High Tech Household

Microsoft has recently announced that it is phasing out some versions of Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Vista as of July 13, 2010.  Specifically, if you have any edition of Windows 2000, Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) or the original release of Windows Vista without any service packs (Release to Manufacturing or RTM) then support is dropping for your operating system.

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I have been wanting to build a Home Theater PC for a while, but was waiting for the launch of Windows 7 to do so.  When Windows 7 was released on October 22, I started researching what I would need to assemble my own Home Theater PC, and began ordering parts.  Last week, the parts arrived for building my home theater PC using Windows 7 Media Center.  I spent a good deal of Friday night and Saturday putting it together and getting it ready for use.  By Saturday afternoon, I had the PC up and running and connected to my television.

Windows 7 Media Center has a lot to offer as a Home Theater PC (or really, a Home Entertainment PC), including Recording and Playback of TV (DVR-functionality), Movies and Netflix, Hulu and Internet TV, Music and Photo Libraries, and more, all controlled via a remote control and optional wireless keyboard.  Media Center also supports hardware (called Media Center Extenders) that allow you to stream your Media Center content to other TVs throughout your home.  What sets Media Center apart from just a traditional DVR or TiVo is the extensibility.  Third party developers, enthusiasts, and hobbiest programmers can create programs that extend the functionality of Windows 7 Media Center, much like people write apps for smart phones such as the iPhone and Google Android.   Best of all, it comes included in all editions of Windows 7.

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I woke up Sunday morning and noticed that my PC’s clock was an hour behind.  This is due to the law that passed a couple of years ago which extended daylight savings time by several weeks.  Prior to 2007, this past weekend would have been the week that clocks were changed back by one hour.  With the law change, they moved Daylight Savings from the last Sunday in October to the first Sunday in November (I really don’t see what difference one week makes, but that’s another story…).  I had installed a patch a couple of years ago on my PC to handle this event, but it didn’t seem to take effect this year.

Turns out this issue affects some, but not all, PCs (go figure).  Even if you use Windows Update regularly to install patches, you may experience this problem.  If you do, you need to install a patch to “fix” daylight savings time on your PC.  The patch can be downloaded for XP, Vista, and Windows Server 2003 and 2008 here (Windows 7 has the fix pre-installed).  Be sure you select your correct version of windows to download, and simply run the executable to update your PC.  If you are using Microsoft Outlook to manage your calendar, you should also install the Outlook patch if you have not already.

The next major version of Microsoft’s desktop operating system is being released into the wild soon, October 22nd to be precise. This will be a very important release for Microsoft, who have experienced increasing pressure recently from Apple on the high-end and Linux netbooks and nettops on the low-end.

So, whether you’re upgrading from Vista, you’ve been holding out since XP, or you’re thinking about jumping (back?) to Windows from Mac or elsewhere, there’s a lot to take in about this latest OS from Microsoft.

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Last month, Brian wrote about his Home Theater PC which he created for streaming web content such as Hulu and YouTube to his television.  I have actively been planning to build my own Home Theater PC for some time, but I had hoped to build in DVR functionality so that I could use my PC as a TiVO-like box, which I could then use to store and burn recordings of shows and movies that I enjoyed.

It turns out that Microsoft Windows Vista included just such functionality through the Windows Media Center, a free Windows extender that allows you to run your media (whether audio, video, or pictures) by use of a remote control, and includes an Electronic Program Guide and ability to DVR, as long as you have a tuner card to which you can connect your incoming TV signal.  However, because of restrictions imposed by the Cable industry, digital cable signals are often scrambled, and require a cable box to be able to change channels.  Most digital cable cards have no ability to descramble these channels, making them useless for any digital cable setup.

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