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Windows 10


iam4uk

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iam4uk

Microsoft will allow downloads of previews of Windows 10 starting 1 October.  If any Media Browser folks test it out, some information and speculation might be worthwhile here.

 

For example, if the Windows Media Center application is available in the Microsoft Store, can it be installed on Windows 10?  Does it work with CableCARD?  Does it work with Media Browser Classic?

 

Are HD audio CODECs supported?

 

This thread could be a place for such info...

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techywarrior

Even if MS has decided not to finally kill off WMC I would highly doubt it would be in the tech preview builds.

 

The build available tomorrow is a pretty early build so it won't be that helpful for our niche segment (as far as the questions you asked).

 

That said, I'll most likely run it on a VM tomorrow so if by some miracle WMC is not dead... AND they left it in there I'll try run some tests. But remember that Win8 preview and early beta builds didn't have WMC in them.

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iam4uk

Techy, my main questions are whether Media Center will remain available in the MS Store, and if it will run in Win10. It surely will not be included in the OS preview, or release, just like 8.

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trooper11

Yeah I doubt MC will be in there yet.  Most consumer facing features have not made it in yet anyway.

 

I'll be installing it tomorrow as well.  I'll throw on the MB programs at least and see how they run. 

 

I'm very excited about this release though.  They made it clear that Win 10 is bringing with it true universal apps and a common store, which includes the Xbox One.  I'm hoping that means good things for the team here. 

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techywarrior

Yea, I'm very excited about universal apps (although it's still not 100% clear if they are 100% universal). What I mean is that there is a difference between making UX adjustments for different devices to make it better versus requiring changes to work. (can I make a nice tablet app that works but is annoying to use on a phone/xbox or is it required to make custom UX changes before I can flag it universal)

 

iam4uk, we won't know if WMC will even be an option until RC2/3 or release (depending on the rumored changes to public beta)

 

The Win8 MB app will most definitely work in Windows 10. They made a point to say that existing WinRT apps would work in Windows 10. It would have been a HUGE mistake to break backward compatibility (and there would be zero reason they would need to).

 

We won't know about any new APIs available until BUILD but with WinRT apps now being more of a focus on desktop (Yay windowed metro apps!!!) but I am thinking that they may want to open up more low level access so that more of the legacy programs we all rely on can be reborn as WinRT apps (there are some really great things in WinRT vs. Win32 but also a lot of drawbacks at the moment)

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gsnerf

Regarding universal apps you need to be aware: Just because an app uses the universal base it does not automatically mean, that it will be available for all platforms!

It simply means that it can be used for all platforms when configured and tested to be. The developer still needs to make adaptations (and in fact define which platforms are to be served), so don't expect to be able to use all windows store apps on all devices like xbox one all of a sudden :)

 

You will also see universal apps that are useable on windows and windows phone but not on xbox one, some that are useable on windows and xbox but not phone and so on.

 

Having said that I'm also excited to get my hands on the tech preview later today and of course the possibilities for developers :)

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techywarrior

gsnerf, that's the way it currently works but the way they talked about it (briefly) made it seem like they have done more now in Win10. They never mentioned Xbox One so I'll leave that out for right now but since it sounds like the phone, tablet, and laptop/desktop OS was now going to be one and the same (with different UI/UX adjustments on each) it may be easier, or even unnecessary, to have to target particular devices with new apps. It's all speculation until BUILD, which is a long way away, but I have my hopes that WinRT finally becomes a complete replacement for Win32 and we see a larger influx of useful apps. 

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trooper11

gsnerf, that's the way it currently works but the way they talked about it (briefly) made it seem like they have done more now in Win10. They never mentioned Xbox One so I'll leave that out for right now but since it sounds like the phone, tablet, and laptop/desktop OS was now going to be one and the same (with different UI/UX adjustments on each) it may be easier, or even unnecessary, to have to target particular devices with new apps. It's all speculation until BUILD, which is a long way away, but I have my hopes that WinRT finally becomes a complete replacement for Win32 and we see a larger influx of useful apps. 

 

 

They may have not mentioned Xbox by name, but they did show it in a graphic during their event where they showed a picture that included all of the devices you can get in the windows ecosystem from the tiny Internet of Things projects all the way up to the xbox in use with a TV.

 

The xbox is clearly part of this transition, we just need to see how it looks in practice. 

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techywarrior

You are being fairly optimistic. It would depend on how many people redeemed the free coupons when Win8 came out and how many purchase it afterwards. Although they haven't done much with WMC in a long time I am sure there is still some minor development time required as well additional testing for it.

 

If the numbers aren't high enough it's very possible that they can discontinue it. It very much appeared that WMC was saved at the last minute in Win8. We may not get another reprieve.

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MrWebsmith

just fyi guys the preview portion of the website went live a bit ago... and you can grab either the exe installer or the standalone iso as needed

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browned

The fact it installed and seemingly works fine in a VM suggests the differences between 8.1 and 10 are small from a desktop application point of view. MS will know almost exactly how much money they will make if they don't offer free keys this time and everyone has to purchase a $10 license. Easy money for them if there is no major development required.

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gsnerf

Just out of curiosity: why are you all hanging on to wmc? It's been quite a while since I've actually used it but feature wise it seemed to have nothing comparable to the likes of xbmc and the interface didn't look so good either.

Is there some killer feature I've missed that makes it worth using?

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techywarrior

The fact it installed and seemingly works fine in a VM suggests the differences between 8.1 and 10 are small from a desktop application point of view.

The differences between Vista all the way to Windows 10 is actually relatively small except for WinRT (as far as applications go).

 

I suspect that if the licensing model doesn't change much between Win8 and Win10 then we will get WMC as an addon. If however they decide to reduce the number of SKUs and do something more along the lines of Basic, Home, Enterprise then it may be dropped.

 

My thinking with this is that they may decide to offer Basic for free to OEMs like they are doing on small devices and the "Bing" edition now. Home would be the main version like we mostly use now. This could be a subscription or low cost ($20-$40). Enterprise would be only for Software Assurance and business users who need Active Directory and the few other things that are added to the analogous Win8 version.

 

I have no more idea then anyone else but they are talking about becoming more of a devices and services company and giving away Windows so they can sell Office, OneDrive, etc. would certainly make sense.

 

Apple has dropped the cost of their OS upgrades (but obviously they make a lot of money on the hardware) and Google has always given stuff away in order to make revenue on their services. It's not that big a stretch to believe MS may follow them now that they are a devices and services company.

 

Of course none of will know which way they are going to go with Windows 10 until April probably.

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iam4uk

 If you have Windows 8 Pro with Media Center on your PC and install the Windows 10 preview, the Windows Media Center will be removed. 

Can WMC be installed or re-installed on Win10 preview?  Or is it effectively banished from working in the OS?

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techywarrior

Just out of curiosity: why are you all hanging on to wmc? It's been quite a while since I've actually used it but feature wise it seemed to have nothing comparable to the likes of xbmc and the interface didn't look so good either.

Is there some killer feature I've missed that makes it worth using?

I find WMC to still be the most reliable and stable Live TV software.

 

I think also it's the only software to work with CableCards (I may be wrong since I only do clearQAM)

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iam4uk

Interesting, indeed.  If MS kills the ability to run Media Center in their new OS, when clearly it can run even in this early demo, then they are aggressively terminating one of the most valuable software tools they ever created.  I hope they continue to allow the Media Center to run in the release build of Win10.  Of course, I also hope some developer will make another program that can use CableCARD to enable HTPC DVR, since that will be of great value as long as we continue to receive television signals from a cableco.  And I also hope some developer will make playback of blu-ray and ___4K (etc.) as "native" to the computer OS as CD and DVD were.  So, I'm a foolishly hopeful sort.

 

http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/viewtopic.php?p=80959#p80959

Interesting... I know WMC may be almost dead etc etc but I still use it for Live TV.

 

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techywarrior

Don't freak out yet. WMC wasn't included in Win8 until just before release. It wasn't in any previews or betas.

 

Blu-ray playback isn't native in Windows because of licensing. It's also why they removed native playback of DVD win Win8. MS had to pay a license fee for every copy of windows sold regardless of if you played DVDs or not. It was determined recently that such a small percentage of Windows users actually play DVDs on their computer that it wasn't worth paying the license fee.

 

Since the market is rapidly moving towards digital playback and streaming there is no chance Windows will play Blu-ray movies natively ever.

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trooper11

I have the iso setup on a usb drive now.  I decided that I wanted to try two different installs:

 

One as an upgrade

 

One as a clean install

 

I wanted to do that in order test out how it might affect media center and my other media browser apps that I have installed on a test htpc currently running 8.1 pro.  Then I will run a clean install as well and install my media apps, checking for any changes in behavior.

 

One thing I'm interested in seeing is how Win 10 might be a nice upgrade for my current WHS 2011 running the MB server.  I'll share what I find.

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Since the market is rapidly moving towards digital playback and streaming there is no chance Windows will play Blu-ray movies natively ever.

 

Yeah, more likely BluRays die off as a format first.

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techywarrior

 If you have Windows 8 Pro with Media Center on your PC and install the Windows 10 preview, the Windows Media Center will be removed. 

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techywarrior

I haven't had a lot of time to play with it yet (I'm at work) but so far the preview is nice. I would imagine that with the options they have put in place now no one can complain about the major UI.

 

If you like the start screen in Win8 you can enable it. Otherwise, on keyboard/mouse setups, you get the hybrid start menu. Metro apps can be full screen if you prefer that or you can make them windowed. I think they REALLY heard from customers about the lack of options when Win8.0 launched and now we have a ton.

 

Interesting solution to the charm menu on windowed metro apps. It makes a small traditional menu appear in the top left corner of the window. Smart.

 

I'm going to post feedback to MS to ask that we be able to turn off the silly search icon next to the windows icon in the toolbar since it's redundant.

 

Once I have more time I'm going to check out the new snap features and virtual desktops. But since I am running this on a VM on my laptop I can't do too much or it'll kill performance.

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trooper11

Well I performed an upgrade, which took 14 minutes by the way, and discovered the removal of Media Center as has been pointed out.

 

I'm not shocked by that at all since it happened with 8 as well, I was just curious if it was different now. So far, all media browser apps are working as expected, including MBT, the win 8 store app, and the win 8 store external media player.

 

I'm just digging into the options but an immediate plus for me is the sheer number of ways you can customize the experience.  The new snap feature is pretty cool in action, it just works.  I am about to test out the virtual desktops next.  I'm probably going to share the same feedback regarding the search icon.  It needs to be optional.  I understand why some might like it there, but not everyone will need it.

 

While I will still use a full screen start screen on my htpcs since they act as a media dashboard, I do like the new start menu option when I need to do work on the systems or for some of my other pcs.  I like how they have integrated the tiles though, brining some more usability to the start menu. 

 

One other visual thing I have noticed is that many icons have changed.  Just open up explorer and you will see new icons for external storage or network locations.  I like how they look, so I look forward to see more of the system get that treatment.

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browned

You can get media center installed on Windows 10 by using the media center key from Windows 8.1 pro with Media Center and adding the feature.

 

The up side - you have MCE on Win10,

 

The down side - everything describes itself as Windows 8.1 pro and I doubt it will activate.542c82b27602d_Win10tp.png

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