World Sojourner : 3760

I love the commercials – Apple’s Mac and PC guy – and new new Windows 7 ones that feature the little girl.  The competition between the two companies is making the products from both companies (and oddly those from Google) better.  I doubt Windows 7 would be nearly as good without Apple to steal from.

However, like all wars there are casualties.  Namely, us consumers.

Mrs M and I both have iPods so we need to have music files that play, you know, on the iPod.  However, last spring I bought a pretty powerful PC to use for Media.  Apple doesn’t really provide a serious option here thanks to it largely avoiding the HD format so I went with Windows Vista.  And, after figuring out what a dog Vista was I quickly went to Windows 7 RC as soon as it was available.

Windows 7 has its issues, which largely come from large lazy companies like HP and Logitech (yeah, I’m looking at you and your sorry ass developers who haven’t rolled out a decent beta for keyboards, cameras and your damn printers) but on average it’s pretty good. 

So back to the music wars.  99.99% of all my music is in MP3 thanks to the an old relationship with Napster and no real desire to go the extra effort with lossless formats like WAV, FLAC or the other proprietary formats for Microsoft or Apple.  At least this was the case until Mrs. M got me the new re-mastered Beatles box set for my birthday.

Since the entire point of the box set was that the sound was supposed to be superior I did some research on formats and found lossless was the way to go.  My first test run was ripping a disk to Apple’s loss format.  The size was much larger than MP3 but the sound would be pure.  This wasn’t a problem since I only list to about 5% of my iPod music.  I’d just kick some random music off the island and move on.

Once the M4A file was created, I decided to test it in Media Player since that’s what would be playing at our house.  No luck.  Me thinks this isn’t a real problem since codecs are available.  But, oh no, apparently since Apple’s lossless is proprietary they haven’t licensed the rights to Microsoft, yet have purchased the license for WAV and Microsoft’s lossless format.

Last weekend and the first part of this morning was spent search for a decent plug-in, which turned up nothing.  I give up.  I’m ripping the disks to WAV and then having iTunes convert the WAV files to Apple lossless, if of course, iTunes can stay stable enough to perform the function.

They want me to go one way or another – Apple or Microsoft but if this stuff doesn’t find a way to get resolved pretty quickly I may look to a third option – Linux anyone?

Basic Problem

I would attempt to play a movie in Windows Media Player (WMP) and only the audio was present.  The system needed a new codec (compression, decompression) to play these off-shored backups

Solution

The full Microsoft Write-Up is here: Playing Video in WMP

It gives the skinny on the entire process.  Here’s the synopsis:

1) Download GSpot codec information appliance, this software analyzes the file and gives reasons its not playing (codec, file corrupted, etc)

2) Assuming it’s the codec, FOURCC.com has a pretty robust list of codecs.  Find the right codec, download it and install

3) Movies should start playing

Updated shortly after post

The above solution only helps those smart creatures running the 32 bit version of Vista.  If by some chance, you chose Vista 64 bit then there’s one final step to get the movies to play in Windows Media Center (WMC).

You need the 64 bit codecs for WMC, which can be gotten from here.  Install the codec package and all should be fine.

Why does part of Vista run 64 bit and the rest of Vista run 32 by default?  Because, and I’m guessing here, the entire OS isn’t well thought out. 

I’m starting to consider it a beta for Windows 7.

Thanks to President’s Day, I have a little more time to play around on the Home Theatre PC (HTPC).  I’d love to just play on it for hours and hours, but I have a few other projects happening so I have to limit my quality time.

Today’s project – getting the movies in AVI format that I backed up for the nice people in Australia to play on Windows Media Player (WMP).  As of now, I can hear the audio, but can’t see the video.  The World Wide Internet suggests this is a ‘codec’ problem. 

Worst case I just use VLC Player, which works perfectly but I like Windows Media Center and using the remote. 

To Be Continued …

I’m finally getting a chance to write about my new HP Slimline computer running Vista Ultimate.  It’s been up and running for over a week now, but thanks to work and other commitments writing about the experience has been non-existent slow.  There’s a good bit to write about in sincere hopes of providing additional information for people who want to do the same thing I’ve done.  Namely, setting up a front-room system that runs Vista Media Center and adds more media choices to everyday living.

But, I digress, this specific post is about Vista Ultimate and the fact it shouldn’t have been released.  It’s clever to use, but there are just some unrefined things happening that hopefully Windows 7 will fix.

My current issue is Vista’s obsession with waking systems from sleep through more than just pressing a button.  Every single thing plugged into Vista can wake it from sleep including Ethernet, a wireless keyboard, wireless mouse, or the $30 notebook cooler that just uses USB to power it (the Slimline runs HOT, HOT, HOT but that’s for another day).

There’s a lot of group discussions on the subject but what a pain the ass.  This shouldn’t have been on by default.  Using this system is like a giant game of wack-a-gopher (game where one has a mallet and tries to hit the gopher when they poke up their heads).   Hit the gopher waking the system via a live Ethernet connection, the gopher waking it via the wireless mouse on the floor pops up its head.  Cream that little fella and the new USB cooler is now out of its hole. 

Clever OS, but not ready for prime time.  Still.