JohnW248 wrote:We know that Silicon Dust is working on DVR software which will support cableCARD tuners and multiple platforms and I would certainly think that the Ceton people are working on something as well. They were well along wit the "Q" at one point and they got sold down the river by MSFT on the extender software when Win8 didn't support the Echo.
This is a even bigger problem. The nice thing about Media Center in it's prime days is, there really was not to many other options to do this type of thing. SO 3rd party developers would create all sorts of apps for Media Center because it was the hottest software package of it's type.
Now you have Silicon Dust creating one, and Ceton is rumored to be creating one, this is going to cause fragmentation in this market with 3rd party pulgins. One great app is available for the "other" because that dev has that software and wont create it for the competitor.
Great IDEA, it actually runs off a media center machine, and checks for guide data, as said, WMC is not officially dead till guide data stops or 7 or 8 are no longer supported (2020 and 2023).
As I looked at stuff, the Silicon Dust project is not as good as I hoped. Sure they made their goal but, How many people actually signed up for it ? As of looking today about 2200 people.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/12 ... e-imagined
When it comes down to it, that really is not a lot of people. Microsoft claimed (posted in this thread) that about 6% of Windows users use Media Center, Now how many computers are available right now that have WMC installed in it AND the users use it ? Microsoft talks WIndows installations in the multi-million, if not billons mark (in all time, WIndows 3.1 to WIndows 8.1).
It's possible a million or more people have or used WMC at one point (more than just opening and closing by mistake). Now when you look at even 5000 of the HDR orders, it's not a lot.
Microsoft is a VERY LARGE company, they need to see very large usage to support an Application, so even if MC users was around 100K, it still would not be enough for MS to open the eHome team again and start rebuilding it.
Media Center has always been more of a specialty thing and some people just use to watch TV. I am going to say 70-80% of the people who actually use it, don't even look at the web for info on it or never mind know about this site, as it just works.
The biggest impact to Microsoft is when windows 10 is actually RTM and is shipping. Users who use it, will find out, install Windows 10 and you lose it.
When Windows 8 was about to be released, a lot of US (including me) give MS a hard time about it, and IT did not come out till after 8 was out because all the users on 7 realized what was happening and created a bitch storm about it.
I know there is a lot of fans on here who use it and follow it but, I am going to say most people wont say anything about it, never mind tweet about it.
Our ONLY hope for Media Center it seems is when Windows 10 is released and those CLOSET Media Center users/fans start coming out of the closet and being very vocal about it.
At this point that is about the only way we are actually going to SAVE WMC (and by saving, just to have the SAME version dropped in Windows 10)....
Very sad indeed...