Assassin's Simple/Beginner HTPC Buying Guide - Page 356

Well I don't change them until the trial runs out and I have too. I didn't really take notes and don't remember which ones do what. What I do want is to be able to see the meta data, including the video and audio encoding used for each file... mostly.

I like Throgmortons' themes. Buying one of the bundles (either 4 or 5 themes) seems to be the best deal, I use the classic bundle.

Maybe a little known fact, but if you own multiple Throgmorton themes and run the Destiny theme (it's free) you can select different styles for each page from any of the themes you own. Ends up being the best from each theme.

Downside is you need to install all of Throg's themes and leave them installed even after the free trial runs out for Destiny to work.

NEO. I have been using it for last couple of months and it's pretty slick. Assuming your talking about MB?

Probably not alot of folks using landlines anymore, but found this nifty little add-on for WMC that displays callerID on the screen. Does anyone have any experience with this? Looks simple, just need a cheap modem/software to work.

http://w7callerid.com/

Yes, I'm using MB. Thanks. IDK if I've used that one yet.

Thanks for pointing this out, good deal on this case. I pulled the trigger on it, plus 50 bucks off if you sign up for their credit card. 20 bucks shipped. Can't beat that.

Snapped a photo of the scan lines I'm seeing. It is occurring all the time. HTPC is connected to Denon AVR-887 then to Sharp 60" LCD all via HDMI. Drivers were the freshest ones from Intel.com when I built the rig in December. Running i3-2120T, DH61AG mobo, 2x2gb Crucial RAM, Intel mSATA 40gb SSD. Seems pretty standard run-of-the-mill build.

Anyways, here are the scan lines that I am seeing:

I'll give that a shot tonight, thanks!

Black Friday Price:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Question,
Would it be possible to use a solid state drive for the operating system and strem audio and video from a server ?
Without the need of a large HD on the HTPC.

Yeah the main reason for a large drive in the HTPC is if you are using a tv tuner card for recording.

You cant go wrong with Subdued... and its free. It has an ungodly amount of customization. I'd be surprised if any 2 people using it had the exact same setup.

Assassin, I cant seem to figure out why my new HTPC keeps waking up. I've used the command prompt, lastwake... it gives me no reason. Should I try disabling WOL??

Some mb require bios level features for alarming to be turned off to prevent this. For example my giga board has this funky alarm trigger that had to be set to disabled..

I uninstalled the current driver and the PC rebooted that the scan lines were gone.... I installed the driver you recommended and the problem came back. Weird. So I started perusing the settings. Turns out the Refresh Rate was set to 59hz by default! I changed it to 60 and the lines went away! I'm pretty certain that was the original issue and that I could have just left the original drivers on there. Oh well, at least the problem is fixed.

Thank You for the quick reply.
One more question....
What software is good to play .vob files.
My movies are in that format in multiple files per movie.
What would play them seamlessly or should I convert them to something else ?

I am still deciding on a skin as well. I think I am using simplicity as of right now. I may have to look at subdued again.

FYI....I just tested the ESPN3 plugin and it looks like it is working again. Someone else want to try it out as well.

I am actually messing with caller id on MCE right now. I liked the feature with my Comcast STB -- not having to get up during a movie to see who is calling is nice. I am using the trial of TapiRex right now and I only sorta like it. I'll have to give this one a try.

This is the modem I purchased. It's cheap and has caller id. It works with TapiRex. It's on the modem list for W7CallerId too.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16825164003

Looks like a nifty feature for less than $20 for hardware and software. I don't have a "landline", but my Ooma VOIP works like one. The website insinuates that it would work....

Might be totally wrong here but with VOB files I thought you could just change the filetype to .mpg and they would play natively in WMC?

Andy

Has anyone seen this? A $25/$35 media solution running XMBC. This is VERY interesting.
http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/571

You could get one for each TV and use XMBC to play your movies for your media server or main HTPC if your movies are stored there.

Finally ordered the parts for build #2 (basic home office / lite-HTPC)! Went with the same mobo and RAM as build #1 [the Asrock H67M-ITX and 8 gigs of G.Skill Ripjaws], but put in a G620 instead of an i3 to offset the cost of the SSD I got for my OS drive. All these guts will go into my Rosewill case from build #1, and build #1's guts will go into an IN-WIN BP671 case that'll tuck nicely behind my bedroom TV.

Once build #2 is complete, I'll have a vintage ~2005 PC with no home. Here's where I'm hoping you can give me some opinions.

I am planning a H61/G530-based micro-ATX server/lite-HTPC build. I could put it into the case from my old/orphaned PC, and save the $ a case would cost... or I could buy a new case, and try to recoup some $ by selling the old PC.

The old PC is in a c.2005 Enlight mid-tower ATX case w/ ~400W power supply. It's got a Pentium 4 @ 3 GHz, MSI mobo, 2GB Corsair RAM, Radeon 9800 AGP video card, Sony DVD-RW drive, an 80 GB 7200 RPM Hitachi HDD. Any chance I can make $50 - $100 selling this old space heater, or should I just re-use the case?

If the motherboard had PCI Express instead of AGP, I'd almost consider popping a cheap video card in there and keeping it (even though it is a bit of a power hog).

Yes that does work - I had done it in the past.