"Messenger Failure - You must install Windows Messenger..."

Why is it happening:-

It's happening due to installation of security update described here:-

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/946648

Resolution:-

1]Uninstall Security update KB 946648 from Add/Remove items in Control Panel.

2]Open Windows Media Center>Setting>Messenger>Uncheck the box against  'Allow instant messages within Media Center'

3]Reinstall the Security Update.

The  Image Mastering API update "enables the Windows platform to do master style optical burning on Blu-Ray media,"

This is for the following operating systems: Windows Vista, Windows Vista SP1,Windows Server 2008, Windows XP SP2+, Windows Server 2003 SP1+. 

So atlast we are going to enjoy Blue-ray disk support.

http://connect.microsoft.com/site/sitehome.aspx?SiteID=434

However, their email responses are pretty good - so I after days of trying to reach somebody at the consulate, I dropped an email and surprisingly I received and very informative response - telling me that I don't need a visa - woohoo! :) I informed the necessary people and booked my flight - a few days later I was on the road to Brasov (Romania).

Arriving in Bukarest after a short flight (2:20hrs), I thought I could pass the passport check quickly - but unfortunately the federal police had a few questions.

However, I was still good in time - of course I had only hand baggage.

But because I could pass thorugh so quickly, I couldn't find the ordered driver (Victor) to Brasov - however he arrived at the airport a few minutes later and we started our trip to Brasov. Victor picked me up with a nice car - a ~2007 Mercedes Benz E-Class. On the road we talked about politics, cars, women, the industry in Romania, the second world war and corruption - of course a wide range of topics but if you sit in the car for more than 2 hours, you need something to talk about.

After arriving in Brasov and checking in at the hotel, I visited the company and met the developers - a group of smart guys with a lot of vitamin C#. We talked about Windows Media Center in general and their current project for the IFA trade show in Berlin (Germany). The IFA trade show is important - it's the worlds leading trade show for the general public - major consumer electronics brands present themselves at this unique event. A showcase for innovation and the technology of tomorrow – coupled with a spectacular programme of entertainment events. I was however, suprised how much they already got up and running - which in fact was good, because we could than move to specific questions and try to solve those or find the right direction to go.

There were some questions or topics that I face very often when talking with developers... let's list a few of them:

• Light samples - Z and Q applications are nice but in addition of complete samples, customers want encapsulated samples to learn one specific feature (like the Repeater or the VirtualList).  One solution per sample/feature would be nice.
• Model/View seperation - Projects have proven that it makes sense to have a ViewModel between your View (MCML) and Model (.NET/Data your application will "use"). Why? -> encapsulated responsibilities, ability to test UI behavior (unit testing), clean code structure, etc. Inside the ViewModel you can prepare your data from the Model for easy access from the UI (MCML), keep UI related states and more.
  
• UI design guides - customers want samples to learn how to implement an UI concept they have received from a Designer.
• Promote exisitng UI classes (Choice, ArrayListDataSet, etc)  - This is what I see very often... developers don't notice these great exisiting classes, like the Choice or VirtualList class - instead they use generic lists or even worst they start writing own classes because generic lists don't cover their needs (ChosenIndex, ...). Those classes are very handy (even more if used in the ViewModel).
• Place your "prepared" data in your (View)Model and try to handle everything inside your .NET code... especially state related data - Having helper classes for UI related things in your ViewModel instead pumping up the <Locals> section in MCML documents is much cleaner and of course accessable for unit testing.  Also you can handle specific events already in your ViewModel instead of taking an extra round (.NET -> MCML -> .NET).

Overall, regarding the project, I am happy that we could get trough a lot of things or found the direction to go on topics that did need further investigation - hope to see the solution at the IFA when I attend - end of august this year.

Thanks!
Olcay

So here goes are their products:-

A1 - Delivering the "Anything" experience

A2 - Delivering the "Anything, Anywhere" experience

A3 - Delivering the "Anything, Anywhere, Anytime" experience

A4 - Delivering the "Anything, Anywhere, Anytime, Accelerated" experience

http://fluiddigitalmedia.com/products

So here I am with my cool Vista laptop with a Media Center raring to share its variety of nice High Def MKV videos to the world, but nobody wants it.

The Xbox 360 media center extender, amazingly slick looking as it is, can't read the same codecs that I've already installed on the PC Media Center. So my precious High Def movie collection with 5.1 Dolby Digital audio isn't going to anywhere near my Component 1080i TV and Optical audio cables + Logitech Z-5500's.

Bummer.

To fix, I'm probably going to need an HDMI reciever to push my audio video through my laptop's HDMI out and then onto my TV / audio setup. Which I was hoping I wouldn't need, but I guess I'd need an HDMI something soon anyway, given the growth of its popularity these days.

Another choice may be to get another TV, say, a CRT HDTV with VGA in or HDMI in, then push my audio through a USB multi-channel sound card, so I can separate analog audio and plug 90 billion wires into the Z-5500's head console.

For now, it looks like I have a really nice way to show pictures and play music! Yay!

Mary Jo Foley has been covering it in detail, if you'd like to read more. But for me, it comes down to these issues:

• No h.264 support (though third party codec packages like the K-Lite Codec Pack will enable it. Check out MediaControl 5.3 if you go that route.)
• No DirectTV support. I don't use satellite, but this would have gone a long way towards increasing adoption.
• No 16:9 or otherwise widescreen thumbnails! This is the biggest for me since I have a media collection with lots of widescreen videos and hate that my thumbnails all have black bars on the top and bottom.
• It was delayed, a lot.
• And last but not least, I CAN'T GET IT IF I WANTED IT (at least not officially, it's OEM only and rumors are OEMs won't release it for already sold computers).

All in all, way to go Microsoft! Media Center may be the only consumer product where you have true technological dominance. This isn't doing much to reassure customers of that, nor build your lead over competitors.

Check it here:-

Turn Any PC Into a Media Center

Korean firm Icom has announced an in-car PC that runs Windows XP Media Center edition. The "Icom MK1" features a swing-out touchscreeen display, slot-loading DVD drive, GPS, T-DMB receiver, four-channel audio amplifier, and drives up to four external displays, according to the company.

The limited specifications released by Icom for its MK1 didn't include dimensions, but the device appears intended to fit within the confines of a "double DIN" dashboard slot, i.e. approximately 7.1 by 3.9 inches (180 x 100mm). It has a seven-inch touchscreen display that offers 800 x 480 resolution, and swings out from the top, revealing a slot-loading DVD drive.
http://www.windowsfordevices.com/news/NS9869668510.html

One measly month????

That's how much time is left of summer vacation.  Makes this geeky homeschool mom want to cry into her Palm Pilot.  Now don't get me wrong.  I love homeschooling.  It has allowed me to spend nine years of quality time with my children that non-homeschooling moms probably never even knew they missed.  It has allowed me to learn about bunches of stuff I missed the first time around.  And it has strengthened my belief in child-led learning. 

But who are we kidding here?  As much as I love homeschooling, I REALLY love summer break.  And since my oldest will technically be of "working age" next summer, who knows if this might be the last one my boys and I will share together just "hanging."  And we've done lots of that so far.  We've hung out at the pool.  We've hung out at the mall.  We've hung out at the library, the bookstore, the parks, the ice cream parlor, and the coffee shop.  We've hung out pretty much every place in town that doesn't have a 'NO LOITERING' placard overtly visible.

We've talked about lots of cool subjects together.  There just isn't anything better than having philosophical discussions with your tween and teen over sherbet Push-Ups.  Lazy summer days seem to somehow loosen our tongues and create discourses on everything from why people get tattoos to what it will be like in the afterlife.  We've been known to even start a conversation in the morning, take it up again after lunch, and run it in the ground before bedtime. 

We've also found incredibly creative ways to avoid work.  I had at least seventeen house projects scheduled for this summer, and do you know how many we actually accomplished??  Give yourself a pat on the back if you guessed: ZIPPO! I've kept up with the laundry and dishes (mostly), and kept the floors from being overtaken by mutant dust bunnies and the bathroom from being overtaken by mutant mold creatures (mostly), but other than that, this has been "the little house that time forgot." 

Our summer has been filled with plenty of Topsy-Techiness, as well. Uber has discovered he doesn't have two left feet at his new favorite game "Step Mania."  H-T has been the official YouTube tester of every sci-fi-related clip - - and, for the record: Yes, they are ALL working!!  I have had loads of fun with R-T's new Windows Media Center PC, and have learned how to control the computer remote from the comfort of my king size bed.  You'd be amazed what you can find to watch on the computer when you have no satellite service.  Even R-T has become comfortable with his new 'puter, and has been blogging away on it. 

All in all, it has been a terrific summer vacation so far. I can't believe there is only one month left!!

Well, I could try to think positively.  You know, cup-half-full, and all that.  Maybe I could look at it as: "Cool.  We've got a WHOLE month of summer vacation left!!!"  Unfortunately, when they were giving out the positive-thinking genes in heaven, I was distracted by the blinking lights on St. Peter's celestial cell phone. 

Stupid calendar.

NBC has launched its online video hub for the 2008 Olympics, which features free on-demand video for over 20 sports. In order to maximize quality, the videos are available as downloads (you can start watching before the download finishes) and will be in “up to HD” quality. Unfortunately, the video downloads will only be available on Windows machines running Windows Media Center - once again Mac users are left in the cold, likely because of DRM issues (and the fact that Lenovo and Microsoft are sponsors). (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/31/nbc-launches-on-demand-olympic-coverage-in-hd 7/31)

Google's video-sharing site YouTube will show daily coverage of the Beijing Olympics in India, Nigeria and 75 other countries where broadcasters haven't bought exclusive rights to the programming. YouTube promises to block the content in areas where rights have been sold to others. (Iwantmedia 8/4, http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aOh2Npv1H8Kk 8/4)

Time Warner is moving forward with its plans to sell off AOL in pieces, and is finally ready to formally separate the AOL portal and advertising business from its legacy dial-up access business. But how much can it hope to get for these parts? When Google invested $1 billion in AOL a few years ago for a 5 percent stake, that valued AOL at $20 billion (which some people thought was an inflated figure even back then). Today, even after breaking it up, Time Warner will be lucky to get more than $7 billion for the whole lot. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/04/time-warner-ready-to-unload-aol-in-pieces-but-at-what-price 8/4)

In a demonstration of just how open Yahoo search can be, one of its senior engineers has created a simple search mashup that combines Yahoo’s BOSS framework and Google’s App Engine. Yahoo BOSS allows developers to create their own customized search apps based on Yahoo’s search engine, and the Google App Engine is a platform for hosting apps. Vik Singh, the engineer who leads the Yahoo Boss project (and a former Google engineer) created a simple Question-Answering Service, where you put in a question, and it tries to come up with the answer based on the top 50 results from Yahoo. (So, if you ask, “Who invented the light bulb?,” it looks for the most popular dates in the top 50 results and returns: “Thomas Edison”). (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/04/yahoo-boss-is-so-open-it-runs-on-googles-app-engine 8/4)

Yahoo's Aug. 1 shareholder's meeting came and went without a mutiny as CEO Jerry Yang received 85% of the vote to stay at the helm of the company. Investors also voted to retain all nine current directors. (Cynopsis 8/4)

AOL's video portal, which has an online syndication deal with Discovery Networks, the Big Four broadcasters and other cable services, has received a makeover with a greater focus on linking with other AOL sites, such as AOL Music, AOL Television and GameDaily. New ingredients will include a search engine more targeted to viewers' preferences and more advertising opportunities. Broadcasting & Cable (8/4)

Joss Whedon's online musical "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog" crashed when it went live July 15, when some 1,000 people a second tried to view the show. "Dr. Horrible" is seen as a notable test of what people will pay money to watch on their computers. (Iwantmedia 8/4, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/02/arts/television/02horr.html 8/2)

The music industry should embrace illegal file-sharing Web sites, according to a study by the MCPS-PRS Alliance, which represents music rights holders, and Big Champagne, an online media measurement company. The illegal sites have strong brand loyalty and "will never go away." (Iwantmedia 8/4, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/e72884f6-6175-11dd-af94-000077b07658.html?nclick_check=1 8/3)

Amazon has acquired twelve year old Canadian company Abebooks (formerly the Advanced Book Exchange), the companies just announced. AbeBooks is an online marketplace for books focusing on used, rare and out of print titles for sale by independent booksellers - it currently has 110 million books for sale from 13,500 sellers. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/01/amazon-to-acquire-abebooks 8/1)

Fox Searchlight has just posted a new R-rated trailer for the upcoming Choke movie, based on author Chuck Palahnluk's novel of the same name starring Sam Rockwell. (Cynopsis 8/4)

U.S. federal regulators are declaring that Comcast's throttling of BitTorrent traffic last year was unlawful, marking the first time that any U.S. broadband provider has ever been found to violate Net neutrality rules. Comcast will be required to disclose in the future how it manages traffic. (Iwantmedia 8/4, http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10004508-38.html 8/1)

Following reports that digital television viewers were blocked from recording the new season of NBC's "Gladiators", Microsoft confirmed that it is preventing users from recording the show. They claim they were acting on behalf of NBC, and are in line with regulations set by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), in disrupting computer usage based upon the so-called "broadcast flag" that was transmitted alongside the show.

A Microsoft spokesperson told CNET News, "...Windows Media Center fully adheres to the flags used by broadcasters and content owners to determine how their content is distributed and consumed."

read more

Thomas Hawk is a big fan of Media Center.Charlie Owen of Media Center team  gave him a tour of their offices and he got to meet some new people from the team that he hadn't met before.

Check it here :-

http://thomashawk.com/2008/08/visiting-with-microsofts-media-center.html

Not just watch analog and digital TV at once or record TV shows using hardware MPEG-1/2 compression, Compro VideoMate Vista E900F PCIe Dual DVB-T & Analog TV/FM Card gives you more.
Here is the press release for 'The Most Professional TV Card You’ve been looking for!!!'

http://www.comprousa.com/en/press/080603_e900f.html

ehrec.exe ties up the tuners, so you can't run an alternate media center while running VMC (or MCE).  Just stop disable the "Windows Media Center Receiver" service, and you should be good to go.

To access the services in Vista:

1. Open Windows Explorer
2. Right click on "Computer"
3. Select "Manage"
4. Select "Services and Applications", and the "Services" from the tree

NBC Universal unveiled a detailed description of how its ambitious digital coverage of the Olympic games will play out online, on mobile devices, on VOD and via interactive television systems (Cynopsis 7/29):

• NBCOlympics.com on MSN will be the hub for news, results, schedules and 2,200 hours of live streaming broadband coverage. Also look here for tutorials on how to connect to mobile, gaming, VOD and other outlets
• The Olympics will be a major coming out party for partner Microsoft's Silverlight 2 video platform, powering 20 different concurrent streams of 25 different sports. Functionality includes picture-in-picture and quad-screen viewing
• An online viewing guide will detail complete coverage across NBCU broadcast and cable outlets with localized listings and athlete news sourced by zip code
• A full complement of widgets will keep web surfers updated on news, video, athletes, metal counts, results and tune in schedules. (Digital agency partner 360i has been spreading the word about these across the blogosphere)
• Two-screen companion games will challenge viewers to answer trivia questions, polls and other games while watching the telecasts
• NBCU Olympics Mobile will offer on demand news, video coverage and breaking news alerts. A WAP site will feature a scaled down version of much of what's on the main site
• Olympics content will be downloadable via Amazon's Unbox and Microsoft's Windows Media Center and Zune player

ESPNU will launch an HD simulcast network on Aug. 28 just in time for College Football season. The collegiate sports network, ESPN's 4th HD net, expects to broadcast more than 70 live College Football games and over 200 overall events during its first year. Go to ESPNU.com for a schedule of this year's televised football matchups beginning with Vandy at Miami (Ohio) on Aug 28. (Cynopsis 7/29)

Since its debut on iTunes on July 14, the full seasons of MOJO HD's Wall Street Warriors, seasons #1 and #2, have been the number one and number two most downloaded TV series on iTunes in the reality TV category. The series, which launched on MOJO HD in late 2006 and aired its second season earlier this year, is a behind-the-scenes look into the high pressure world of financial investors. (Cynopsis 7/29)

I watched only 30 seconds but I’m already into it.

Amie Street, the indie music store that prices songs by their popularity, has pre-released The Walkmen’s new album You & Me three weeks before its scheduled launch date. The entire album is available for $5, with all proceeds going to the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center as part of the site’s “Download To Make a Difference” campaign. You can download the album here. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/28/get-the-walkmen-album-early-help-charity-on-amiestreet 7/28)

Hewlett Packard, Intel and Yahoo announced the Cloud Computing Test Bed this morning. Executives from the three companies are holding a 9 am PST conference call to discuss the new venture. Participating are Prith Banerjee, Senior Vice President, Research, HP and Director, HP Labs; Prabhakar Raghavan, Head of Yahoo! Research; and Andrew Chien, Vice President, Corporate Technology Group, Intel and Director, Intel Research. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/29/cloud-computing-test-bed-live-notes-from-the-conference-call 7/29)

Long outplayed by two Indian brothers, Hasbro finally delivers a massive counter blow to Scrabulous, one of the most loved games on Facebook. Scrabulous fans in North America will see the below message when they try to play the game.  (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/29/endgame-scrabulous-gets-wiped-off-facebook 7/29)

Newly formed media-buying group Mediabrands will buy at least $1 million in ads from cable providers under a new partnership with Microsoft-owned Navic Networks, whose interactive ad-buying technology mimics the process of buying online ads. A part of the Interpublic Group, Mediabrands is composed of four agencies that will each assign employees to explore Navic's technology. The Wall Street Journal (free content) (7/28)

Specifications:-

http://www.sandberg.it/product.aspx?id=630-63

These are the two themes -just create a video demonstrating one of the two above contest themes.

Lots of prizes are waiting for you.

http://www.qwebl.com/video.html

The Media Player and Media Center remotes are very similar. The true greatness of these gadgets come in their functionality, although they are lacking (especially the Media Player gadget) in UI. Too much of the interaction with the gadget is through Windows Mobile menus, and not pretty buttons in the gadget itself. But considering they are betas, and Microsoft seems to be focusing on functionality and reliability and not yet UI, they are very impressive. (Although I'm pretty sure if Microsoft really wanted to they could have one of the resident über-geniuses whip up a pretty GUI for it by tomorrow. I mean, we talking about swapping a couple dozen menu items with graphical buttons instead...almost makes me think they are intentionally leaving the UI bare so as not to infringe upon partner companies building SideShow remotes.)

You can browse all of your media libraries, change the current playing selection or add items to the queue, view the TV listings, and change radio stations, all though these gadgets! Amazing.

Here's some screen shots of the Media Center gadgets:

You can download the installation files for SideShow for Windows Mobile here, and download the Windows Media Center SideShow gadget from Microsoft Connect (you'll need a Windows Live/Hotmail login).

The Office PowerPoint Remote and a Windows Mobile device is probably the best PowerPoint remote available. No other remote I know of let's you control not only flipping slides forwards and backwards, but see the slide you are looking at, it's notes, and the next slide in the queue all on one screen. Simply amazing.

Grab the Office PowerPoint Remote on the Windows Live Gallery.

Got Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate? Also got a Windows Mobile? Then this is for you

Again, I will post this as a tutorial-like... tutorial, with steps and what you'll need, as well as what the final result should be. But before I go into that, I will first detail what makes this possible.

On the 2nd of June, 2008, the Windows Sideshow team over at Microsoft released a program, a "developer preview", which lets users use the Windows Mobile 5 or 6 device, whether touchscreen or not, as a Sideshow device. That means that all Sideshow gadgets compatible with all other Sideshow devices. This includes Windows Mail, Outlook and Windows Media Player controls.

But much more recently, on July 7th the Windows Sideshow team launched a Microsoft Connection at Microsoft Connect, which when joined allowed users to download their WIndows Media Center remote control gadgets, especially for the Windows Sideshow system. It allows you to view your TV, your music, your videos and pictures as well as control the Media Center. It even displays the album art of the music file you are viewing. That is the technology that makes it possible to do what we are doing today.

To use your Windows Mobile device as a remote control, you need a computer with Windows Media Center and Bluetooth (or Bluetooth dongle), and a WIndows Mobile device.

1. Download Windows Sideshow for Windows Mobile here.
2. Install it. The instructions for installing the program can be found below the download.
3. Setup a bluetooth partnership between your phone and computer (explained below).
4. Click start, then search "bluetooth devices" and open the program.
5. Click add...
6. Follow the wizard, turning on your bluetooth on the phone and making it discoverable.
7. Right-click the paired device on your computer (still in device manager)
8. Click properties.
9. Go to services tab.
10. Check "Windows Sideshow"
11. Click Apply, then OK.
12. Watch as the drivers get installed.
13. Open Windows Sideshow and click Connect. Then choose a user.

You have successfully configured Windows Sideshow on your computer and mobile device. Now to get the Media Center plugins working.

Note: If steps 1 or 2 fails and you are not able to download the file, download it here.

1. Join the Microsoft Connect connection with your Windows Live ID here.
2. After successfully joining, download the executable here.
3. Download the Windows Sideshow Managed Runtime 1.0 here.
4. Install it.
5. Install the "executable" from step 2 now. There's two, so depending on whether you're using 32-bit or 64-bit, choose the right one.
6. Click start, then control panel.
7. Search "sideshow"
8. Click "Windows Sideshow", you should see your already-configured device here. If it isn't connected, connect it.
9. There should now be 4 new programs: Music, Now Playing, TV and Pictures+Videos. Click all of these checkboxes to enable them.

Now you can control Windows Media Center with your Windows Mobile device! Very convenient.