Transcript: Chat About Windows XP Media Center Edition with Lead Program Manager Rodger Benson
Published: April 22, 2003
Please note: Portions of this transcript have been edited for clarity
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): Welcome to today's chat. Our topic is Windows XP Media Center Edition. Questions, comments, and suggestions are welcome.
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): We will make an effort to answer as many questions as he can. There may be times when a question may be asked that we do not have an immediate answer for or cannot get to. We encourage you to post any of these questions in the newsgroups.
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): I'll now have the hosts introduce themselves.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Howdy! I'm Rodger Benson, lead program manager on the PC Experience team here in eHome. I've meen at Microsoft for about 5 years now.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): My team designs end-user features for XP Media Center Edition, inc conjunction with other teams of developers and testers. I'm excited to be here on the chat this afternoon, and answer any questions you might have for me!
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): And I'm Ken McGrath, TechNet/MSDN Web and Communities Producer.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: Any idea when Media Center 2.0 will be coming out?
Special Guest Grant (Microsoft): Q: Will there be functionality and/or the ability to create/edit/append playlists through MCE instead of having to exit MCE and open WMP
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: We're hard at work on our next version now. I'm hoping to get some great ideas for you guys as part of this chat!
Special Guest Grant (Microsoft): DOH ! Wrong window!
Special Guest Grant (Microsoft): Disregard. :)
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): Thanks again. Could everyone hold on additional questions for a few minutes to allow Roger and Grant a chance to catch up?
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): Q: Any idea when Media Center 2.0 will be coming out?
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): A: We're hard at work on our next version now. I'm hoping to get some great ideas for you guys as part of this chat!
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: Will you consider adding a TV-oriented Web Browser, Email and Messenger client to MCE?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: These are good suggestions. Although Media Center right now is focused more on Media, it's a natural evolution to look to expand the types of experiences that you can do from the TV.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Looking ahead, media is just the tip of the iceberg! You can impage TV-based interfaces for a lot of what we're used to doing "up close" with the keyboard and mouse.
Special Guest Grant (Microsoft): impage=imagination :)
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): Sorry, we've had some connectivity problems.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Sorry about the chat problems. :)
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): q: What features did you work on?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): a: I worked on the common UI that's used by the media center experiences. This includes the start menu, transport controls, sounds, and animations.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Also includes things like figuring out how to navigate though our UI with the remote.
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): OK, I've reopened the room. Sorry again for the holdup. Roger is typing like crazy to answer the existing questions.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft):
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: Any hope for a standalone copy of MCE to be sold in retail stores?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: Right now, Media Center is only available through OEM machines. We've found that there's still a lot of fiddling to do to make sure that Media Center systems deliver good quality experience.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): There's a very careful balance that needs to be made between the OS software, encoder cards, decoder software, graphics card, and all of the drivers in between.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: any hope of adding a fast-forword opition for MP3's to MCE through WMP9?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: I've hit this personally. (Although I should ask why you're not using WMA for your audio!. <grin>) Let's just say that I've got connections and we're working on it for the future. <wink>
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: Do you all plan to add more Tivo functionality (automatic intuitive scheduling)?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: We're always looking at building up our features... You mention automatic scheduling/recording ... are there any other features you're particularly interested in?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: What would you think of allowing MC to be full-screen on the secodary display (TV) while the primary is used for traditional PC tasks?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: Media Center's UI is DirectX-based -- that's how we can include all of our great visuals and transitions. One of the limitations is that DX apps can only run fullscreen on the primary monitor.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): q: I just got my MC PC. Is it possible to watch a show while recording another show?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: Yes: You can watch a recorded show while recording a new one. You can't watch one live show while recording another. Media Center PCs only include a single tuner, so media center can only tune to one live show at a time.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q:Will there be functionality and/or the ability to create/edit/append playlists through MCE instead of having to exit MCE and open WMP
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: Right now, there isn't. This is an example of a tough problem that we have taking keyboard-and-mouse activities and figuring out how to make them work well with a remote control.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Some activities that need a lot of manipulations are pretty tough to make easy to use with a remote! We're constantly looking at new features, and this is one of those.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: TV-oriented interfaces are important for those of us who *only* use the MCE machine via a TV
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: I've got to disagree with you on that one! I use Media Center on a pm in my home office, and it's only connected to a monitor. I love to plop down in my armchair and access my music and TV across the room. (It's a lot more relaxing than having to s
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): ... more relaxing than having to sit upright at the keyboard!)
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: Will Media Center support connecting into other computers on a home network and then sharing the audio and video from them?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: You can already do this with Media Center -- just make sure that the media is on shared folder on the other mahcines, and create shortcuts to those network shares in the My Pictures or My Videos folders.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: You can also have WMP search for music content on other machines on the network if the files are shared out.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: (I've gone a bit crazy with shortcuts. I've also got shortcuts set to point to my CD drive and flash media drives, so that I can insert picture CDs and browse to them from within Media Center.)
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): We will be continuing this chat for about 12 minutes and will continue to take questions. We encourage you to repost any questions we may have missed. Thanks all for participating in the chat.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: could u make a mce pc that is in a small stereo type case, and only have it come with the stuff need to hook it up to a stereo system. this system might have a smaller processor not includes speakers and other things such as that. also sub $400.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: We're always looking at pushing the envelope of what a "PC" should look like and do. In fact we've already got OEMs that are going in this direction with their Media Center PC -- a couple examples are ABS and Cyberpower.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Their PCs are in horizontal orientations that would fit in with your stereo system.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q/A: We've only got a few minutes left. I wanted to turn the tables and ask you some questions.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): (1) What Media Center feature do you use most?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): (2) What's your pet feature that we should be working on for the next version?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Sorry, the built-in coffeemaker got cut.
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): We have about 5 minutes left and will try and get a few more questions.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Tea bags fit nicely in the floppy drive, though. :)
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Q: any chance that the next edition will have smart display compatabilitty with the mce gui?
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): A: There are a lot of great MS technologies that we're investgating for future v's. You can imagine a lot of great scenarios with smart display!
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Well, it looks like our time is up. Big thanks for coming to the chat, and bigger thanks for sharing your great feedback with me.
Moderator: KenM (Microsoft): Thanks for joining us today and thanks for the questions. It's time for us to go now. Please see the chats schedule for upcoming topics.
Special Guest RodgerB (Microsoft): Back to the salt mines, working on some of your requests. :)
