Welcome to the all new TGB! Introduce yourself here!

[makryger]

Welcome, David. Not sure how much research you've done, but I'll just warn you that time warner does seem to copy-protect a lot of their content (if not all?), so you more than likely won't be able to just copy recorded tv from one computer to another. It also means you may not be able to stream recorded tv using remote potato. But getting an official media center extender (like the echo) will allow you to spread your content throughout your house. You may also be interested in trying to get a MoCA network in your home, especially since the echo will work with MoCA instead of ethernet. May be an easier option than rewiring your entire house. The last thing I'll remind you of as a TWC customer, is that I believe they require Tuning adapters as well. Basically another small box that you'll plug into the HTPC with the infiniTV in it so it can send the message to TWC to change the channel.

[rjairam]

Hi all,

My name is Ryan.

I am from Trinidad and Tobago originally but now I live in somewhat rural Northwestern New Jersey. Married with 3 kids (triplets, actually).

Media center started as a curiosity in my wife's Windows Vista PC and now with Windows 7 and a Ceton InfiniTV 4 it is our whole home entertainment platform. I was a regular participant over at the "other" site similar to this one.

I find myself mostly using OS X and other Unix based operating systems, except for my media needs.

I have been around technology as long as I can remember since my dad bought us a Commodore 64 back in the 80s.

My day job is at a cable TV network based in New York and I am also an avid amateur radio operator.

[StumpyBloke]

G'day Ryan, and welcome!

[shadetree]

Hello Mates,

I'm new to Windows Media Center, have always used a Linux distro for my HTPC needs. Have moved to Windows 7 and all is almost working brilliantly.

Much information here to read so I'll be busy lurking..lol.

G'day

[STC]

Ah welcome to you. I hope MC will do it's duty for you!

[blammo]

Hi all, Andy here and I've been using MC now for just under a year having bought an Asus EB1501P having tried to persuade my wife that a nettop + freeview was a better (and cheaper) option than Virgin+. Once she saw that it would record TV, play DVDs, play photo slideshows and home videos, plus iPlayer and Skpye she (grudgingly) agreed it was worth having another computer in the house!

Only just discovered this site today having googled "windows 8 + HTPC". I had high hopes for MC in Win8 but looks like I'll be sticking with Win7 for a good while yet.

[makryger]

Interesting google search! but whatever brought you here, welcome. This is a great place to offer and ask for help, as well as geek out over new tech, praise microsofts great dvr software while at the same time , complain about microsofts shortcomings.

[blammo]

Interesting google search! but whatever brought you here, welcome. This is a great place to offer and ask for help, as well as geek out over new tech, praise microsofts great dvr software while at the same time , complain about microsofts shortcomings.

Cheers for the welcome. I think what surprised me about MC when I started using it properly was just how good it was as a DVR.

[Jade10145]

Hi All,

I'm John from MA. I have been fasinated with AV most of my life. I used to literally go around the neighbor hood looking for old amps and speakers that people were throwing out so I could couple them all togther to make a ridiculously loud stereo (and as a by product urine of my mother lol)

As the years have past I have started a fasination with computers and especially networking. It just blows me away how all the pieces come together and how we are able to access so much information from anywhere in the world. And how most of this is invidible to the end user.

With all that being said, an HTPC was a perfect combanation of AV, Networking and computer technology.

My knowledge level is enough to get me in trouble. I know more from the prespective of of the front end then the nitty gritty of programs and hardware. I do strive to learn more and this website definitley looks like a resource for that.

I have already built my first HTPC with the help of people from this site, and at this point I am looking to make it do more. I am loving being able to record LIVE TV automatically. I travel a ton for work and its great to be able to watch my shows while i'm on the road.

I look foward to visiting and thank everyone for the help!

[makryger]

Welcome to the community, John. I think we all suffer from a little bit of "enough knowledge to get ourselves into trouble". I, for one, have gotten my HTPC into somewhat of a steady-state where I don't really feel the need to change much, resulting in a great experience overall. Now, if only the rest of the technological world would reach steady-state! But in the meantime, we look forward to hearing about your experience, and offering/receiving help in whatever area that needs help!

[holidayboy]

I keep missing this thread, welcome John - and all of our other recent sign ups!

I'm guessing that we all have some terrible tinkering stories - I know I've broken my setup more than once whilst trying a tweak or two

[Jade10145]

I keep missing this thread, welcome John - and all of our other recent sign ups!

I'm guessing that we all have some terrible tinkering stories - I know I've broken my setup more than once whilst trying a tweak or two

Holy cow are you right on the money about tinkering. One time I ended up disabling the network interface on my HP Mediasmart. I don't even remember what I was trying to do. The problem was that the HP Mediasmart doesn't have a monitor or KB/mouse, the only way to access it is thorugh RDP or having to buy an adapter for a monitor. So essentially I ended up locking myself completley out of it!

One thing that I have learned from my tinkering, try to keep a change log. Key word is "try" lol.

[xegroeg]

hi. i'm xegroeg from chicago. i've been running mc since vista, which i first installed after an orginal xbox running xbmc gave up the ghost. i've tried just about every media center software under the sun and settled on windows media center since it was and has been the best avail. i work in IT and have passion for all things tech (and ui). i'm a bit of a dreamer/futurist and spend a lot of spare time trying to turn my daily life into a office labs future vision video.

[STC]

Welcome!

[keithge]

Hello, Keith from new Jersey just across from Philadelphia, Pa. I have just completed my HTPC build and am very happy with it so far. I have been using WMC for a short while on a Zotac mini PC which is used in the bedroom. I am an avid Phillies fan and also enjoy EPL soccer.

[STC]

Welcome Keith!
'Tis a good place to be, here

[Crash2009]

My name is Ken, and I too suffer from the "know just enough to be dangerous" syndrome. In April of this year 2012, Comcast did an audit in our neighborhood and figured out that they had been giving me 100 bucks worth of cable for only 20 per month. To add insult to their injury they had been doing this for 5 years. Long story short, they shut the leak and are now giving me what I pay for. Originally, I thought I was going to build some kind of computer that would give me everything back that was taken away during the audit. While researching the cable theft idea I stumbled into you guys and your HTPC's. It looked like more fun than a jail cell so I jumped in. Recently I read the top ten wrong ways to build an HTPC and I must admit I am right up there with the worst of them. Mistakes aside though, I now have a reliable machine and am currently enjoying my Ceton Infini4 PCIe.

If you ever get up into the U of M area give me a call and I will take you fishing for Largemouth Bass and Northern Pike.

[CojakSilverBack]

Figure its about time I introduce myself
My name is Brian I live in Denver, CO with my new wife we got married back in May.
I had started working on my media center conversion about a year and a half ago but had a bit of a set back when my old place had a direct strike by lightning and toasted everything I owned. Been rebuilding since and making an honest go if it after we moved to our new apartment.

Server:
Chassis: NORCO RPC-4020 4U Rackmount Server Chassis w/ 20 Hot-swappable SATA/SAS Drive Bays - OEM
Mobo: ASUS KGPE-D16 SSI EEB 3.61 Server Motherboard Dual Socket G34 AMD SR5690 DDR3 1600/1333/1066/800
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model (8 x 4GB)=32GB
PROC: AMD Opteron 6128 Magny-Cours 2.0GHz Socket G34 115W 8-Core Server Processor OS6128WKT8EGOWOF x 2
Hard Drives: Seagate Barracuda ST3000DM001 3TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive x 5 for main RAID 5 have a bunch of old drives from old server that I am migrating the data from
SSD: had one in there for the OS but after it flopped 3 times decided to stick OS on a spare WD Black 640 I had Laying around.
DVD drive: some generic slim drive
RAID Card: HighPoint RocketRAID 2680 SGL PCI-Express x4 SATA / SAS Controller Card x2

Router:
Linksys E4200 IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n, IEEE 802.3/3u/3ab Maximum Performance Dual-Band N Router

TV Tuner:
Silicon Dust HD Homerun PRIME 3 tuner with a Motorola cable card from Comcast

Xbox 360

Media Center:
Case: Antec MicroFusion Remote 350 Micro ATX Media Center / HTPC Case
MOBO: ZOTAC GF9300-I-E LGA 775 NVIDIA GeForce 9300 HDMI Mini ITX Intel Motherboard
RAM: Crucial Ballistix 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model
PROC: Intel Pentium E5300 Wolfdale 2.6GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Desktop Processor BX80571E5300
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD2500AAJS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Blue Ray: ASUS Black Blu-ray Drive SATA Model BR-04B2T - OEM
Keyboard: Logitech diNovo Mini Black Bluetooth Wireless Mini Keyboard
Remote: Logitech Harmony One

Desktop:
Case: COOLER MASTER Stacker 830 NVIDIA Edition NV-830-KKN4-GP Black ( Green Mesh) Aluminum ATX Full Tower Computer Case
MOBO: ASUS M4N98TD EVO AM3 NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI ATX AMD Motherboard
RAM: OCZ Gold 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Low Voltage Desktop Memory Model OCZ3G1333LV8GK
PROC: AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Deneb 3.2GHz Socket AM3 125W Quad-Core Processor HDZ955FBGMBOX
GPU: GIGABYTE GV-N470D5-13I-B GeForce GTX 470 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive x 2 Raid 1

[STC]

Wow that's an inventory! Welcome. Nice slice of life told there.

[aeblank]

Recently I read the top ten wrong ways to build an HTPC ...

Can you post a link?

[Moderator Edit: Link moved into its own thread]

http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... f=7&t=2358