Hello everyone! I've grown tired of wireless streaming through the three floors of my 100 year old home, so I'm moving my PC down into the basement theater. Now when I say theater, I mean I have a screen, a projector I got for free, and a surround sound system. This is by no means going to be awe-inspiring, but I'm tired of the buffering of wireless streams, and I can't really think of fishing wires through 100 year old plaster walls. I have an HP dc5850 microtower with an EVGA 1GB 9500GT card in it. I also have two 500GB HDDs, and another 808.88GB HDD (long story). The PC already has Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit along with some other ripping, processing, and burning programs. I just downloaded Media Browser yesterday and am looking to move everything this weekend. I already have the quick start guide from the Media Browser site and will follow that to at least get going. My questions are mainly involving what comes after that.
1. I already have k-lite codecs installed on the machine, would I do better to remove them and install the "Shark" pack I have read about?
2. As far as playback goes, I assume that it's done through WMC, so I have no use for VLC any more?
3. Themes, man do some of them look sweet! Is there a list of the most popular/updated themes with screenshots for perusal? Any that are preferred to others from personal experience?
That is what I can think of off-hand. Again, my equipment is beyond modest more towards mediocre: 1024 x 768 projector, hand me down receiver and speakers. So, I'm not trying to set the world on its ear here, but we do have people over a lot for movie nights, and I'm just looking for a way to simplify the browsing, selecting, and experience for the end-user a.k.a. my wife and other friends and family. I was using the 360 in the basement to stream from my PC on the second floor office, but the constant pausing/buffering became maddening. I guess I really just want to make sure that my PC will do a serviceable job, until I can build a new HTPC and upgrade the projector.
Sorry for the novel! Thanks in advance for any feedback!
1. I already have k-lite codecs installed on the machine, would I do better to remove them and install the "Shark" pack I have read about?
2. As far as playback goes, I assume that it's done through WMC, so I have no use for VLC any more?
3. Themes, man do some of them look sweet! Is there a list of the most popular/updated themes with screenshots for perusal? Any that are preferred to others from personal experience?
That is what I can think of off-hand. Again, my equipment is beyond modest more towards mediocre: 1024 x 768 projector, hand me down receiver and speakers. So, I'm not trying to set the world on its ear here, but we do have people over a lot for movie nights, and I'm just looking for a way to simplify the browsing, selecting, and experience for the end-user a.k.a. my wife and other friends and family. I was using the 360 in the basement to stream from my PC on the second floor office, but the constant pausing/buffering became maddening. I guess I really just want to make sure that my PC will do a serviceable job, until I can build a new HTPC and upgrade the projector.
Sorry for the novel! Thanks in advance for any feedback!
