Help Me Build My Media Center

[Josh_C]

Ok fellow nerds, here is my situation. I'm in the process of moving. In hopes of downsizing, I'm ripping most of my movies to my computer(s). Here is the hardware I have:

One 61 inch LCD tv with HDMI in

One Dell computer with 4gb RAM and HDMI out (i forget the exact specs, about 2 years old)

Xbox 360

PS3

iMac (my main computer)

Right now I have the Dell hooked up to the TV. I rip everything using Handbrake on the Mac, then drag it over to the Dell via my network. I then stream it to the Xbox. The xbox is convenient because of the remote. But streaming direct from the Mac has been annoying. Plus I'd like to use the Dell's ~400gb storage instead of taking up space on the Mac. I've tried playing around with XBMC and I'm willing to give it another try.

Any thoughts/input on any of this?

[dshale]

windows media center should stream to the xbox. You could use the xbox for you front-end and the dell as the server. I was thinking of something similar with a cablecard in a pc and using that as the dvr. cablecard rental is $2.50 versus $25 for a cable box.

[walt_mink]

I'd look at the Ceton cablecard tuner cards if you go down the Windows Media Center path. Also, be sure to stick with Win7 over Win8, as there are more media compatibility issues with 8.

Sent from my Nokia Lumia 920 Windows Phone 8 using Board Express

[Shukar]

Yeah with that setup I think that ingesting the movies the way you currently are and storing them on the Dell running Windows Media Center using the XBox as a front-end is a good option. I've not yet done it, though most of that is on my to-do list. I've also heard good things about the Ceton cards, they are some of the only cards that will allow you to record multiple streams of encrypted cable content in the US where you seem to reside. Though it's worth noting they do not work for Canadian or other non-US cable to my knowledge.