Which version of Media Centre?

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allstarnz

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#14644 13-Jul-2007 14:51

If I was to install a Media Centre OS, what are your recommendations between something like Vista with Media Centre or Windows XP Media Centre 2005?

I'm using it on an Athlon 2000XP with a Radeon 9600 and 1GB RAM if that makes any diff.

Seems Vista is the way to lean at the moment.

sbiddle

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#77994 13-Jul-2007 14:56

Vista Media Centre is miles ahead of XP MCE. My only doubts would be your slow processor, it might be too slow for the system to be usable.

What exactly do you want to do?

bradstewart

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#77996 13-Jul-2007 15:07

I would agree with sbiddle. You would need a faster processor to get the most out of Vista

allstarnz

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#78008 13-Jul-2007 16:31

it'll be more for watching and recording television using a DVB-S card than anything. Not so much playing avi type files.

sbiddle

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#78021 13-Jul-2007 17:52

Use GB-PVR with Windows XP. As a PVR application it has a lot more features than Media Centre does and is a lot better suited to your machine specs.

allstarnz

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#78237 15-Jul-2007 21:15

thanks for the info.

ok, so i've had a play with a couple of bits of software.

It seems a lot transcode the transport stream into a variation of MPEG2, rather than simply ripping the TS to the hard drive. I have found (due to the PC being a bit old) that this puts a lot of stress on the PC, thus making choppy recordings.

Do either MythTV or Media Centre record the raw transport stream?? This seems to be a must for me.

Will give GB-PVR a try