desktop running Windows Media Center Edition 2005 Rollup Patch 2. If you’re not familiar with windows media center it allows you to stream media files (videos, pictures, music), watch TV (if you have a TV tuner card), act as a PVR and more.
The Xbox 360 has Media Center Extender capabilities built in so that I’m able to connect to my Media Center Desktop over the network and access all the Media Center features remotely through my Xbox and display it on the TV. The goal with Media Center Edition has always been to rip all my DVD’s to files and then stream them over the network to the TV and Amazon Unbox Videos takes me a little closer to that.
First getting the media center to tie into the Xbox 360
Getting the Xbox and Media PC to see each other should be pretty simple, unfortunately it wasn’t as straight forward as it should have been. It turns out that if you’re running XP you need to download some software (Vista users don’t need to do this).
Here’s a few sites to help you with this:
- A good walkthrough on what you’re going to be doing.
- Download Software for your version of Media Center.
- Media Center Extender FAQs (it does a great job detailing what you’ll need to do).
- The Xbox360 PC Setup instructions For Vista.
You’ll want to use the download software link above to make sure you download the correct version of the Media Center Extender Software on your Media Center desktop. If you have Vista you don’t need to install anything at all and can follow the Vista Setup Instructions. Now, you may get a warning that your network won’t support standard or high definition video stream. You’ll want to play with the network and settings and even if you don’t get a strong signal give it a try, you might find it works fine.
Setting up Amazon Unbox for the Xbox360
This is a slam dunk, it just works! Download an Amazon Unbox video to your PC using their viewer tool. There’s a number of free downloads available right now and some special $0.99 rentals on the weekend. If you need more information on this Amazon has some instructions.
Watching a Movie over the Xbox 360.
This just works. Now if your Xbox doesn’t have the option to show movies you probably didn’t enable videos because of a poor network signal, you’ll want to adjust that. On the Xbox go to Media Center, then select My Movies and select the Amazon Unbox folder to pick one of your movies.
How’s the Movie Experience?
It’s great! I honestly couldn’t tell the difference on a video streamed across the Xbox and standard definition TV and I have a 50″ plasma so it should have showed some pixelation. Now the movie I watched was We Are Marshall which is a pretty good movie and it was only $0.99!
I noticed Amazon Unbox has a blog and on their blog they have a post talking about the different video details:
Below are some technical details about our most common video and audio parameters.
DVD-quality PC File
- Video Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
- Video Codec: Windows Media Video 9 Advanced Profile
- Video Bitrate: 2500 kbps avg, 6000 kbps peak
- Video Frame Size: 640×480 (4×3 content), 720×408 (16×9 content)
- Video Frame Rate: 23.98, 29.97 (same as source)
- Video Keyframe Interval: 4 seconds
- Audio Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
- Audio Codec: Windows Media Audio 9.1 Professional
- Audio Bitrate: 192 kbps avg, 1000 kbps peak
- Audio Sample Rate: 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz (same as source)
TiVo “Best Quality” File
- Video Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
- Video Codec: MPEG-2
- Video Bitrate: 2800 kbps avg, 6600 kbps peak
- Video Frame Size: 640×480 – all 16×9 content is letterboxed
- Video Frame Rate: 23.98, 29.97 (same as source)
- Video Keyframe Interval: 4 seconds
- Audio Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
- Audio Codec: MPEG-2 Layer 3
- Audio Bitrate: 192 kbps avg, 1000 kbps peak
- Audio Sample Rate: 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz (same as source)
Portable Video File
- Video Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate CBR
- Video Codec: Windows Media Video 9
- Video Bitrate: 600 kbps
- Video Frame Size: 320×240 (4×3 content), 320×180 (16×9 content)
- Video Frame Rate: 23.98, 29.97 (same as source)
- Video Keyframe Interval: 6 seconds
- Audio Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate CBR
- Audio Codec: Windows Media Audio 9
- Audio Bitrate: 96 kbps
- Audio Sample Rate: 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz (same as source)
Another great reason to test out Amazon Unbox right now is that they have free video rentals on the new TV series that are launching this season (I’m downloading the Bionic Woman at the moment but without atleast cameo of Lee Majors it just won’t be the same).
It does have a few drawbacks.
Now, it’s not all roses and peaches. I did run into a problem with the unbox video. I’m downloading at 6Mbps on my cable modem and started watching the movie on the Xbox when it was at 10%, after about 20 minutes I ran out of movie and it ended. I waited about another 30 minutes and I ran out of movie again! UGH. So I’d say if you’re going to watch a movie give yourself atleast a 60% complete download before you start watching the movie. I was looking for HD quality video downloads but couldn’t find any hopefully some will be available soon. Another cool thing about Amazon Unbox is that they have partnered with Microsoft to create a site createspace.com. Createspace.com is for indie film makers to get their movie out in HD DVD format and available on Amazon Unbox, this should be pretty exciting for independant film makers and I can’t wait to see what new and exciting films come out of this project.
So that’s Amazon Unbox and the Xbox 360
So that’s all there is to that. You can configure the xbox to talk to your media center PC using the links provided for instructions and software as needed, you can signup for amazon unbox and rent some pretty cool movies, dirt cheap and have them delivered to your PC (and xbox) immediately and then stream them over to your xbox 360.
I’m excited about the prospects of what Media Center and the Xbox 360 as a media platform have and am excited about the upcoming projects I’ll be planning around this. My next project is going to be ripping one of my own DVDs and playing it across to the xbox. If I get some time this week, I’ll also post some pics of the movie playback on the xbox 360 so you can see how well it looks.
