As many have likely noticed the Media Center Studio site has been down for quite some time and doesn’t look likely to make a reappearance. Due to the web-based application installation procedure used by MCS this puts us in a particularly hard position as there isn’t a simple installer to redistribute. A few guys (Josh3693, JoshFink and Assassin) at the [...]
Today we’ve got another theme available for download thanks to a submission from Matt Osburn. The theme is a variation on the single color theme like the original blue or black themes, only this time in sweet Cherry Red. The theme and gradients are all very smooth, clean and pleasant to look at but there were a few problems for [...]
Today we’re back online and ready to give you a couple of new themes to download. Apologies for the recent downtime, the server seems to always know just when I’m leaving town for extended periods of time. I’ve put top men on it and hopefully we can get the problem fixed soon. To brighten things up you can find a [...]
Remote Potato is a fantastic app for adding remote DVR capability, common in commercial DVR set-top boxes, to Windows 7 Media Center. We’ve taken a look at this handy tool previously here on Hack7MC and the feature set remains largely the same with a few additions. The most current version of Remote Potato adds support for a number of additional [...]
Welcome! Today we’ve got another theme available for download. This theme, derived from the original wallpaper available here, is another piece from the venerable collection of wallpapers at perfecthue.com. For those who have yet to check out previous entries from this collection be sure to pick up the Crowd and Platform themes as well. These works are thanks to the [...]
The original My Channel Logos endeavored to brighten up our Windows Media Center TV guides by adding bright colorful logos to the channel listings. Not only did this make browsing channels a little more colorful but it makes it substantially easier as well, when your able to quickly identify the specific channels your interested in. The second version goes even [...]
Hello again, today I’ve got another theme that I was keen to transfer over to a Media Center theme from perfecthue.com. This particular one is based on the wallpaper ‘Crowd’ which can be downloaded as a matching background from the artist, Jason Benjamin, right here. Once again I’d really like to thank him for allowing the use of his work [...]
Greetings internet denizens and media center fans! I realize it’s been quite some time since the last update but today there’s a new media center theme available for download. Thanks to Jason Benjamin of perfecthue.com for allowing the conversion of his work over into Windows 7 Media Center themes. This particular theme is based on the Platform wallpaper available on [...]
Thanks to Dave Bryce, a Hack7MC reader and AVForums member, we have a new theme available for download today. Dave sent us this theme via mhealy@hack7mc.com and you can send your themes in as well if you’ve got them! Just attach the MCT file from Media Center Studio and we’ll post it here for our users to enjoy. Dave’s theme, [...]
In case you hadn’t noticed previously we’ve added a pair of new Media Center themes to our Download Center. Future themes and updates will appear in the Download Center section and users can email their themes as attachments to mhealy@hack7mc.com to have them added to the section. This new pair of themes comes from a Hack7MC reader, Steve Firestone (thewarm). [...]
Although there are a growing number of users who have dedicated Media Center systems, a large number of users are still using an all purpose machine. Often times these users will switch to a secondary set of outputs (a second monitor and audio outputs) when using Media Center for their entertainment. The problem for many of these users is the [...]
One of Windows Media Center’s many self-imposed limitations is to prevent the user from utilizing more than four tuners of any one type at the same time. With many tuners commonly coming with more than one tuner per card these days it’s easy to reach and pass this limit even on a tight budget. It’s hard to image why Microsoft [...]
Choosing the right codec setup for your Windows 7 Media Center build can be tricky. Should you stick with the built-in Microsoft decoders or get something a little more tweak-able? Even the built-in decoders need some help playing a number of file formats available, including the most popular format among enthusiasts, MKV. How do we choose which route to go [...]
Getting the latest film trailers inside Windows 7 Media Center seems like a perfect fit for something so focused on entertainment on the big screen. Unfortunately, it’s something that’s also been mostly left out of the native Media Center product. A relatively new entry, Trailer Library, from MediaPCTycoon on The Green Button forums let’s you stream movie trailers from Filmtrailers.com [...]
With this handy tip from Marc, a reader of Hack7MC, we can setup a regular alarm clock using Task Scheduler, mcShoutcast and Media Center. Much like your standard alarm clock this setup will be set to wake each morning and start a radio stream. Users can setup the alarm to wake regularly on weekdays, weekends or whenever you need an [...]
There are a number of other media center solutions that provide the ability to have a different background for each area of media. Movies, Music and TV all come with various different backgrounds to represent their different content. Now, thanks to bill24 of the Australian Media Center Community, Windows 7 Media Center users can as well. The end result is [...]
So you’ve sprung for one of those fancy new ATI GPUs and downloaded the newest drivers but you’ve got black bars all around the screen? I thought so, it’s a common problem recently and with ATI having some of the best GPUs on the market currently for HTPC playback with their onboard HDMI sound output and sheer video processor power [...]
