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February 2009 - Posts
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With the new features of the 2008 TV Pack, I couldn't resist buying a new media center from a cutting edge OEM like S1Digital who was the first to ship systems with the new update, and according to Paul I was the first to get one. I plan on writing (at least) a couple posts on this system, in this one I won't be going into any details on the new TV Pack update. This is a kind of a sticky situation, Microsoft OEM is saying it's OK for me to discuss all the new features since I've purchased a machine with it loaded but the Media Center Beta Team (I am on the beta) has asked that I not until my NDA expires on 9/3, so I've decided that I like testing Media Center and wish to remain on the beta's I'm on so I'll wait until my NDA is released before going into any details. So lets start with the system specs. Paul was great to work with and let me customize some of the components of their Platinum Edition Media Center. In addition to the default specs (which are quite good to begin with), I went with a Quad Core 9300 CPU, added 2GB of RAM for a total of 4 and got Vista Ultimate instead of Home Premium. Disk wise I went with 2 500GB drives in a Raid 0 (striped disks) for a total of 1TB. For the tuners I got 2 internal Digital Cable Tuners, I'll go into more detail on my tuner setup in a later post. I just went with the default DVDRW drive as all of our Blu-ray and HD-DVD viewing is done on standalone players in our home theater, this machine is in the living room. The system has an e-SATA port so I could easily add a SATA HD-DVD/Blu-ray combo drive later on if needed. The system took about a week and a half to get to me after I ordered it, I did the cheap ground shipping which was 4 days of that time. The system arrived in perfect condition. I hooked the system up in my office to get everything configured, the first time you boot the system it runs through the final steps of the image deployment and the Vista OOBE wizard which took about 15 minutes. I'll detail out my setup in a later post, but I've had the system in the living room replacing my Velocity Micro CineMagix Grand Theater system since Saturday and it's been solid as a rock. Look for my next post after 9/3 where I'll get into all the details of my setup and the TV Pack update.  
More unboxing pictures are available here.
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So it's been about a month since my S1Digital Media Center arrived and I couldn't be happier with it. Like every other review I've read about their systems this thing is just rock sold! I meant to get this post written sooner but IKE had other plans for me, including no power for a week! In my last post I said I'd go into some detail into my tuner setup. The machine shipped with 2 Internal CableCard tuners, I added 2 additional external CableCard tuners and 2 HDHomeRun units, for a total of 8 tuners. This is working quite well. The HDHomeRun tuners are setup as QAM tuners, natively supported by the TV Pack upgrade, no more tricking Media Center into thinking the signal is ATSC. The TV Pack only automatically adds QAM channels that also have their station ID in the stream, scanning found 6 here in Houston. Adding the missing channels is pretty easy, I used a combination of the SiliconDust Channel list, and where I found discrepancies I fired up VLC and went to zap2it.com to identify the channel by what was currently playing. After I got all the channels I wanted added I combined them with the guide listings I already had for that channel from my CableCard tuner. Doing so eliminated the duplicate channels that I found annoying in my last setup (cablecard and hdhomerun also) where for example I would have two HD NBC's one on the CableCard tuners and one on the HDHomeRun tuners, now I have 1 HD NBC and Media Center can use any of the 8 tuners that are free to record the show. Hardware wise I've only added an LG HD DVD/Blu-ray reader via the e-Sata port by using the Addonics Zebra enclosure, I only wish the Intel e-Sata chipsets supported port multipliers so I could run more then one device off the e-Sata connection. Software/Plugin wise I'm running mControl, Total Media Theater, myTV, My Movies, and HeatWave all of which run just fine with the TV Pack. myTV has a small issue currently where after a show ends or you press stop you're left at a frozen frame of what was playing and going back to play a 2nd show crashes the app but I'm sure this will be worked out in the next beta release. Additionally I've used MC Menu Mender to create a custom strip with all my plugins on it and removed them from the other strips. Also removed the sports strip as I'm not a sports fan. I've also have 2 DMA-2100's, 1 DMA-2200 and an Xbox 360 hooked up to the system, and even with them all fired up and the machine recording all of mine and the wives shows the box doesn't break a sweat. So anyone looking for a true Media Center with official TV Pack support from an awesome OEM give S1Digital a serious look before you buy elsewhere. (if you don't want/need official tv pack support hit me up, I'm selling my old velocity micro cablecard media center.) ; ) I think since my blog is called "Mike's Digital Home" in my next post I'll start detailing everything I've got going on here from home automation to homeserver to a dedicated home theater room and how they're all integrated together.
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I usually don't post things other bloggers post, but just in case someone reads my blog and not Ian's (fat chance I know) I thought I'd pass this along. Enjoy! Media Center Evolution
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So way back in September I wrote a review on my new S1Digital machine which is the core of my connected home. That machine (which is still awesome!) is directly connected to my living room television (as seen below).
 Not much with the system has changed since the review except I've installed Media Browser and SecondRunTV. I'll do a review on those two plugins in a separate post. In this post I want to cover my favorite room, my dedicated home theater. When we moved into this house back in December of 2007, the room looked pretty bad. 
The previous owners were using it as a studio/practice room for their band. As you can tell they didn't really care what it looked like and honestly either did I, I was just happy that we found a house that my wife and I both liked and that it had a room I could create the home theater I've always wanted in it. I did all the work myself, with the exception of installing the drywall. The project took me around 3 months of working as much as I could (and reading as much as I could on the avs theater design forums) on the weekends to complete. While it's not the most lavish or best looking home theater out there, I love it and am pretty proud of the work I did. 
So what alls in it? From a Media Center standpoint not a lot. It took me awhile to do bring myself not to put in another full blown CableCard Media Center PC, at the end of the day it just didn't make sense. I wanted to be able to view my recorded TV anywhere in my home, and by putting in a 2nd CableCard machine I wouldn't be able to view what the 1st machine had recorded in my theater or what the theater PC had recorded in the rest of the house because of the DRM all CableCard recordings are wrapped in. So I opted for a DMA-2100 extender instead. This was a good choice and one I'm still happy with almost a year later. I also wanted the ability to bitstream all the new HD audio codecs to a receiver, which at the time a PC couldn't do so I opted for separate HD DVD and Blu-ray players. The overhead cans and the lights in the equipment room are both wired with Insteon In-LineLinc dimmers and controlled via a KeypadLinc dimmer on the wall, an IRlinc controlled by a Harmony 1000 remote and the mControl Media Center plugin. Complete Equipment List: - Brilliant White 126" Carada Criterion Series Screen
- Mitsubishi HD4900 1080p LCD projector
- Onkyo TX-SR705 7.1 channel receiver
- Toshiba HD-A35 HD DVD player
- Samsung BD-P1400 Blu-ray plaer
- Linksys DMA-2100 Media Center Extender
- Xbox 360 (used for gaming only)
- Logitech Harmony 1000 touch screen remote
- (2) Polk Audio Monitor 60 floor standing speaker
- (1) Polk Audio PSW110 powered subwoofer
- (1) Polk Audio Monitor CS1 center channel speaker
- (4) Polk Audio Monitor 40 bookshelf speaker
- (2) Insteon In-LineLinc Dimmer
- (1) Insteon KeypadLinc Dimmer
- (1) Insteon IRLinc receiver
- Linksys SLM2008 8 port gigabit switch
- Linksys WRT110 wireless router (used as an access point for my laptop or Zune)
- Zune Home A/V Pack
- APC AV H10BLK Home Theater 1000VA Power Filter and Conditioner
- Row of 5 Producer Collection Leather Home Theater Seats
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Thanks to Richard for tweeting about this. A member of the green button community has released a utility for Windows 7 Media Center that many of has been waiting for for quite some time, the ability to have channel logos in the guide as opposed to just the name of the station in text. One of the best features of the utility is that it has an Auto Populate button that will do most of the dirty work for you, while also giving you the option of using your own images. I ran this against one of my test boxes hooked to digital cable tuners and the auto populate feature was able to automatically add 176 channel logs to my guide and it looks great! For more information and to download the utility check out this post on the green button:
http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/thread/333270.aspx
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My favorite Media Center OEM has updated their product line and I gotta say they all look awesome! 
I thought I would share with you some exciting new product announcements and updates. It's been way too cold for us to venture outside here in NJ, so we've been burning the midnight oil designing a new Media Center and updating all our other ProLine Series solutions for 2009. First, I'm proud to announce the launch of the new P500 Media Center. The P500 builds upon S1Digital's already successful line of ProLine Series Media Centers and provides customers with powerful features in a high-end, custom designed chassis. Available with up to four CableCard HDTV tuners plus an unencrypted QAM/ATSC tuner, Blu-ray movie playback with Profile 2.0 features, movie archiving capabilities, and three terabytes (2TB useable) of internal RAID-5 storage. The P500 supports HDMI (with 5.1 channel audio), DVI and component video outputs as well as digital optical and 7.1 channel analog audio. The P500 is powered by Intel's latest Core 2 Duo CPU, P45 motherboard and runs Vista Ultimate. RS-232 control is available via the built in serial port.
 The P500 was designed from the ground up to look great out on display. Primarily designed for the living room, the P500 can also support up to three zones of audio and video streaming (via Extenders or other Media Centers). I'm also excited to announce that we've refreshed the other ProLine Series Media Centers with additional features and new hardware to bring more powerful digital entertainment capabilities to you. - S800 Media Server - Updating the already powerful
 S800 Media Center Server with Intel's latest Core i7 CPU and Extreme Series DX58SO Motherboard, the S800 can handle demanding activities such as streaming multiple HDTV content around the house while recording multiple TV shows and playing Blu-ray movies simultaneously. The S800 supports six terabytes of hardware RAID managed storage with a 12 terabyte option planned shortly. - P600 Media Center - S1Digital's silent Media Center has been upgraded with a more powerful Intel P45 motherboard, two terabytes (1TB useable) RAID 1 storage and the video outputs have been upgraded to support HDMI (w
 ith 5.1 channel audio), DVI and component video. An unencrypted QAM/ATSC TV tuner is also included. - Media Center Mini Edition (Home Series) - The miniature MCME has been upgraded with Blu-ray playback capability, a more powerful CPU and motherboard (G45) and HDMI audio capabilities.
All ProLine Media Centers include as standard Blu-ray movie playback and storage with Profile 2.0 capabilities, Vista Ultimate with SP1 and TV Pack and support up to four CableCard TV tuners for watching and recording HDTV cable channels. In addition, S1Digital is offering a free upgrade to Windows 7, when released on all Media Centers, with the exception of the Mini Edition. Full details can be found on the S1Digital website.
ProLine Media Centers are now upgradeable with Soundpack, which provides HDMI 1.3a and 7.1 channel analog audio outputs with RCA connectors. The Soundpack option features support for Protected Audio Playback System (PAPS) and Advanced Access Content System (AACS) certification. S1Digital's Media Centers are capable of decoding Blu-ray movies that take full advantage of lossless digital audio formats such as Dolby® TrueHD and DTS-HD Master AudioT for the ultimate aural experience.
As if that wasn't enough, S1Digital's close partnership with Autonomic Controls enables S1Digital's Media Centers and Servers to be controlled via Crestron, AMX, RTI, HAI and PC based touchscreens over IP or RS232, including full two way feedback. But we're not resting on our laurels, even if we do see glimpses of warm weather between the snow flurries. We have some new storage solutions in the works as well as new multi-room audio options in the pipeline. Stay tuned for more! Hope you are well otherwise and of course, if you have any questions about anything at all, please don't hesitate to contact us. Paul Heitlinger, CEO and Founder S1Digital
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What is a RoomClient:SE?
Starting at $2249, the RoomClient:SE system is a single box that allows you to:
- Store and play DVDs, music, pictures & slideshows, videos, and TV** on-demand, instantly
- Archive 150+ DVDs with the standard system, or 230+ DVDs with the optional 1.5TB upgrade
- Easily watch any title on your TV & control it with the included IR remote!
Simplify your home entertainment! Get a RoomClient:SE today to upgrade and reduce the number of boxes & systems in your setup, as it can replace:
- A standard definition DVR
- A stereo / CD changer
- A DVD player & carousel
- A picture/camcorder video viewer/archiver
- An IPTV box
..and best of all - you can now control it all from a SINGLE remote! * * * · What makes the RoomClient:SE unique compared to other systems?
RoomClient:SE is the first VidaBox system offered at such a price point with most of the standard Media Center features that its larger cousins have. It has several unique features, including:
- Compact size: Approximately the size of a small shoebox, RoomClient will fit just about anywhere.
Perfect for dorm rooms, bedrooms, or cramped offices.
- Handsome Styling: The RoomClientT may very well become the first system that you will want
to show off to your friends and family. Its styling is worthy of attention!
- Near silent operation: System noise can be extremely - that's why the RoomClientT features
advanced cooling technology that provides near-silent operation. * * * · Looking to start with one system and add more later? No Problem!
Additional VidaBox systems, such as the SLIMv2, LUX, or even our new RackServers can be added into the setup at any time to support multi-zone distribution! No worries about having to throw out obsolete equipment - just grow your system as time passes - as you wish! * * * · What is the RoomClient:SE's interface like?
The RoomClient:SE features the same great software as its larger, higher-end cousins. Read about the on-screen interface and see snapshots by clicking here! * * * · How can I buy one?
For a short time only, you can purchase the RoomClient:SE by giving us a call at 516-730-7500, or on our eShop via a special link by clicking on the button below:
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