AV After Dark #1: Wii Yoga
Welcome to this inaugural edition of AV After Dark. This podcast is planned to be a once a month collaboration between the HT Guys and AV Rant. This month we discuss such burning topics as Windows 7 and how un-sucky it is (mostly). Why do Blu-ray players come with composite video cables? Braden has the answer. What is Managed Copy? I’m not sure any of us really knows. The Oppo-83SE – is it for you? Hint – No. Netflix via the PS3 – experiences. Is the Wii really worth it as an exercise device? The guys weigh in. Thanks for listening. You can find the HT Guys at their website and AV Rant right here. We really enjoy these collaborations and hope you do too. Thanks to listener Ted for both the Intro and Outro music. Check out more of his work at www.thesysmusic.com.
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Hey Tom, I just listened to the podcast and I enjoyed it a great deal. I hope you keep doing them.
We had a bit of the problem on the front end with the audio so I had to use my backup. After that, it should sound better. For those that noticed.
How about a link for intro music!
http://www.thesysmusic.com
=D
Yeah, where did that link go? http://www.thesysmusic.com
I’m a big media center user in Vista/Win 7, and it’s a big upgrade over what was in XP Media Center Edition. It supports Clear QAM TV tuners for your local cable unencrypted stations for one. Also, for the first time you’ll be able to use CableCard tuners without buying a specifically blessed OEM PC.
It also automatically transcodes files if you are streaming it to an extender (Xbox for one), so if you have a file the PC can play, you can most likely play it to the extender. A few things might still require a bit of work to set up (mkvs).
And the overall screen GUI is just so much nicer. I’m a huge 7MC user as it’s my primary DVR and video playback device. I also have archived a lot of my DVDs to my server that I can play straight to the 7MC box.
I actually noticed my Win7 box showing up on my PS3 menu last night. Didn’t mess with it but I was pretty impressed. That’s the way this stuff is supposed to work – plug it in and it all finds and connects to each other.
Not bad… not what I was expecting but now bad at all! I was looking forward to an f-bomb filled and ending up in at least 1 Cease & Desist letter type podcast… but this’ll do.
Excellent freaking intro music ted… I think I listened to the intro music 3x!
I’m using a Win7 Media Center as a media center type hub. My main box has 4 TV tuners (yes I’ve recorded across all 4 before) and a 7.5 TB RAID stack for ri- er, backups of owned DVD’s and Blu-Rays. Last count I was at around 600 DVD’s and 25 Blu’s all backed up at 1:1 without menus, nag screens, secondary audio tracks, and extras. Just the movie… the way it should be.
Win7’s media center really is what we’ve been wanting since the begining (I beta’d MCE 2004 that became XP MCE 2005 and have used MCE ever since). This is my 5th MCE box and this is the first time they’ve gotten it “right” but the MCE buzz has died and extenders have gone the way of the dodo… sad really.
The GUI is gorgous and works very well… enough for my wife to get really good at it.
Clear QAM is huge addition
The netflix addon is the best I’ve seen on any bluray player or gaming system
Overall the application runs much faster with less crashes.
The one thing I REALLY REALLY want to see is native blu-ray playback. Now all versions I’ve tried using an internal BD drive launch powerDVD for viewing which takes you out of the MCE program.
About the PS3, Win 7 includes a DLNA media server. You can actually “play to” certain DLNA devices. For instance, if you have the Xbox in media center extender mode, from the Win 7 PC in Windows Media Player, it will show up as a device that you can push media to. So if you click the little server icon in the top right of WMP above your playlist, you can send your playlist to your device (Xbox, etc) automatically. So you could force a playlist to another room in the house.
Here’s a list of some of the devices:
http://thedigitallifestyle.com/cs/wikis/windows7/play-to-devices.aspx
So far the PS3 doesn’t allow the “play to”, but is a DLNA client that can play anything that the Win 7 box has in it’s library.
Tom, there are a lot of receivers on there that work with DLNA servers as well (my Onkyo isn’t there). Also the Roku Soundbridge and Sonos boxes. Might be an interesting write up or discussion on the podcast.
Here’s a quick guide:
http://windows7news.com/2009/10/29/windows-7-guides-using-play-to-in-wmp-12/
Leif, glad to see another 7MC user here. I’m also running 4 HD tuners (2 clear QAM, 2 ATSC). I expect to get one of the Centon or Hauppauge MOCUR mutlistream cablecard tuners next year when they are released and the system will be complete. I even just picked up a second Xbox when Amazon had a $100 credit on the arcade lightning deals a couple of weeks back to use as a bedroom extender.
Leif, thanks! I’m working on a vocal version of the song and will post that and the whole instrumental on the thesysmusic.com site soon…
AV After Dark was so good, I listened to it twice. Well, okay, so it was an accident. But the point is that I didn’t skip it on the second round! Seriously, I enjoyed hearing my two favourite (if only) AV podcasts come together.