Media Center vs. Front Row

I hate to say, I just watched the keynote, and Steve made a really thoughtless comment that got the crowd cheering.
He had a comparison of the iMac remote, and 2 different Windows XP Media Center remotes from HP and Gateway. He pointed out that the MC remotes had around 50 buttons, and the iMac remote had 6. This is an absurd comparison.
The Media Center remotes allow you to pause, play, record, rewind, and fastforward TV. They also have, EQ controls, volume, audio switching, video input, and many other useful controls.
There's no surround sound with an iMac. There's no hi-def inputs with an iMac. There's just volume, play, rewind, fastforward. (with the remote).
And yes, I own a Media Center PC, and such a copy Front Row is. He's bragging about it like it's new technology, when the Media Center has been around for 4 years or so. He even copied the in-menu interface (once you choose music or video, etc.).
Vikram

Vikram's point was that Media Center has been out first for 4 years and Apple just NOW came out with it. And copied parts of it besides. By the way, other things, like Widgets, has been out for PC's a while before they were included in Tiger. Apple is not as great as they, and Steve Jobs, think they are. And everything Apple is still overpriced compared to PC's.

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HP Media Center m7350n front head ohone jack

the question appleis to my hp media center desktop pc m7350n. afterinstalling windows 8 preview i am not seeing the audio manager icon with which to choose the output jacks in the front of the desktop.
This product is different from what appears above. Thanks.

I did that. But the front desktop connectivity center is not having output still.
When I click the "speaker" icon on toolbar, I see :speakers" and "realtek audio" as two audio playback devices.
Both are realtek audio outputs
But the
The first one is outputted in rear jack next to microphone and I can hear it in monitor or head set.
Thanks.
Second one when tested shows green signal as if it is outputting sound, but I cannot hear it in any of the output jacks-front or back.
I use d to be able tp see a small window"audio manager" with all the jacks in a diagram. But I cannot see it now,.
Thanks you.
Thirumalesh

Thinking of buying iMac, Front row Question

I'm thinking of getting a new iMac that would be hooked up to my media center downstairs and used by my wife for non-front row purposes (email, internet access). My problem is I've read somewhere that Front Row might not work with music from a connected iPod or shared libraries over a home network. Since my 140GB music collection is upstairs on my G5 this is an issue I need to have clarified because not being able to view content on any of my networked macs would negate one of the reasons I'm buying this mac.
So, can Front Row play music from my networked G5 upstairs or am I going to be better off fixing up my old Pismo to give to my wife and buying something like the Squeezebox (http://www.slimdevices.com/) for my media needs?

Front Row needs the audio files to be in the designated iTunes folder. However, I don't believe this folder needs to be on the iMac. If you changed the iTunes Folder Location in iTunes Preferences to the networked G5 then I believe Front Row will play those tracks from the G5 as long as you have the G5's hard drive mounted via File Sharing.
The following is from iTunes Help:
If you try to play a song in Front Row on your iMac G5 (iSight) but the application can't find the song because it's not in the default iTunes library, you'll see an alert message that either says, "iTunes cannot play this song" or "Communications error." If this happens, just show Front Row where you keep your music.
If you keep all of your music in one folder location:
Open iTunes.
From the iTunes menu, choose Preferences.
Click the Advanced tab, then click the General tab below it.
Click Change next to the "iTunes Music folder location" section.
Navigate to and select the folder that contains your tunes.
Click Choose.
Click OK.
If your music is stored in different folder locations:
Open iTunes.
From the Advanced menu, choose Consolidate Library to copy songs from all locations to your default iTunes Music folder. Let the consolidation process finish before you go back to Front Row.
Tip: If you want to play just one song from another folder, play the song in iTunes first. Front Row will be able to find it once iTunes knows where the song is located.

I prefer Windows Media Center (but I would like to use Front Row)

This is a plea to Apple that they would update Front Row with some more functionalities!
I'm using my Mac mini as a HTPC and it's doing it's job absolutely great - thanks to Windows Media Center.... Awwww, I wish I didn't have to write that
Well, it's all about functionality and at that point, I have the conviction that WMC is really kicking FR's a**. I really don't get why Apple has chosen to put a media center software (don't know if I dare to call it that) in their OS which lacks of so many important functions.
One of the important things for me, in a media center software, is support for TV tuners, and guess what... Windows Media Center has this, but there's no support in Front Row.
I would also like to see more integration with iTunes, so that I can use the Remote app on my iPhone to control the music in FR and so it's possible to use the party function (also with the Remote app, cause that works really great).
This is only some of the functionalities I miss in Front Row, but I do hope that Apple will consider those so I can get rid of Windows from my machine.
//Cheers

Best way to convey your wishes to Apple is to send them feedback.
Where to send product feedback to Apple:
http://www.apple.com/feedback/

Mac mini and Front Row - entertainment center

I plan to use a mac mini as a replacement for my CD jukebox and DVD player in my entertainment center. I have everything, including the HD cable box through the Yamaha receiver - what am I going to need to make this work? Router, etc??? Does Front Row just play media or do I use it to rip CD's - or is that Itunes?
Thanks, Just getting in to the mac and really like the operating system much more than Windows DME.

I did the same thing about a month ago, but we loved the Mac Mini so much more than our PC that I moved it to my desk and it's now my main PC. I plan on checking out the iTV like the previous post stated when it comes out too.
But, back to your question . . . Depending on what kind of TV you have, you may need an adaptor. For an HD widescreen TV, you can connect direct DVI if your TV has the connector, or you can get a DVI to HDMI cable (about $110) to go to an HDMI connection. I'm not aware that there are converters for composite video. For digital audio, you should get the mini to optical toslink converter. They sell it on the Apple store. I couldn't find one at Circuit City, Best Buy, CompUSA, or my local Apple store, but got one at a Re-Mac store. I recommend just buying it online. If you have music already imported to iTunes on a PC or another Mac, you can stream it to the Mac Mini on a wireless network. If you don't have one, you'll need a wireless router. Wireless G is the standard and works great. N is the new standard coming out, but unless you'll be streaming video over the network, it's overkill. The mini will easily hook right up to it once your network router is turned on and you've named your network. You can play iTunes songs and playlists from the other computer through Front Row as long as you have the music sharing option turned on in iTunes (PC or Mac) on the computer that holds the music. If you're just going to have the music on the Mac mini, none of the wireless shareing is necessary.
On your last question, Front Row doesn't rip CDs, but you just rip the CDs into iTunes and then Front Row will automatically see any music or playlists from iTunes. Front Row is basically just putting window dressing on iTunes for music. In fact, you can see after closing Front Row, that the little black arrow is under the iTunes icon on your dock meaning that it is open (even if you didn't open it before).
One last note, the mini won't work as a PVR unless you buy an external device to work as a TV tuner. You can search the discussions on Mac Mini to find a lot of posts for recommendations on how to do that.
I've been combing these discussion boards for the last month learning everything I need to know about the Mac. They're great for any other questions you have. Good luck!
Mac Mini 1.83 Intel Core Duo Mac OS X (10.4.8)

How do I point Front Row to a media server using AppleShare?

I haven't used Front Row much. Does it have to use the same library as my iTunes? What I'd like to do is point Front Row on my various Macs to my Lacie Media server. I fooled around with "settings" in Front Row but I'm not finding the server on my network.

Drag an alias of your movies folder from the media server to your Front Row computer's movies folder inside your home account. Front Row will allow you to navigate using that alias.

Why did you drop Front Row? I use my mac as a media centre and apple TV will not work (no DVD control)

Front Row was an eligant way to access our media files (our nanny, my mom and other non mac users) found it easy. Apple TV would work but there is no DVD contol so it is out as the mac is our media server.
APPLE BRING BACK FRONT ROW!

http://www.mac-hatter.com/blog/frontrowenablerforlion
Plex as a replacement for Front Row. See http://www.plexapp.com
MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.1), 2.4GHz IntelCore i5 320 HD 8GB RAM ParallelsDesktop6.0

Front Row - Mac Mini - and PowerBook G4, Mac-Mini Multi Media centre.

I will be purchasing a HDTV is the near future and would like to buy a Mac Mini to complement it. ( then sell my DVD player )
The big question are:
-Can I ( using Front Row ) stream AVI data (film) from my PB G4 to my Mac-Mini and watch the content on my new HDTV. ( over AirPort )
-Do I need to buy a new PB that also has Front Row ? ( I hope not )
-What type of video data can I stream ? (iTunes and iPhoto I already know about)
-What about HD DVD's when they come out. Is the drive in the Mac-Mini HD DVD compatible ?( I don't think so )
Please - If you have any other relevant points or question's about the Mac-Mini usage as a multi media centre, Post them here.
15" PB G4 SD 1.5 GHz Mac OS X (10.4.5)

I just tried a AVI film and it work's with QT,
although a mpg film did not.
Now that I think about it, I tried a mpg plug-in for
QT and was disappointed.
Has anyone had any success with such a plug-in ?
Another Question:
Must then this AVI data reside in iTunes for
Front-Row to "see" it ? How does this work ?
I guess that when a Blue-Ray drive is added to Apple
products that a HD DVD will not play, or will it play
it but only burn Blue-Ray ?
When shopping for a HDTV I asked about the difference
in Blue-Ray and HD and he told me that the TV will
play both versions.
I hope that the drive will also play both, although
the way I know Apple it will be Blue-Ray only. (
at-least in the beginning ) Remember DVD-R
i would not worry about the blu-ray - HD-DVD thing right now. too much still in the air. once they realize consumers are too un-techie to figure it out and just continue to buy DVD's their will be a standard plus their is already other formats being developed. then if you talking about movies and such my guess is downloaded content is the way apple will go with an itunes movie store but thats my guess.
but yes, HDTV's will play either, its the player. I have a 61" samsung 720p DLP and my new mac mini looks good on it at 1280x720. front row is great. I also watched a ton of HD trailers from quicktime's website and they were amazing.
and from what i have seen from front row it only shows content that is in itunes or iphoto not random folders but i could be wrong, still palying around with it.

Front Row 'Sources' not finding media server

Hi all!
I use my Mac Mini as a media server for my apple TV and all my computers/macs with iTunes.
Everything works fine apart from Front Row on my MacBook that only seems able to find my local machine under sources.
Any ideas?

You are not alone. I am experiencing the same problem.
We have consolidated all of our music and videos (much if it purchased via iTunes) onto a NAS media server. Our Macs have no problem seeing the server either from within iTunes or QuickTime Player. Yet, trying to find it using Front Row is impossible. There are no menu source options other than one's own mac or, alternatively, the iTunes Server mothership.
Either this is an oversight in the way Front Row was written, or more likely, it's some Draconian control issue decided in Cupertino.
For anyone who's acquired a lot of content (all legally, too, I might add) and stores it externally of his/her mac, this issue makes Front Row useless.

Front Row causing sleep when media on external drive

Hello. I have my media on an external drive, a WD My Book. I am getting a "no signal" message from my monitor when browsing with Front Row. If I click the remote, it will wake back up, for about 20 seconds.
It seems like the new Front Row doesn't use iTunes as intimately as before.
Where is my Video Podcast list?
Where's the cool animation transition when you envoke Front Row?

I did this and it didn't stop the "blinking." The machine still appears to sleep the display for about a second every 10 minutes or so (about the amount of time my Energy Saver is set to kick in).

Possible to use both Front Row AND Media Central with same Apple Remote?

Dear Fellow Mac Users,
I have just got a copy of Media Central as i want to use it to view movie files with due to its great codec support. however due to its slightly sluggish and cumbersome design i'd like to continue to use front row for my itunes and dvd needs. whatsmore i'd like to be able to command both programs when i want them using my apple remote. is this possible?
Tim

Yes. I do this right now - mainly using Media Central, and switching to Front Row if I have .mkv files to watch.
What I do is since you hit "Menu" to load Front Row, I just went into MediaCentral's preferences and had "Play" launch MediaCentral. Once you are in one, it 'grabs' the remote commands, so you shouldn't have to worry about it loading the other program.

Any way of getting Real Media files to play in Front Row?

I was just wondering if there is any way to get Real Media files to play in Front Row? I realise this is probably not possible, but I thought I'd ask people who know more about this than me!!
I do have Real Player installed if that helps......

Probably not right now. Since Front Row uses iPhoto to play slideshows, the DVD Player to play DVDs, iTunes to play MP3s and the QuickTime Player to play videos, there's no way now to change the default video player application. All of those connections are hard-wired into the software. Apple has not released any kind of SDK (software development kit) for third parties to add on to Front Row, so it would have to be an unauthorized hack to get another video player to run. I might suggest you send Apple some Mac OS X feedback and let them know you'd like to see third party add-ons to Front Row.
-Doug

Media not showing in Front Row

I'm new to mac and just bought a macbook. There is probably an easy solution to this, but when i use Front Row, my TV Shows and Music Videos are not showing up. It says that I do not have any TV Shows in my iTunes Library. But obiviously i do.
How do I get them to show up??

It all depends where your saving your iTunes is saving its media (. i used to have problems with this but since I dont use iTunes for movies anymore I just put all of them directly into my movies folder and things work beautifully now.
P.S. File type is very important as well. I had some problems with .avi's and wmv's iTunes doesnt play nicely with others.

External Hard Drive media in Front Row

I know this has been answered before, but I'm still new to OSX and the answer was too technical. Anyway, I just installed a 250GB External HD, and I'm planning on saving a lot of movies and possibly music on it. How can I access these files using Front Row?
P.S. A similar post answered... type "ln -s /Users/your_user/Movies/ /Volumes/MassiveMedia/Media/" (sans quotes) in Terminal. I found Terminal on my comp but I don't know how to use it.

You could also place all your movies on the external drive into a folder, create an alias of that folder and put the alias in your Movies folder in your 'home'. Front Row will play the movies on your external through the alias folder placed in your movies folder!
Hope this helps!

Front Row crashes when I try to access media

Hi,
Whenever I try to use Front Row I just crashes. The programme launches fine and I can navigate through the menus. But when I select a specific media it crashes. Eg I go to music then when I select Artists it tried to open the folder but then hangs. I am then unable to quit and have to re-start with the power switch. I have the same problem If I try to access movies.
If I try to access pictures via iPhoto it works fine.
Anyone got any ideas?

Hi again,
I don't know where the file is in tiger, nor it's name for sure, but I'd get EasyFind...
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/8707
Quit Front Row, then search your HDD for front row .plist, with a space between t&r and w&.
Check only files, All words, case insensitive, & invisibles.
Trash that file, most likely in your user's prefs folder, reboot & try again.

Media Center vs. Front Row

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