Media Center vs Cable Box - Part 1

A video comparison between using Media Center on a regular 4x3 television and using the DVR offered by the local cable company. If you have ever been curious about how your experience would change by moving to Media Center then check out this series of videos.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Media Center
• Cable
• MCE
• Extenders
• Windows 7
• TV

[PartikEwing]

Can you tell me what kind of a PC i would need to set this up myself ? Where I live Twc is the only option I have the same cable box you use in the video. Can I use my existing PC and the external tuner/card that I seen you show in different video ?

[aechevarria76]

At the time I made this video you needed a special OEM computer to use Cable Card and get all of your cable channels.

Now you can use any Windows 7 PC. There is a tool in Media Center that will check if your PC can handle cable card and if so make it Cable Card compliant. From that point you just need to add the tuners. Currently there is only 1 cable card tuner for sale made by ATI but that will soon change and tuners that are A LOT better will be hitting the market in the next 3-4 months.

[aechevarria76]

It's Windows 7 with Cable Card. If I had regular analog TV tuners it would be faster.

[MajesticMike007]

What operating system are you using for your media center?

My XP media center changes channels much faster then my cable box and much faster then your media center channel changer.