Music search and remote questions (1 Viewer)

[clunesy]

Hi everyone, let me start by saying I'm loving the MP experience so far on my new build HTPC.

In the past I was the sort of guy who persevered with everything, read the forums and put in the time to find solutions. Sadly now with job, wife, house, family, small child etc, what little spare time I have will be spent using the HTPC, not tweaking it. As my time is at a premium I certainly appreciate your time with any help I get in forums online. With that in mind can anyone point me toward a solution with the following ?

My setup in a nutshell :

Asus P5Q-EM mobo, (HDMI out at 1920x1080 60hz) SPDIF optical to my amp
Vista 32 SP1,
MS MCE remote USB receiver -
Logitech Harmony 525 remote
Pioneer DVD-RW drive [I don't really care about disc playback at this stage, 99% file-based]

1) I hate Vista. What will I lose if I go back to XP ? Codec support shouldn't be an issue. Will the MCE remote receiver and IR server suite work ok ?
I don't care about BluRay support for the moment, and will only occasionally play any discs at all.

2) At the moment I'm using the vanilla Microsoft MCE device profile in my Harmony 525, it seems to have a few buttons missing when using the music part of the software (I can't seem to queue tracks - even though this is the default setting, and I can't click on 'x' delete buttons etc). Is there a better setting I should be using ? What is the ideal remote profile to use - Does IR server suite offer more functionality.

3) If I want to do an artist search under music, how would I make a list profile to show me every single artists on one page. I don't like having to choose the initial letter, before I can search. Is there way to list all of them (I don't mind if the list is thousands and the search is slower).


Thanks again in advance for any help.



Niels

 

[clunesy]

Hi there, sorry to pester. Really hoping for some recommendations on WinXP ?
Is it satisfactory for MP ? What are the pitfalls.

many thanks

Clunesy

 

[pt4117]

Never had Vista with Media Portal, but it works just fine with XP. I used both an old MCE remote, and harmony and they both worked. Some of the buttons weren't what I wanted them to be, but you can easily remap them.

I just did a clean XP Pro install, and I did all Windows updates, driver updates, and installed the XP codec pack, and everything is fine. The only issue I think you might run into is drivers. Check to make sure your hardware has an XP driver, and you should be fine.

I was lucky, I was going from XP MCE installed on the box to XP Pro, so I was able to copy all of the drivers with DriverMax. They say you can try using the Vista ones in XP, but it isn't always going to work.

Sorry I can answer more of your questions, I'm still pretty new to this.

 

[clunesy]

Thankyou very much for our reply. Up and running on XP. Can anyone help with the artist search ? How do I list all (thousands)of artists in one page ?

thanks

Clunesy