[tparikh4]

I found this out from slickdeals.net and it seems to be legit. Starting Jan 9th PST you can download a copy of Windows 7 on the Win 7 page that will be good until Aug 1st, 2009 for the first 2.5 million people.


Is anyone planning on doing this for their HTPC or maybe even already using Win 7, is the media center in Win 7 suppose to be any different and better then VMC?

 

[sethhorwitz]



Quote:
Originally Posted by tparikh4 /forum/post/15494258


I found this out from slickdeals.net and it seems to be legit. Starting Jan 9th PST you can download a copy of Windows 7 on the Win 7 page that will be good until Aug 1st, 2009 for the first 2.5 million people.


Is anyone planning on doing this for their HTPC or maybe even already using Win 7, is the media center in Win 7 suppose to be any different and better then VMC?

It's legit, except it's a beta version. It's free because it's going to be buggy as hell, and they want you to find the bugs to help them fix it for the release that will cost a few hundred bucks. You'll get updates as they fix them, but beta testing isn't for the weak of heart. I'd stay away from it on an HTPC. Downloading it for fun on a second desktop is another story.

 

[gorthocar]

I'm willing to give it a shot. But as I say this, Vista 64 has finally gotten to the point where it is relatively stable for me. I can go a few weeks without rebooting, and everything seems to be just fine, except that IE7 will crash once every few days.


If I had a W7 Media Center wish or two, I'd wish for proper Media Center integration of my Hauppauge HD-PVR. And I'd wish that W7 Media Center natively had Blu-ray playback with excellent disc compatibility and with full lossless audio support. At first glance, I don't see those listed on the W7 web page, but maybe I'm missing it.


Microsoft, please impress me.

 

[perpetual98]

The betas that are out there are quite stable actually, and some people are using them for their day-to-day HTPC duties. Do I suggest that? Heck no. I've got W7 on a laptop, and it's basically like Vista that has been tweaked. I don't care for the task bar, but I haven't messed with it that much to get used to it. If I can get the 7000 release (I've got 6956) I might play with it. It does seem to install faster than Vista, but the betas might not be full of bloat too. I'm running it on a Athlon x2 with 1GB of RAM and it seemed to be snappy. I couldn't play WoW on it though because of my proprietary video card.

 

[dan4081]



Quote:
Originally Posted by gorthocar /forum/post/15494340


I'm willing to give it a shot. But as I say this, Vista 64 has finally gotten to the point where it is relatively stable for me. I can go a few weeks without rebooting, and everything seems to be just fine, except that IE7 will crash once every few days.


If I had a W7 Media Center wish or two, I'd wish for proper Media Center integration of my Hauppauge HD-PVR. And I'd wish that W7 Media Center natively had Blu-ray playback with excellent disc compatibility and with full lossless audio support. At first glance, I don't see those listed on the W7 web page, but maybe I'm missing it.


Microsoft, please impress me.

Not to sidetrack to much, but IE7 has been crashing for me every couple days for a while now on both my computers. Never had this problem before maybe a month ago. I didnt know if anyone else had been having this problem until I read your post.


Any ideas on this?

 

[DeadmanInc]

IE8 on the pre-beta isn't much better... probably worse actually.

 

[rtapia]



Quote:
Originally Posted by dan4081 /forum/post/15494888


Not to sidetrack to much, but IE7 has been crashing for me every couple days for a while now on both my computers. Never had this problem before maybe a month ago. I didnt know if anyone else had been having this problem until I read your post.


Any ideas on this?

Download Firefox

 

[iatacs19]

I see it on my MSDN page, it's a BETA though... I guess we need to wait a bit for the RC.

 

[benjamin.r]



Quote:
Originally Posted by gorthocar /forum/post/15494340


If I had a W7 Media Center wish or two, I'd wish for proper Media Center integration of my Hauppauge HD-PVR.

I'm surprised no one is working on putting up a hack for this yet (to my knowledge). It's up to Hauppauge to deliver a driver for Win7 but I'm not entirely sure it's gonna happen anytime soon. I'm planning on installing the beta and trying to figure out a way to make it work with MC. Since H.264 support is built into MC, the only thing that is left to do is to tell MC how to use the HD-PVR with DirectShow, i.e. HD-PVR Capture Device -> HD-PVR Crossbar -> HD-PVR Encoder -> H.264

 

[jeffreydeng]

I am using Windows 7 Beta for several days The first thing I would like to find out is whether it solves issue related with Vista crash when waking up from sleep with ATI 4xxx cards. I haven't got there yet.


However I found that I can't install Deamon tools nor VCD. Anyone had success on that?


Add: Windows 7 is available at MSDN subscribe page and I am downloading it now. But I am sure that this is the same as that leaked in the Internet.

 

[TimBob5259]



Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffreydeng /forum/post/15496457


I am using Windows 7 Beta for several days The first thing I would like to find out is whether it solves issue related with Vista crash when waking up from sleep with ATI 4xxx cards. I haven't got there yet.


However I found that I can't install Deamon tools nor VCD. Anyone had success on that?


Add: Windows 7 is available at MSDN subscribe page and I am downloading it now. But I am sure that this is the same as that leaked in the Internet.

I just installed the leaked one yesterday. It hasn't been very stable for me so far. Only played with it for a couple hours though.


I didn't crash when waking from sleep with my 4870s and the ATI preview drivers. Although, for some reason, I could only sleep once. I sleep once, then wake up and it goes great. I try to sleep again and it starts going to sleep but my fans keep going and will not wake up. Have to reboot.


Media Center seems kind of slow also and froze up a lot on me.

I was able to use slysoft virtual clone drive.


I have a Technet subscription so will be downloading the real Beta tonight and reinstalling. Hopefully that will go better.

 

[IAM4UK]

All you brave W7 beta testers, thank you! Tell MS the product is only worthwhile if it makes HD media integral to the Media Center experience. That means bD and support for things like the fabled D* PCI DVR card...

 

[archer75]

I've been using Windows 7 since the 6801 build, and a couple of weeks ago I put on the 7000 build.

I'm not using it on my HTPC yet but I had no problem getting all of my various video formats playing on my desktop.


So far it's rock solid.


It uses the same driver model as vista so they all work. I just downloaded vista drivers for everything.

So far all my apps I have work on it.


But again, I have not set it up for HTPC use. I supposed since WHS has a backup of my WHS box I could do that. But I haven't felt like taking the time.

 

[Derek K.]



Quote:
Originally Posted by IAM4UK /forum/post/15496585


All you brave W7 beta testers, thank you! Tell MS the product is only worthwhile if it makes HD media integral to the Media Center experience. That means bD and support for things like the fabled D* PCI DVR card...

the d* pc tuner is dead.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...6#post15262206

 

[sotti]

I hate NDAs

 

[gorthocar]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Derek K. /forum/post/15497089


the d* pc tuner is dead.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...6#post15262206

Dang, I didn't know that, but after a few years, I haven't been following it too closely. If I had a 3rd wish for W7 Media Center, I would have wished for the d* pc tuner. I'm willing to settle for proper integration in W7MC of the Hauppauge HD-PVR used in conjunction with my dish receiver.

 

[gorthocar]



Quote:
Originally Posted by sotti /forum/post/15497151


I hate NDAs

Although I'm sure everybody here would love to hear some hot information, it isn't worth the risk of breaking an NDA. It will all happen in good time. But if you want to PM me the information...

 

[Derek K.]



Quote:
Originally Posted by gorthocar /forum/post/15498220


Dang, I didn't know that, but after a few years, I haven't been following it too closely. If I had a 3rd wish for W7 Media Center, I would have wished for the d* pc tuner. I'm willing to settle for proper integration in W7MC of the Hauppauge HD-PVR used in conjunction with my dish receiver.

maybe the dish pc tuner is real. who knows?

 

[ksarauer]

I've been fairly impresed with W7. It's installed on my main computer that gets used daily by myself and the kids. The taskbar took a little to get used to, but I like it.


I do have some problems with WMP locking up. Overall, I would say it is faster than Vista, and fairly stable for the first beta build. Keep in mind this is more if an update than an upgrade, simular to Windows 95 and Windows 98.

 

[sotti]



Quote:
Originally Posted by ksarauer /forum/post/15500479


I've been fairly impresed with W7. It's installed on my main computer that gets used daily by myself and the kids. The taskbar took a little to get used to, but I like it.


I do have some problems with WMP locking up. Overall, I would say it is faster than Vista, and fairly stable for the first beta build. Keep in mind this is more if an update than an upgrade, simular to Windows 95 and Windows 98.

It's really even more similiar to windows 2000 to windows XP. Microsoft was out of their mind rolling out a new driver model to consumers. I started running win2K from RC1 forward (hmmmm dual celeron @450mhz w/ DX 7 support) and man were drivers a total nightmare until about 6mo after XP came out. Same thing here. By the time win7 is out the drivers mess has finially settled down.