Thursday, December 30, 2010

Digital Cable Advisor

This month we finally made the switch at home from analog cable TV to digital cable. I have been using Windows Media Center for years, since the old XP Media Center days, and have really enjoyed watching TV and recording movies to DVD's.

But now we have a new hi-def TV, Blu-ray DVD, streaming Netflix, etc. I took one of our old DVD's recorded from analog cable TV and it looks HORRIBLE on our new TV. So now I'd like to make the switch on our home computer to digital TV.

You can buy a modern PC with a digital TV tuner already installed. But you can also install a digital tuner in an existing computer PROVIDED that it meets the Media Center requirements for a digital tuner.

You MUST run Microsoft's Digital Cable Advisor from within Media Center to enable Media Center's digital cable functionality. See here for more information about it.

Unfortunately for me, our home computer doesn't cut it. While I could buy and install a new graphics card to replace the motherboard's integrated graphics, I only have two DDR memory slots and 2GB is as high as I can go. Maybe it's time to shop for a new motherboard.



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