Fun With Windows Media Center – An Epic Journey

It may not be quite "epic", but it has been quite a journey.

First, let me explain what Windows Media Center [let’s just say WMC from now on] is. WMC is an application that runs on Windows [for the sake of discussion, let’s keep it Vista specific] and allows you to host music, pictures, videos, TV, DVDs, radio, etc. on a computer which is connected to you home entertainment system [TV & stereo system usually].

As a small point of history, Laura and I have moved around a little in this area discovering the good/bad/ugly of the local cable systems and DirecTV. Not that DirecTV in and of itself is bad, but the outages during high winds and storms was unacceptable. We tried local cable: Comcast first and now Cox. Verizon Fios is out but not yet at our house. In the course of trying out the different cable systems and DVRs, we fast discovered that both cable system boxes are VERY bad. The Comcast box was better, but the guide was awful and had advertisements all over it. It was slow and never quite worked for On-Demand videos. The Cox  box works just fine – if  you like slow and non-responsive at times. However, the DVR portion of this box is absolutely horrible. There’s no "series priority" setting that the Comcast box had – in other words, you couldn’t program 3 shows to record at once [of course, since there are only 2 tuners] and have it chose the top 2 in case of a conflict in time. I can’t even view the list and settings of my scheduled recordings. I have to guess. Also: I can’t record a series with the settings: "all new shows on all channels". Even recording "all shows on this channel" isn’t smart enough to know that it has already recorded that episode – it records it anyway and fills up the disk.

So I thought I’d remedy the problem by using Laura’s "old" computer as a WMC station. By "old" I mean only a year old. The only newer computers in this house are the server and my work laptops – only 1 of them, actually. So it’s not really that old. It came with a tuner and has a 300GB hard drive which at first glance is enough to be a basic media center.

Configuring the basics of the WMC and connecting it to the TV/stereo was a joy: everything worked great. I had digital audio connections and a VGA jack right into the TV. It would have been better with HDMI I’m sure, but that would have been an upgrade at a later date when I found out if it worked like I wanted it to. The only initial problem was WiFi signal strength [don’t do this, by the way – go for wired connections] which I have now solved by using an Ethernet over power line adapter. The great thing about this is that I could now [once the network problems were solved] listen to all of our music CDs which I painstakingly ripped to MP3 over a series of months and stored on the server. Now, there is no need to dig through a box of disks searching for the right one. I just load up the music library and Boom! Tons of music. Success!

It also worked great for some downloaded episodes from Amazon Unbox – some NCIS or CSI episodes we missed and needed to catch up on played very well. DVDs played wonderfully as well, even transmitting digital surround signals to the amplifier [I don’t have all the speakers mounted yet, but will soon… I hope…].

Then came the big problem. The whole reason I started this journey [not the "whole" reason really – I did want to play our music and videos from the server as well…] was to eliminate both the extra cost and evil [yes, I mean "evil"] interface of the cable guide and DVR. If you’ve ever seen the interface of WMC, it’s really slick. I’m not just saying that out of loyalty, but out of experience. The WMC interface is quick, intuitive, and very pretty. It makes the cable box interfaces look like 80s video games… like "pong" or "Space Invaders" instead of "Halo".

So – what’s the problem with that, you ask? Well, the tuner. Yes. The tuner. The system itself ROCKS. As far as analog cable shows go, it’s the system to have… if you have only analog cable. Digital cable is another story altogether. I found that my tuner would only work with analog signals and over-the-air HDTV signals. Anyone who lives in a hilly or mountainous area will immediately recognize the flaws with that. Right – over the air in Virginia? Not. In Houston, I know this is not only possible but works quite well. It just doesn’t work for me. So I tried another tack: many cable companies will send digital channels over "clear QAM" or unencrypted digital signals over the cable. My card didn’t support this, so I picked up one at a nearby store and tried it out.

Success! I could now view digital channels… but… wait… only 13? I thought I was paying for 150 or so. Where’s all the other channels? It seems that only local broadcast channels are sent in the "clear". All the others are encrypted. What should I do? After some research, I discovered that there is a system that will support this called CableCard. This is a method by which encrypted signals are decoded and able to be played by a media system or even TV which has this capability. I thought I’d found the solution.

The more I read, though, the more disappointed I became. CableCard tuners only seemed to work on pre-configured systems with special BIOS that would support them. What this means in English is that in order for me to get the channels that I wanted on my WMC PC, I would need to spend about $1500 or more on a new computer just to escape the ugly interface and clunky DVR. I wasn’t ready to do that. I am glad I didn’t buy the tuners – returning them would have been a pain. So I was stuck. Well, not only stuck, but I found out that Cable Labs who makes these "standards" for the cable industry keeps changing things. There’s now a new standard for bi-direction digital cable encryption/decryption that cable companies will be utilizing, thereby obsoleting any system that I would have purchased or configured.

The conclusion of this story is that I have relocated Laura’s computer back to the basement, created a virtual desktop running Vista, installed WMC, created a local copy [which is synchronized via Live Sync] of all of our music, and connected a Media Center Extender to the stereo and TV which now lets us play our music and videos on the main entertainment system.

Oh – and that now includes a Blu-Ray player which I had intended to add into the WMC computer.

I’m not giving up, though. Verizon Fios will be coming soon and their DVR system and cable box is based on Windows CE and a custom version of what looks a lot like WMC.

Maybe one day, cable companies will do something smart… or helpful… or maybe not.

One can hope, yes?

Time For A Re-Fi?

What with rates as low as they are, we are looking into a refinance of our home loan. Yes, I know: we just bought the house not six months ago. But, I assure you that the lock we put in at 5% is such that we will be saving almost $300 per month on our house payment without significant cost. In fact, it’s almost a wash with the costs of the loan being the same as a month’s payment, which we’d get to skip. The only thing "bad" is that our loan length will be 6 months longer. But, with diligence, we can decrease the total loan time – and the total payoff amount, which will be over $100,000 less than the old loan even if we only pay the minimum payment.

What we’ll have to decide, though, is if we divert the additional savings to a savings account or just keep it going to the principal to pay it off early.

Probably a little of both.

Merry Christmas, World!

Merry Christmas to all those reading all around the world! Remember to celebrate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ who was born to save us.

Our Christmas today was wonderful and intimate with just Laura and I with a few presents [we bought and gave each other gifts all year long, so it’s hard to find more to give!] and some music.

We wish everyone out there a wonderful Christmas celebration with family or friends or however you wish to celebrate!

It’s Really Winter Now!

This morning when I got up, I looked at my laptop and in the weather gadget, it said 14 degrees. Wow. Now that we’re officially into Winter, I guess it can get cold, eh?

Actually, I’m kinda stoked because I get to wear my real Winter coat that I bought in Minneapolis that I can usually never wear here because it’s too warm. And warm it was this morning! The only thing cold was my ears! I guess I need some sort of ear-protectors in this kind of weather – especially when there’s powerful wind like there is today.

Of course, it’s warmed up now… close to 18…

Christmas Approaches…

2012-01-08 23:30:33

Are you ready? I’m probably not. We don’t have much in the way of decorations this year, but we’re still not fully settled in to the new place. Yes, I know it’s been six months, but we take time to find the perfect layout.

This year for Christmas, we won’t be traveling. Staying home can be fun, and we might even get some work done! [Maybe. I’m not promising anything, though…] At least I’ll be able to get more regular with my workouts, I hope. I’ve started getting back into the gym already… ouch… I have to work off the extra weight from Thanksgiving and hope I don’t put more back during Christmas.

Well, enjoy your weekend!

All Silver’d Up

I’m back from my ’round-the-South mileage run. In a couple of days/weeks, it should register that I’ve achieved Silver Elite status.

Yahoo!

All in all, the trip wasn’t too onerous, like some in the past have been. It was a quick trip to Houston, a nice wait while I ate Cajun food [yum!] and then a hop over to Gulfport/Biloxi and back. Now, I get to add another airport and another state to the places I’ve been.

One interesting thing I did see was the remaining devastation from Katrina that still lines the Gulf Coast from New Orleans to Gulfport. I saw many empty lots, empty foundations, and damaged buildings. I also saw a lot of rebuilt or newly built houses as well. It looks like at least some people were able to start again, but many may never be back.

You Really Can’t Go Home

That’s what they say anyway. [Who is "they" and why do we listen to them?] I dropped Laura off for a massage and I went exploring in the old neighborhood. It feels strangely familiar, but very different at the same time. Little here has changed, so I think it must be me. Well, little except which streets are under construction.

I have to say, though, that there are many things here in Houston that I miss: the friendly people, the wonderful food – food that you can get at any hour of the day, and cheap stuff… like houses, gas, etc. SO cheap down here. Of course, there’s always the things I don’t miss, like nasty tasting water, some pollution [nothing like Los Angeles, but it still stinks…], traffic and things like that.

Of course, working in the Federal space like I do at home also gives me a sense of doing something "important"… At least, more important than making some CEO feel better about getting his email faster. I don’t know: maybe living in the DC area makes one feel more important. Maybe it’s a false feeling, or even arrogance, that says the rest of the country’s problems seem smaller and more trite. It could be that.

Or maybe it’s time for me to think about changing what I do. Should I dive head-first into photography or maybe move to Redmond?

I guess, when it comes down to it, Houston is always good at making me think. There seems to be more time to do so here.

That is also something I miss.

Must… Work… Out…

After many days in Texas, Laura and I are wrapping up our whirlwind tour of the families located there. I have to say that I certainly miss Texas food, too! Although, I’m not exactly “missing” it right now… In fact, I think I’m gonna take it with me!

Once we get home, I’m going to have to go on a strict workout regimen. I think I may have gained a few pounds while here… And we have two big dining events to go!

It’s definitely good to see family, though. I got to see my parents new house for the first time.

Well, it’s back to vacation now!

Return Of The Mileage Run

This year, it just so happens that I am very close to achieving Silver Elite status on Continental. So I thought it might be a good time for a mileage run. I know I won’t have any business travel that will give me the miles, so I found an incredibly low cost plane ticket to Gulfport, MS. Yep. The exciting town of Gulfport. Having never been there, I will get to add another airport to my list as well as another state. Even though I’ll only transit through, I think that qualifies as "being there" in my book. This trip will take me into Silver qualifying range. I’ll earn back my Elite status and the benefits that go with it, such as no baggage fees [big one there], quicker security screening, and even the remote possibility of First Class upgrades, which I’ve discovered doesn’t happen much for the lowly Silver like it did when I was Platinum.

Mind you, I’m not complaining at all that I haven’t been able to earn Elite status like I once was, but this year I was close enough and flights were cheap enough for me to give this one a whirl. The trip is in December, and I should see my "lifetime miles" go up above 700K…

Nice.

We’ve Flown A Long Way, Baby

Many who know me know that I spent about 10 years on the road, flying most every week. Well, that life is past for me now and I don’t get out near as much. So imagine my surprise when I log into Continental’s web site and discover that they are now posting your “lifetime mileage”. Below is the snippet of my actual lifetime miles on Continental:

mileage

That’s almost 700,000 miles! Of course, it would be more if I had learned the secret of benefit consolidation early on in my career at IBM. I only learned of this later on, and then only after deciding that American Airlines had it in for me. So, if you were to add up all the miles I wasted in my early career [I happen to know that this is over 250,000 miles on American alone] plus the several unaccounted for trips to Saudi Arabia to visit my parents, I would be well over a million miles.

Oh, that I had started with Continental from the beginning!

303K and I’ll earn “lifetime Silver”. Guess I need to circle the earth a few times…