Wow, lots of interest in MCE on Windows Vista
I’m a little surprised by the attention my post titled, Thoughts on MCE beta feedback, received. It was picked up by TechMeme, Gizmodo, eHomeUpgrade and a bunch of other MCE/Vista blogs. What’s most surprising to me is that I really just read the Windows Vista Beta 2 Product Guide and put all that enough into a bulleted list :). But really, it’s great to see some much excitement about Windows Vista (and some disappointment about what we’re not doing :P).
I will probably respond to some of your comments in the comments but some of the biggers themes are worth dealing with here (so in no particular order):
Q: What’s going on with HD-DVD?
A: I’ll address this in it’s own separate blog post next week.
Q: Do you believe that the Start Menu needs seven links to the Online Spotlight?
A: The Online Spotlight you see in the beta builds today is not the Online Spotlight that will ship with the product. When you see what we’re shipping I think you’ll find our Start Menu organization makes sense and provides the right balance between user needs and the service providers who want to extend your Media Center experience.
Q: The best use of a media center is hooked up to a lounge TV and operated with a remote… not a mouse. The lounge TV environment has to be the core design goal
A: We have the data about how many people use it hooked up to a TV with a remote control versus how many use it with a mouse. Since there’s a significant number of people using it with a mouse we absolutely need to invest in ensuring it works well at 2′.
Q: The old method of adding folders for each category of video, pic or music allowed for much more control of media discovery.
A: I’ll address this in it’s own separate blog post next week.
Q: Don’t forget about all those killer features that you have already developed but switch off for the non-US markets… i.e. the Movie portal feature… why oh why oh why, ohh hum i guess we will just have to keep tricking media center to switch it on and suffer no cover art for movies in the guide or non region 1 DVDs!!!
A: We’re working very hard to add metadata providers for non region 1 discs but it’s not an easy task licensing all that data and won’t be happening for Windows Vista.
Q: There were lots of questions/statements around DVD ripping, DVD streaming, etc.
A: DVD ripping is illegal in the United States. Enough said.
Q: All I want is an MCE that can recieve MPEG-4 DirecTV and stream to extenders all over the house.
A: Fortunately we announced at CES 06 that we struck a deal with DirecTV. Unfortunately, we can’t comment on the specifics about when this is happening.
Q: Will I be able to buy a cablecard reader off the shelf, a video card off the shelf and be able to playback [OCUR] content?
A: No.
Q: Can I stream that protected Digital Cable Tuner (formerly called OCUR) content to an Extender?
A: Yes
Q: When are you going to provide more information about Digital Cable Tuners (formerly called OCUR)?
A: Soon. I’m sorry that we can’t provide a firm date.
Q: DVB-S, DVB-S2, DVB-C support?
A: I honestly didn’t really know much about these standards and so I went and talked to our expert on them, got educated, and all we can say is that we won’t be supporting these in Windows Vista but they are standards that we are considering supporting in future releases.
Q: MCE is mainly targted for the US market. Why doesn’t MS care more about others?
A: We have been targeted at the US market but with Windows Vista are shipping into all the same locales and languages you will see us targeting features at specific markets.
Q: When is there going to be a solution for someone who owns more than one media center PC?
A: Great question, we were hoping to address this during the Windows Vista timeframe but it has been delayed until a future release. We definitely want to support those of you purchasing not just one, but two or three Media Centers.
Q: What about recording AM/FM radio and playing it back later?
A: This is definitely feasible but I’m guessing that the number of people who using AM/FM radio makes implementing the UI for this feature not worth the investment compared to other features. Sorry.
Q: What about a TV guide for Australia ?
A: Unfortunately due to licensing issues we are unable to offer EPG data for Australia.
Q: When will MCE support a video playlist?
A: Hopefully next release! In the meantime check out this post.
Q: Another feature would be the ability to have two different lineups like cable and satellite at the sametime
A: We are investigating supporting this in future releases.
Q: Why don’t you offer support for more than 2 HDTV cards?
A: It would sound like it’s due to the added development and test complexity. To be clear we do support up to four tuners. For instance, one configuration in the US could be two OCUR devices with two ATSC tuners.
Q: what is the record number of comments for one of your blog entries?
A: I don’t know :)
Q: Will it be possible to disable the “delete†option in Vista MCE?
A: There is a ‘Media Only’ feature which I’ll address this in it’s own separate blog post next week.
Have a good weekend. Talk amongst yourselves. And see you on Monday.
CableLabs just shot down a Vista sale for you guys (well, not “just”, but you know). I absolutely refuse to buy an entire new system because I’m being treated as a criminal, not a customer.
The only way I’ll be purchasing Vista now is if the DirecTV deal allows users to implement on their own machine, without having to buy a whole new one. But I don’t hold much hope….
Please surprise me.
[Quote]
Q: DVB-S, DVB-S2, DVB-C support?
A: I honestly didn’t really know much about these standards and so I went and talked to our expert on them, got educated, and all we can say is that we won’t be supporting these in Windows Vista but they are standards that we are considering supporting in future releases.
[/Quote]
Many comments about DVB-S / C / S2 and this is all you can say about it? Very, very sad. That means no HDTV support for the whole Europe market and no digital-TV support (beside the crappy DVB-T) also. It seems, MCE is just made for the US market. Very sad. Maybe its time for mediaportal?
I don’t live in Europe but your response the Bernhard quotes above is very dissapointing. The fact that a MCE PM doesn’t even know what the broadcast standards are outside the US is alarming. It shows a true lack of globalization goals.
Thanks for responding to my questions from the previous post. It is especially good to hear an official quote on the pre-built (Dell, HP) vs. home built OCUR. It is an unfortunate answer, but I am pretty sure it is more a decision of cable labs and the industry than it is of Microsoft. It just tells me to wait until Vista ships to buy an MCE machine.
I must say that your statement about DVB support is indeed alarming and it confirms my impression that MCE is a US market only product. Don’t misunderstand me I really love MCE, but since my cable company moved to digital cable (and here in Europe that almost always means the DVB-C standard , see http://www.dvb.org) MCE lost most of it charm unless I am willing to accept moving back to analog TV quality, and HDTV is even completely impossible with MCE… I was already getting very concerned by all the attention that something called cablecard (or ATSC) was getting, to be honest nobody outside the US cares about it but is seems the biggest thing in Vista :(. The frustrating thing is that the hardware is available (DVB-S/T/C cards and CI interfaces for encryption) but aside of the support for unencrypted DVB-T there is no support in MCE.
The saddest thing is that you and your marketing department don’t understand that you just missed the chance to make MCE a big hit in Europe. If there had been full DVB (with encryption) support in MCE it would have filled the gap at the introduction of DVB and HDTV here in Europe…. the first good settop boxes with recording capabilities are only now starting to appear and support for HDTV is still very poor….
Maybe it is worth to investigate the market outside the US a bit better.
Matt,
First and foremost, thanks a lot for your reply about the major concers we have with Vista MCE. It’s very important, at least for me, to have this two way communication with someone from the development team.
Unfortunatelly, you just confirmed the major concerns that were expressed in the previous blog. Most of the features that we were talking about (like “Softsled” kind of integration among different MCEs, DVB/ISDB support, media streaming, more places with the EPG or a way to load the data ourselves) will not be suported by Vista, but some of them in a future release. So indeed, Vista has no compeling features to a lot of people, specially those outside US that were expecting to see Vista solve a lot of frustrations that we have with the current MCE. Well, we will still be frustrated with Vista, and possible even more, since the features you exposed before, in my opinion, are low impact and the high impact improvements are to be expected in a future release.
Also worth mentioning that now that MCE and Vista are integrated, we might not even see this future release in at lease 2 years starting 2007 !! (even assuming future as next, witch might be wrong)
So, sorry to say, I know you guys worked a lot on this software, but from a customer outside US perspective, you just picked the wrong priorities (touch screen-domain join?!) or were forced to obey an irreal schedule and just transformed a possible good release into a mere cosmetic update.
I see no (absolutelly none) reason to upgrade to Vista and a LOT of reason not to (my xbox, SmartGuide, no hw upgrade needed, no sw upgrade costs and the list goes on).
Maybe, in a future release…. But then again, maybe not. How good will MediaPortal be in 2-3 years? You know, this little free software supports DVB-C, DVB-S….
I surelly hope you do have big sleaves and no “touch screen” feature hidden on them. But, with the features you just ruled out, I don’t beleive you still can surprise too many people with them.
Enjoy your weekend, you guys propably deserve to enjoy every second of a weekend. Week days are probably insane at development around now.
Matt - when MS made you a PM for the MCE application - have you considered that your not the right person for the job… Come on - I dont work in the television industry but I know what dvb-c dvb-s etc are… There is nothing in Vista that is going to compel anyone to upgrade from MCE05 - both products are a sham when it comes to globalisation. We are probably just lucky that PAL works by accident and not good design.
Your ignorance of the rest of the world standards and wanting of features just gives the impression of a 30 something guy who has never left the west coast of the USA. There is a big world out there….
Not only are you letting us all down with no new features, some of the concepts in User Interface really are questionable… Was it not Bill Gates who queried why an ipod had so few buttons yet the mce remote was full of them - the same is true for navigation around MCE and with a 16 * 9 screen real estate, why is the info not more logically laid out… Think of grandma wanting to watch CSI from a week ago - its not real intuitive for her… unless she came from a programming background.
Seriously Matt - I respect your blog, but read some forums outside of the green button and read some blogs outside of the MS ones, look at some newsgroups - either learn what the people and the community want or maybe move on to the excel team, and let someone who knows more or cares more take the reigns….
It is really a shame you posted about not knowing about dvb-s etc… it has not made a great impression on the non us world….
Well no DVB-S support in vista is the final straw….. My MCE2005 system won’t be upgraded to vista, and might be reinstalled with Media Portal to the looks of it!
Thanks Microsoft for the long wait, and another crap product update.
I can’t believe that someone in Microsoft’s MCE development is not aware of TV standards outside the US too. Simply shocking…!
I think we should make sure that many people OUTSIDE of the US in forums and on blogs link to this article so that as many people as possible can see what the current mindset of MCE development truely is.
I mean, how often have people on The Green Button and XPMCE.com from Europe constantly asked for things like DVB-T interactive support (i.e. supporting the ‘Red’ button), DVD-S/DVB-C support etc…!?
Does the MCE development team read these blogs and forums, at all? Or is it only the USA that matters in final sales?
It really is worrying and sad… :-(
Media Portal it may be then too…
A poll of what TV cards/standards people use with Media Portal:
http://www.team-mediaportal.com/component/option,com_poll/Itemid,0/task,results/id,20/?mosmsg=Thanks+for+your+vote%21
Man, let’s take it easy. I’am also very disappointed to what it’s happening (or not) to the product, but we should not get personal.
Blame the message, not the messenger.
Matt is one of the only guys from eHome team to openly talk about the product. In this case, blamming Matt for not knowing what DVB-C is is like blamming a baseball guy for not knwing the final result of a bike race in france. Come one, the guy works with the DVD and HD-DVD area !!!
I live in Brazil, and as most of you outside US, we use DVB-S and DVB-C, but to make it worst, we don’t have DVB-T. Also, we don’t have XBOX 360’s to use as extenders. We don’t have any guide. And no, Vista is not going to change that. But I’am sure that MS knows that. MS don’t ignore DVB-S, DVB-C, ISDB or any of those things. They just make business decisions. I might not like what they are doing, might have my own point of view, but I can’t assume they are just playing stupid. They know what they are doing, they do have an strategy. If it will work? I don’t know. Does this strategy works for me? Currently, no.
We use and like MCE, otherwise we would not be yelling at them how unhappy we are. But we might need to face the fact the what we want from the product is necessarily what MS want’s. It migh happen.
We are not obligated to use MCE, I for one spent the weekend testing MediaPortal as an alternative.
Let’s keep this space at a high level. Please.
Just my 2+ cents. ;)
Matt-thanks for all the info you have posted, it’s great to finally get some answers on MCE!
But there’s one burning question that I haven’t gotten a clear answer to anywhere. This is probably the most important feature for me in MCE, and I’m sure a lot of others would also agree:
Will the new MCE support recording an UNENCRYPTED digital cable channel (without a CableCard)? There’s been a lot of talk about recording encrypted stuff using a CableCard, and as disappointed as I am about the lack of off-the-shelf CableCard readers–my cable company only has a handful of non-broadcast HD channels, and it wouldn’t be a huge deal if I can’t record them (there’s no way I’m buying a new computer just to record Discovery, ESPN, and INHD).
What WOULD be a huge deal is if MCE could record the unencrypted broadcast HD channels that come over cable (FOX, ABC, etc)–(without a use of the new cablecard reader which in turn requires a new PC).
I know MS spent a lot of time adding various HD related features to MCE 05 (dual tuners, etc). All of which were completely useless to me. Unfortunately, my condo has too many walls around it so I can’t get decent antenna or satellite reception–cable’s the only way to go.
Please tell me MCE Vista’s able to record cable HDTV without a CableCard =) Without it, all of the awesome TV features you guys have worked so hard to include into your product are a complete waste for me (and several others in my situation!) Thanks!
As so many others mentioned before… it is such a shame that Microsoft is not aware that there is a world outside the states and that there would be a market for Media Center outside the US if they would only consider implementing important TV-Standards like DVB-S/S2. Thank you Matt for confering that matter with your expert and for making clear that there will not be any support soon. To me that means that I will turn my back on Media Center and that I will use an alternative product like Media Portal instead.
I can only add my frustration. In Denmark, Europe, we have a grand total of 2 (two) channels broadcasting on DVB-T, and hundreds on DVB-C and DVB-S. While I can understand that MCE 2005 did not support these standards, the fact that you completely ignored them for the Vista release is utterly dissapointing. The worst part is that your DBA driver architecture only needs a very minor extension to fully support these standards. MediaPortal (and many others) fully support these, but lacks the power to work with extenders.
When you say it will get done in a future release, you are really just rubbing salt in the wound. If you follow your current release schedules, the next release, where we can hope for this functionality, will be in 2009. If you think we will use MCE using analog signal and no HDTV until then, you are very much mistaken.
Are you just trying to make MCE fail?
I suspect the problem here, at least as far as the UK and Australia are concerned, lies not with the technical guys on the eHome team but much higher up.
Bill needs to get together with Rupert and persuade him that a PC with a broadband connection as a way of viewing Sky TV offers him more ways of making money than a proprietary box.
It is perfectly legal to make backups of DVDs that you’ve purchased as long as CSS is not being subverted (i.e. .iso), and it’s a hundred times more convenient to have all your movies accessible on a hard drive, as opposed to the DVD changer solution which, aside from loading much slower, costs a pretty penny. MCE should have support for streaming of DVDs to extenders in .iso format. The line about DVD ripping is a cop out. Microsoft assumes no risk by sticking with .iso.
So there really is no reason at all to upgrade a current Media Center box from MCE 2005 to Vista. I was looking forward to upgrading my current home-built MCE box with Vista and an OCUR. But now I can’t get one, so I won’t get the other.
Same goes for people who bought HP, Dell, Gateway and other Media Center 2005 computers, which, apparently are selling incredibly well.
This is a huge loss for Microsoft and computer users. I’m not going to throw away my specialized hardware just to buy some lowest common denominator computer from a manufacturer.
Early adopters, you got Media Center on the map, but MS and Cable Labs sure have an odd way of showing their thanks.
We have clients desperately awaiting the ATI OCUR. A few have 20 terabyte harddrive arrays storing televisions recordings using cable boxes and IR blasters.
One customer has 12 tuner cards across 6 computers. 8 of them using cable boxes. None of the OEM’s will be able to provide us with computers to fit my customers needs. What can I do. Purchase PC’s with OCUR cards and rebuild for my customers needs? We would only build 25 - 30 mega Vista MCE systems per year. We don’t quality as an OEM.
Hello,
another comment from a European on the DVB-S issue…
you’ll be amazed to find out how many people in North America are now using DVB-S satellite cards in their PCs…the 60 euro Technisat Skystar2 model (German-designed)is the defacto standard, so if you include support for that, you’ll satisfy over 90% of the intended audience…just talk to a satellite specialist in your area to find out more about satellite viewing via PC
Some info on MCE2005 plugin developement for the Skystar2
http://dvbportal.dyn1.de/forum/index.php?board=14;action=display;threadid=452
Because OTA HD TV has not yet arrived in Europe (DVB-S is not HD) most Europeans have turned into satellite viewing for high quality content - and it’s easy to add interfaces to the cards for legal subscription cards in order to watch PayTV programming, most people don’t want to spend the money for dedicated PVR (Tivo-like) boxes, plus it defeats the purposed of the all-in-one media box…
btw Pinnacle has just come out with a dual tuner DVB-S card (Pinnacle PCTV Dual Sat Pro PCI) - maybe you could contact Pinnacle in the USA about Vista support for the product
bye
will vista have an open standard for uploading epg data? perhaps XML format.. this may be a strategy that enables MS to profit somewhat by opening up many more markets to drive MCE sales.
Sorry, another question from a person outside the US, but this has to be brought up.
I’m happy with DVB-T, like SOME of the Vista interface changes (others are quite ugly), but there’s a serious problem in Australia with the fact that you only allow EITHER digital or analogue cards in MCE 2005.
Which means we are stuck choosing between either having high quality digital television, or analogue input and the ability to connect Pay TV/Cable TV or other devices and actually USE those little IR emitters that came with our Media Center Remote.
Given that the software that comes with the various TV capture cards can do it, a number of competing products can do it - even the FREE MythTV on Linux can do a passable job - why doesn’t MCE provide either one of these functions? We need either a) compatibility with both types of input card or b) compatibility with digital cards with an analogue input, such as the DVICO FusionHDTV PLUS.
When you combine this lack of compatibility with the whole Australian episode guide fiasco, it’s getting VERY hard to convince locals to stick with their Media Centers or buy new ones. A know many people who have instead installed KnoppMyth (Linux + MythTV), and if it wasn’t for all the work I have already put into MY center, I would have joined them.
What was really funny was that regardless of the fact that Microsoft apparently has been trying to launch an EPG for Australia, NineMSN (the Microsoft-affiliated commercial television station in Australia) recently sued the one company that DID provide an EPG to Australian audiences. If they are going to be associated with that kind of action, can’t they at least arrange to distribute CHANNEL 9’s EPG information?
I know you aren’t personally to blame about this one, but there is a lack of any real good contact point other than through the various blogs.
Microsoft saying that we are RELEASING the product internationally doesn’t really mean that you’re TARGETING the product towards people outside the US. It’s still very, very North American. I know that’s your core market…but surely if you want to dominate the Media Center market, you’re going to have to try to win over the people off- shore.
Will we be able to watch and record unencypted (in the clear) QAM? If we need CableCard hardware installed to get any QAM, even if there is no CableCard inserted, will there be any way we can get our hands on that hardware? I know you say it won’t be available off-the-shelf, but the same was originally said for the Media Center software itself. Now, I can buy it from Newegg. Not exactly off-the-shelf, but still available to the average system builder like myself.
Matt,
First: thank you for very informative post. It is really a good idea to communicate publicly like this.
After doing some studying with DirectX (and DirectShow in particular) it seems that it is actually DirectX 9 that is missing DVB-C/S/S2 and even EPG functionality. So the reason for MCE not supporting for DVB-C comes fromm DirectX itself.
The SDK documentation for DirectX 10 is a bit vague, but I got an impression that the support for those is actually coming with version 10 of the DirectX. (And yes, DirextX 10 is going to be Vista-only).
Are you able to confirm this?
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And yup, another dissapointed european user.
I’m very happy that you publicly talk about this stuff on your blog, don’t get me wrong. But it does kinda show that the vista team has no idea of european market..
You guys have the mission to take over the living room.. But is that just the USA ones?
You don’t have ANY idea what you are missing out on by excluding DVB on Vista. HDTV is finally getting through here in europe and digital tv penetration is going up rapidly, being it DVB-C/S/T.
THIS is the moment for vista to take over the european market by providing a product that supports it all, now that the normal end-user market is looking towards all-in-one mediacenters..
I can guarantee you, that you are going to loose a lot of potential costumers by not including dvb support. I for one, won’t be watching analogue tv EVER again.. So MCE still again won’t be my one-stop place .. And I find that a shame, cause I love everything about MCE and really WOULD use it as my only means of watching and playing every media I own.
I just hope you guys listen to this and to us europeans, cause for us, this is really very very very dissapointing.
So IF you guys after all these rants ARE willing to include DVB, albeit not at release date, then please don’t let us wait TOO long for it, since we have been missing out on all the enjoyment that’s called digital tv for long enough.
I’ve buyed an WinXP MCE2005-PC with DVB-T/Analog Hybrid card, build in. DVB-t is not avaiable in all over Germany and I also can’t get analog TV well, that’s why, I recieve with all my TV an Computers DVB-S but unfortunaly, I had to see, what you know!
There’s no way, to let DVB-S work well with the MCE!
There are some hack, by using DVB-T tables, but what to do, if MCE don’t know Disseq, to recieve from more than one Satelite, if the scan shows me 25 of 1300 Stations or Radioscan do not scan Satelite Radio, because it can’t find a Tuner Hardware???
I will go on, usind Mediaportal!
To Microsoft: Please! Don’t go on selling MCE!
The Mediaportal Projecz is Open source and free, may be, if you ask the peoples there (because they know, what they do!!!), youd rather sell WinXP with Mediaportal than with the MCE!!!
Will I be able to buy a cablecard reader off the shelf, a video card off the shelf and be able to playback [OCUR] content?
Matt Goyer posted
some answers to common questions about MCE in Vista a few weeks ago.
I’ve been following…
No DVB-S or DVB-C support :( . Media Portal here I come.
You should really consider the possibility to record the radio. I would like to have it.
I’m not sure what pressures were put on MS, but to yank cablecard ATI OCUR support for upgrades is a dirty bait-and-switch. I purchased a dual-core MCE machine with analog tuners a few months ago based on my belief that it will easily handle Vista and a new ATI OCUR when available. Now you must buy a new machine to get the OCUR w/ Vista. Nothing like this was mentioned in Jan. at the CES OCUR debut.
I’m fed up with the TV networks, Hollywood and Microsoft.
Hi Matt
please READ this
you say in top of the this page
” Author
Hi, I’m Matt Goyer. I used to work at Microsoft in the eHome division on the Windows Media Center team as a Program Manager.
”
you are a program manager
and you help to create MCE to work and to prepare to S E L L !! to another country around the world
how you can ignore dvb-s system ??
i couldnt understand
if you want to sell more MCE license in around the world especcialy in EUROPE you MUST add support to DVB-S and DVB-S+ and CI support
i m sure you dont know nothing about dvb-s system
becouse if you know something about dvb-s i m sure you’ll know how many people using DVB-S satellite receiver in their home
DVB-S system is still best choice for digital broadcast in EUROPE country
we dont have DVB-T System in our country
only cable system but small channel list
thats why
we use still stupid satellite devices for whatching digital tv broadcasting
off course some satelite receiver is not stupid device some devices is smarter and much more stable than mce
did you hear dreambox satellite receiver?
or any linux base satellite receiver
you must to look a little bit what can they do with small processor, small memory small box
and look again to mce device
good processor good memory good hdd but result is still BAD
first of all you must wait to load system still not instant on
ok some motherboards can support instant on but not so much
i wish to microsoft add in vista dvb-s support
i use in my home dreambox satellite receiver and xp mce
but if mce can support dvb-s system better than dreambox or any receiver i m sure i never buy another receiver becouse i really like mce user interface and some mce capabilitys (dreambox can do what mce can do believe me but….mce is looking nice)
please
add dvb-s support in XP MCE and VISTA MCE for this tv cards (skystar,avermedia,lifeview,haup…)
i want to watch Digital TV in my MCE Living room cmputer from dvb-s Satellite system and i want to record some tv show,nba and futboll games locally or remote from my work for example without coming to home
and dont forget to add Diseq support :)
Thank You
Orkun