.net and other interesting dev stuff in PA

Thankfully, my UltimateTV's tuner started to die, and my wife got annoyed enough to let me replace it with an Windows XP Media Center 2005 box.  I had certain operational parameters, however.

First, since it was going in the family room, it could not look like a PC.  That's grounds for unending huffing.  So I looked around and found that the HP z545 Digital Entertainment Center looked like a stereo component, fit in the cabinet where the UltimateTV box was, and had dual tuners.  Recording one show while watching another, as well as recording two shows when we weren't watching TV, was high on her list of requirements.  Did I mention that it couldn't look like a PC?

I got the unit installed, and after dealing with getting two DirecTV receivers set up to replace the UltimateTV receiver, everything worked as planned.  Sort of.  It definitely worked much better after installing the update to Windows XP MCE 2005 from the Windows Update site.

With the included 200Gb HD, and the removable 160Gb "Personal Media" drive, it's got a lot more room for recorded TV than the UltimateTV box had.  Of course, now I'm storing music, pictures, etc. on disk, so it'll be interesting to see how usage works.  Since it has several USB 2.0 connections on the back I can easily add more external storage, too.  Didn't attempt to open up the box (yet), as my wife was "supervising" the installation to ensure that the new unit didn't somehow get changed to look like a PC.

I did find that the airflow in the stereo cabinet is inadequate for the heat this thing pumps out, and I'll have to pull the cabinet out and cut some holes in the back and possibly install a small fan to pull out the air in it.  I need to find some mountable 120V, very quiet fan to do this.

One other thing that is an issue, unfortunately, is that the remote doesn't have support for additional devices.  That means I still need another remote to turn the TV on/off, and another for the A/V receiver. I did hear good things about the Logitech Harmony 860 Media Center remote, and will probably get myself one for Christmas.  This should allow me to have just one remote for my wife to use, which seems to be important.

This is all just in time for Christmas, and I've got Christmas music CD's and downloaded music, set up by genre, which my wife loves.  I didn't show her yet that I've got most of my digital pics of family holidays and trips on the box, and will spring that on her as slideshows (with music) when the family comes over for Christmas.

Overall, this is a good setup.  Since we don't have HDTV (another edict says that I can't get one of those set's until I start, and finish, a planned basement), I'm not overly concerned by the limits in WinXP MCE 2005 for this.  Or is it limits in the hardware to support it?  Chicken, egg, whatever.  I do wish DirecTV made PC card based tuners, or someone did, so I wouldn't need the desktop boxes.  For that matter, if such tuners were made it would be cool if HD versions were also made, making upgrades that much easier.  Wishlists...

I did download the MCE 2005 SDK to see what it would be like to write utilities for MCE, and if I get a chance to play with that I'll post some findings.  I'd love to be able to do some stuff with the channel guide.  For instance, a filter to find all new TV show premieres, or first runs of movies, or search-based scheduled recordings for when you know a new show is coming, but it's not going to be on for a few months (example: Earthsea on SciFi Channel, which recently showed up in listings).  UltimateTV could do the latter, but neither of the two former.  It would also be cool to be able to select what ratings I wanted to search for.  With no kids yet, I don't particularly care about G-ratings :).

In any case, I'll find it interesting if we can indeed program against the channel guide, but it'll probably take me a little time to just figure out the correct way to work with the UI.  I have to be dead careful, since this is a "production" box!