Live from the Microsoft Windows Media Center event
By Ben Drawbaugh 
posted Sep 9th 2009 7:16PM
posted Sep 9th 2009 7:16PM
It is almost time as we wait for the event to start and find out if all or any of our Windows Media Center CEDIA predictions come true. We had to travel a long way from the show floor to get here, but so far Microsoft is doing it right. They have us setup with free WiFi and a table right up front, so now we just wait for the show to begin.
7:06PM Ben Reed just came by and said they'd be starting in another 5 to ten minutes.
7:10PM Well 7pm has come and gone and we still haven't started yet, people are starting to enjoy the free food and beverages yet, lucky for you we plan on eating afterwards so it won't get in the way of our coverage.
7:12PM Ben Reed takes the mic and welcomes us to the Media Center and MC Integrators alliance event. He explains how he is also an enthusiast and uses Media Center at home.
The Agenda is
- Windows 7
- Digital CAble Evolution
- MS at CEDIA Expo 09
- Ultimate Install Contest Winner
7:15PM Ben explains that a number of new features in Windows 7 will help the enthusiast and integrators. And then he goes through the new Windows 7 tuner features, that we are all too familiar with.
7:20PM We are announcing support for SDV, yeah! And the new DRM that will no longer lock down every single show.
7:21PM No more OEM CableCARD requirement for Media center!
7:30pm Kevin Collins takes the stage and gives some back ground on himself, including the fact that he has 13 tuners and 6 extenders at his house, must be nice. It is the center of his home system.
7:32PM Now Kevin is going through all the ways that these new features will benefit integrators and customers, like the fact that there is less DRM. He's also talking about AP2.0 that allows integrators to go beyond the 5 extender limit of Media Center -- wish we could access it.
7:34PM Todd Rutherford takes the stage. He was an integrator for 12 years before he came to work for Microsoft, but is also an enthusiast.
7:36PM Todd talks about the history of the Ultimate Install contest and the winner of last year.
7:37PM This year's winner is a 17k square foot home, with 32 zones of audio, 13 zones of video, 6 media servers running WMC and is fully integrated with Crestron.
7:38PM Dustin Anderson of Odessa Texas is the winner of the contest. The winner gets cash and a pro photographer to the site to help publicize the vent and a full case study. The home owner gets a bunch of Xboxes and games.
7:39 Ben Reed takes the stage to close things up. And says thanks and have a great show.
So most of our predictions didn't come true, just the firmware so far. We totally missed the lack of OEM requirement one, but at this point it isn't just academic as it was easy to bypass. We still think there might be other announcements before the show is done, but a few of the items in the predictions post are dead in the water.
7:30pm Kevin Collins takes the stage and gives some back ground on himself, including the fact that he has 13 tuners and 6 extenders at his house, must be nice. It is the center of his home system.
7:32PM Now Kevin is going through all the ways that these new features will benefit integrators and customers, like the fact that there is less DRM. He's also talking about AP2.0 that allows integrators to go beyond the 5 extender limit of Media Center -- wish we could access it.
7:36PM Todd talks about the history of the Ultimate Install contest and the winner of last year.
7:37PM This year's winner is a 17k square foot home, with 32 zones of audio, 13 zones of video, 6 media servers running WMC and is fully integrated with Crestron.
7:38PM Dustin Anderson of Odessa Texas is the winner of the contest. The winner gets cash and a pro photographer to the site to help publicize the vent and a full case study. The home owner gets a bunch of Xboxes and games.
7:39 Ben Reed takes the stage to close things up. And says thanks and have a great show.
So most of our predictions didn't come true, just the firmware so far. We totally missed the lack of OEM requirement one, but at this point it isn't just academic as it was easy to bypass. We still think there might be other announcements before the show is done, but a few of the items in the predictions post are dead in the water.
Hey alright!
Ugh Homegroup. As someone with a WHS, that and the "Shared" tab in all libraries in MC are the two things that bother me most about Win7.
Wow. I didn't even know this was happening today. Looking forward to hearing what they have to say. I love Windows Media Center and the Xbox 360 extender. It's my home DVR.
"... integrators and enthusiasts can now add Digital Cable Tuners ..." This summarizes their strategy well. They do not even try to reach wider audience and go mainstream, but media centers will remain a small niche:
http://mymediaexperience.com/2009/09/simple-and-easy-why-media-center-pc-is-not-going-to-be-mainstream/
Bad network connection?
zzzzzzzzzzzz....come on guys, this guy is kicking your asses....http://mynetworkproject.blogspot.com/2009/09/windows-media-center-press-event-live.html
I'd say that most likely, it's just Ben who Engadget sent there, so he's probably having to write multiple posts like the most recent one about no more OEM requirement for CableCard at the same time he's trying to update this post, and maybe even get pictures of it at the same time.
Let's face it, this isn't quite the Apple event of this morning, that I'm sure most of the staff was at.
Yeah, this is liveblog is really disappointing.
Technical difficulties?
Say wha? You created a new post (which still is behind) and stopped updating the other post that many of us were patiently refreshing?
No more OEM CableCard requirement! THANK GOD! I'll be adding one to my PC as soon as possible!
Same here
I would buy a couple tomorrow.. maybe the ATI internal OCCUR refresh is coming up.
Same here...well as soon as we see multituner options and better prices.
Well right now I'm paying comcast for an extra reciever... so this will pay for itself over time. Plus I will also be getting rid of that ugly Moto box in the middle of my living room.
What I would REALLY love to see is Silicon Dust take a stab at a Cable Card tuner. I'm in love with my HDHomeRun, and would buy a Cable Card tuner from them right now if it was available.
Oh nice... Gotta get a hold of one of these tuners now... no more Cox DVR/HD-DVR combo!
Hey Engadget HD! How about streaming the posts from the top like you usually do with these "live" blog events? Just a suggestion.
Your pal,
Twanzio
I want to see a price drop in the DCTs as well. Those puppies are expensive!
That was the worst Press Conference I've ever seen a company put on! Boo for Microsoft!
This has to be the biggest letdowns in press conference history. Only 2 interesting things happened. They should have just issued a press release.
That was a real let down.... I hope the rst of CEDIA isn't like this. Your coverage was subpar, but I suspect technical difficulties beyond your control.... damn gremlins.
Does relaxed DRM plus homegroup = increased portability mean more than just non-drm'd content can be shared in the homegroup?
Oh, thanks for covering the press conference.
non-oem cable-card is fantastic news for the US, but diddly for me in Canada (as usual) , oh well. I really wanted an update on the mesh webguide.
Not a lot of news in this event but the big one is of course the Any PC can use CableCard thing. A few others, but most of them we already knew. Disappointing that MediaCenter is getting so little new. I really had hopes (long shot I know) for new extenders.
Thanks for the coverage guys - Appreciate it!
I'm kinda dissapointed (except for the CableCARD thing) also, but then I thought about it, and I realized just how close to perfect the features in Media Center are. Obviously a clean integration of Blu Ray would be nice, but beyond that the only thing lacking are extenders that aren't the 360, that are actually good.
I'm starting to fear that we aren't going to get Blu-ray in MC7.
I think we are supposed to pay for Managed Copy instead.
Though I doubt MS is the one to blame for that.
That was it? What did they say about Remote Media Streaming - Webguide Mesh? Anything?
"7:38PM Dustin Andrew of Odessy Texas"
It's Dustin Anderson of Odessa, please correct.
for more detailed info, here's a press release...
http://news.prnewswire.com/DisplayReleaseContent.aspx?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/09-09-2009/0005091086&EDATE=
Wow. The winner owns a 17k sq ft property. So they reward him with more cash and prizes, because he has the money to blow on that kind of system. Great.
my sentiments exactly...he was probably a cousin to gates or balmer
The bulk of the prize goes to the hard working installer, in this case Vision Audio, not so much the home owner.
For full details on the content and prize package:
http://www.microsoft.com/ceinstaller/content/installs/uic/Overview.aspx
Ok, good.
I was gonna post about how amazingly ironic this was as well. The dude thats prolly worth $50+ million gets cash prizes and xbox games for having so much stuff already.
where is the news about the dish tuner!?!?!?!?
I love media center. I have a tuner in my main desktop pc and i use it to watch live and record tv all the time. Im using vista right now and i still love the features in for example the guide and stuff. But the windows 7 experience for media center looks to be even better. So cant wait till Oct 22!
Dropping the OEM requirement is huge. Maybe now more companies will make tuners. More interest may mean lower prices. Other than that its pretty disappointing so far. Where are the big announcements? Zune integration? Sharing premium recorded tv?
Yeah, was expecting a lot more. I understand that this means a lot for the US market, but means nothing anywhere else.
Dish would be great since it would open precedents and others could follow. Extenders would be nice too.
Well, maybe something can still come from the Microsoft booth tomorrow, but hopes are down right now.
I'd have numerous audio and video zones too if I were rich. Does it really look like whoever owns that home needs "a bunch of xboxes and games"?
Getting rid of the OEM requirement is great but we already had a workaround for that. What really got my attention was SDV support!! As in being able to watch (and possibly record) OnDemand channels in Media Center and without a cable box? That is sweet!! My only question would be whether the existing ATI DCT's are going to be compatible or will I need to upgrade to a new DCT to get this feature. Obviously, we'd need new 2 way Cablecards from the cable companies but those are rentals anyway.
Scratch that. Found an article on engadgetHD that has a letter from TW - "The current generation of CableCARD-compatible devices sold at retail, known as Unidirectional Digital Cable Products ("UDCPs") or Digital Cable Ready devices, only allow you to access our "one-way" services. in order to access On Demand programming, the Interactive Program Guide, switched digital video ("SDV"). and other "two-way" services, you must use digital cable equipment that includes two-way capabilities, such as a TWC-provided set-top box."
So the current ATI DCT's are UDCPs. It sounds like we'll have new DCT's coming that are bidirectional.
Also, Ondemand and SDV are both listed as seperate features so I guess I won't be watching Ondemand channels on Media Center :-(
Here's the link to the article:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/02/27/twc-transitioning-three-hd-channels-in-albany-to-sdv-cablecard/
You are correct the the ATI OCURs are UDCPs, but you are incorrect that this means/requires a new tuner. Your existing OCUR will be used in conjunction with a Tuning Adaptor (the same one TiVos use) combined with the new firmware and a service on the desktop PC.
Over here in "the rest of the world" we don't get compatibility with your cable tuners. And so once again Media Center fails to release any desperately needed improvements like Softsled.
I have to say I am appalled at Engadget's balanced coverage of two major electronics corporations events on the same day. In their 'second by second' blog from the Apple show, not a detail was left out, almost 100 pictures posted, and even their own personal biases. On the other hand, this coverage, if you can even call it that, makes me wonder why I come to this site to read the information. Granted, each company may present the information differently, and Apple may be hipper, newer and more exciting, but get with Engadget!
Not everything in life is as eye-popping as an iPod Nano with a crappy video camera.
While you might not agree, we have many more visitors interested in Apple's events than any other company. So you are basically arguing that we shouldn't cater to our readers. I could show you the traffic graphs, but instead I'll just say that every single one of the record setting days at Engadget was the day of an Apple event and that it is far and away a bigger event for us than CEDIA.