http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/ Engadget Comments for Engadget HD Podcast 182 - 03.09.2010 http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
And Ben, sorry to say I don't know anyone who will agree with you that the 360 is just as fast as a dedicated box. I'm not saying it is that much slower but it's just not as snappy. But we are talking about hundreds of a second in speed and I never seen this with a couple of hardware extenders. It's nothing to do with my hardware or setup. I have been running a HTPC before Media Center on Windows XP was out and normally replace the hardware every few months and it is overkill for a HTPC, even various routers and network configurations. No wireless is involved, it's nothing to do with hardware. The 360 in general can be a bit sluggish not just with Media Center but even the native 360 OS, such as with menus and what. But there are also features not there for the 360 which I would like to see it to be identical, like as you mentioned the sound on 2x fast forward is nice to have.]]>Mar 10th 2010 7:28AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/Mar 10th 2010 1:47AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
Here are two videos I did. One on the PC and one on the 360, are you telling me you notice one is slower than the other?
http://hd.engadget.com/2009/07/27/windows-7-media-center-review/]]>Mar 10th 2010 7:29AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
There is a difference as you are using it. Yes, we are talking less then a second and it's not all areas of Media Center but it is there. I mean even on a 360, hitting the home button (whatever the X is called) and moving through the menus doesn't always snap between them, and some games running affect how it responds.

I'm not saying there is a 5 second lag, I am saying there is a split second delay. Even in the various forums, such as TGB, people notice it.]]>Mar 10th 2010 8:03AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
Interesting, I guess I'm not sensitive to it. Either way it isn't worth the cost of a HTPC connected to a TV. You can't put a price on never needing a keyboard or a mouse in the living room.]]>Mar 10th 2010 8:04AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
I guess you can put it like that. Honestly I wouldn't have known the difference until I started running Wnidows 7 beta and when Xbox Live went down so did the 360 being an extender. The wife didn't like that so well so I had to hook up the HTPC to the TV and hadn't gone back since. Mostly because my condo doesn't really allow me to put the box anywhere besides under the TV so I figure why not just plug it in? Plus I benefit with a slightly better response time and a few other things missing from the extenders. But I am sure when I buy a house later this year that it will be going into the garage and will be using the 360 exclusively. You also can save power since my HTPC uses half the power the 360 does, and is quieter. But I'm not really concerned about the power part.]]>Mar 16th 2010 2:28AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/Mar 10th 2010 4:31AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Gateway+-+Desktop+with+Intel%26%23174%3B+Core%26%23153%3B+i3+Processor/9698918.p?id=1218153427813&skuId=9698918&st=i3
+
400 dollar ceton card

gives you a 4 tuner media center system with a 1tb hard drive and 6 gigs of ram. Also the i3 chipset mother board combo here supports bitstreaming for a blu ray player later.
for 950

as compared to the tivo premiere

which is about 500 bucks with 3 years of service 300 if you pay upfront (466.20 if you pay monthly)

gives you pretty much 800 bucks up front for a tivo xl premiere.

I'll be paying the 160 dollar delta to get the extra two tuners and the ability to add in a blu ray player with bitstreaming in a few months for 60 bucks.

The x factor is of course ownership of the 360 which drives the cost up another 150- 200 bucks if you don't have one.]]>Mar 10th 2010 11:08AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
Thanks for the suggestion, but we really want to try and make it cost the same as the Premier. So $700 for a 320GB or $900 for a 1TB.]]>Mar 10th 2010 11:09AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
But let's think. We can get a $70 Pentium Dual Core Wolfdale, $80 mobo, $80 4gb memory, $50 hard drive, $80 case with PSU... and that's using on board graphics, we're already over budget, and with no DVD drive (not really essential with a USB drive) and no OS. I'm really looking forward to this feature, but I'm nervous of your ability to pull it off. I do think that's a lot more likely at the $900 price point than the $700 one.]]>Mar 12th 2010 8:34AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
I've found a few PCs with an empty PCI-E slot and Windows 7 pre-installed for $300. In fact I think I'm going to just pick one up from Best Buy, uninstall the crap ware, and call it a day.]]>Mar 12th 2010 8:35AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/
the gateway DX4831-01e goes for 550 at best buy
+
400 dollar ceton card

gives you a 4 tuner media center system with a 1tb hard drive and 6 gigs of ram. Also the i3 chipset mother board combo here supports bitstreaming for a blu ray player later.
for 950

as compared to the tivo premiere

which is about 500 bucks with 3 years of service 300 if you pay upfront (466.20 if you pay monthly)

gives you pretty much 800 bucks up front for a tivo xl premiere.

I'll be paying the 160 dollar delta to get the extra two tuners and the ability to add in a blu ray player with bitstreaming in a few months for 60 bucks.

The x factor is of course ownership of the 360 which drives the cost up another 150- 200 bucks if you don't have one.]]>Mar 10th 2010 11:09AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/Mar 10th 2010 5:00PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/dont we all.
Not sure if any of the guys have a review copy of the quad tuner card but it looks to me at least that ceton will in fact hit their launch date of March 31 which is never a given with regard to media center products (ie the dish network media center plugin) . As proof Cannon PC recently had the ceton card listed up for pre order. It was down within a few hours but they did have it up which leads me to believe they received some kind of communication from Ceton. I'm pretty certain that engadgethd is planning to review the quad tuner card since theyve talked about it so much in the past. ]]>Mar 10th 2010 10:48PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/09/engadget-hd-podcast-182-03-09-2010/Mar 12th 2010 7:00AM