Your HTPC...

Matt; thanks for sharing - have found this a really interesting read and an eye opener as I did not think anything was as good as VMC. I was wondering if you would perhaps take a screenshot of what your music looks like within this application. Also, the screenshot of the Shark, showing 'Moving Pictures' at the top is what manages your Movies? Is this the default plugin for Movies? I was going to install Media Portal a while back, but hesitated as the movies front end did not look as nice as My Movies on VMC.

VMC is still looking a bit dated; and the TV plugin for MP looks excellent and the whole black background, slick font are making me contemplate changing over. The Music and Video/Movies on VMC work really well, hence why I am curious whether the rest of MP is up to par (visually, as well as functionally).

Lastly, hope you don't mind, but what skin are you using? and does it come with or is that an additional download?

Thanks again! :)
 
The music section is a bit poor in the StreamedMP skin for MP, but hopefully will quickly improve :)

As default MP looks quite basic, but the skin i am using (StreamedMP) and the plugins this has (MyTVSeries, MovingPictures, etc...) make it a lot better.

Follow the link at the bottom of my first post for info on getting it setup.
 
Vertigo1 said:
VMC can't handle different tuners (with different program listings) without the TV Pack 2008 add-on. I've tried a fresh install with the TV Pack this week and it lasted 24 hours before a format as it's a bug-ridden heap of rubbish that just wouldn't work properly. If you need Freeview and Freesat, I'd stay clear of VMC.

Don't know about MP though, would be interested to hear if this is possible.
Click to expand...

I am suprised I have been running TV pack since it came out on two HTPCs and its worked fine with a satellite and dual freeview card. The only problem I came across was running the TV pack on the HTPC in the bedroom the PC would wake up at 10pm and 3am everyday, these were TV pack services going online for updates I wrote a batchfile to stop the services before the PC went to sleep.

I have been trying Media Portal which is better for TV Series/DVDs etc however not quite as good on the TV side. You can run freeview and satellite with MP using TV Server, this is the next thing I need to set up !
 
Matt said:
The music section is a bit poor in the StreamedMP skin for MP, but hopefully will quickly improve :)

As default MP looks quite basic, but the skin i am using (StreamedMP) and the plugins this has (MyTVSeries, MovingPictures, etc...) make it a lot better.

Follow the link at the bottom of my first post for info on getting it setup.
Click to expand...

Sorry, reread your post and spotted the link to the skin.

One last question, where do I find a download for the plugin Moving Pictures? I have searched through the Media Portal plugins but cannot find it? Probably doing something stupid. Can you post a link for me please.

Thanks again :)
 
Matt said:
No. Windows only.

XBMC works on Linux though :) But there is no TV PVR side to it. It's great at everything else though.
Click to expand...

Don't need pvr. Have sky +hd anyway.

Is it easy to setup?
It'll be mainly used for streaming dvd's of my main pc (vista) and If I can afford it playing blu-rays. Does it sort oout all the case pictures and info?
 
Main HTPC (used only for PVR, media playback, Memory map and a bit of internet access)

Antec 300 (ran out of space under the TV)
Phenon X4 9500 + Zalman 8500
MSI 790x-DS6
2Gb PC6400
Passive ATI 4850 via D-sub
Blackgold 3540 (DVB-T/DVB-S)
Auzentech X Mystique DDL
OCZ 64GB SSD
2*5K100 2.5" Travelstars
LG BR/HD-DVD Rom drive
Bluetooth KB+Mouse
MS MCE keboard
Silverstone 5.25" VFD display
Nesteq 550 semi-fanless PSU

All connected to a Samsung 40" 786 TV and Onkyo 605

Secondary HTPC (also tertiary Office PC)

Zalman 160 case
Athlon x2 6000 + stock HSF (surprisingly V quiet)
M2N-SLI
2GB PC8500
Passive 8600GTS
Terratec 2400i
Audigy 1
60gb 7K100 Travelstar + 3*160GB 2.5"
Pioneer DR-Rom + XBox HD-DVD drive
Yessico 550 fanless PSU

Connected to a dell 24" screen and 4.1 speakers.

Both have XP MCE, Purevideo, and Power DVD 7.

I did fiddle around with FFDshow, Core AVC etc and found it great when using a Dell 30" screen but the rest of the family couldn't tell the difference at normal TV distances. Also MCE with the remote can be used by all to reliably record TV (which is a miracle in itself).

Nearly every HTPC so far listed has got massive (and loud) 3.5" disks. Even my quietest 3.5" disk (WD Green RE2) are louder than the four 2.5" disks together in the second HTPC. They may be more expensive and slow but were the single biggest step in getting the noise down to the point where it did not distract from the media being played.
 
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Me again :)

Matt, I was wondering if you did anything special to get the picture to not be hidden under the menu to the left of the screen. Took a screen-shot with the same pic as you have on your first picture for comparison:



Compared to yours you can see the picture is partly hidden by the menu, not to the right of it. No big deal, I am just playing around with Media Portal.

Edit: I semi solved it, setting "Menu x position" to 200 in StreamedMP editor shrunk the menu, but didn't stop the menu hiding part the picture.

More edit: Thought of another way, Photoshop the pic to add the amount of pixels the menu takes up to the left side of the pic. Seems like a lot of effort though.
 
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Just recently built my new HTPC :)
Amd A64 X2 4850e (2.5ghz)
FoxConn A7GM 780G mobo
LG Blu-ray / HD-DVD Drive
Rosewill RG430 PSU (super high efficiency)
2 x Samsung 1TB Hard drives
2 x 2GB G-Skill DDR

Running XP and Media Portal with Moving Pictures.
Am using PowerDVD at the moment but might try KMPlayer but I've heard the audio output is not nearly as good?
 
Dangerous Dave said:
I am suprised I have been running TV pack since it came out on two HTPCs and its worked fine with a satellite and dual freeview card.
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Did you have to change channel numbers in the guide though?

I found everything was fine before I started doing this. Unfortunately, a large chunk of the Virgin guide that's downloaded has incorrect channel numbers so I have to change them. I've never had a problem with this on XP MCE or Vista without the TV Pack but with the TV Pack installed it just lost the plot. At one point I'd select channel 143 and it would change the STB to channel 142 but the guide would say I was on channel 145.
 
Vertigo1 said:
VMC can't handle different tuners (with different program listings) without the TV Pack 2008 add-on. I've tried a fresh install with the TV Pack this week and it lasted 24 hours before a format as it's a bug-ridden heap of rubbish that just wouldn't work properly. If you need Freeview and Freesat, I'd stay clear of VMC.

Don't know about MP though, would be interested to hear if this is possible.
Click to expand...

I just read that Windows 7 has all of the features of the TV pack. I'm going to give it a try today.
 
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