My Perfect Home Movie Setup
With my DVDs copied onto my computer and my 360 connected to my HDTV, watching movies has never been so simple. Sure, putting a disc in isn’t that hard, but since I don’t have a standalone DVD player, streaming saves me from having the drive noise in the background in addition to the fans. Also, it lets me store all of my DVDs in a closet and simply browse through a list in order to locate what I want to play. Aside from the TV (obviously), it’s a full Microsoft solution from end to end with no 3rd party software in the mix to handle various formats or anything. Sometimes you get so jaded with having to come up with workarounds that whenever something just works, it’s a pleasant surprise.
Against my better judgment, I’ll probably update both the file server and the HTPC in Dallas to Windows 7 over Christmas (hey, I’m going to be able to get the licenses super cheap, and I’ll need something to do while I’m down there). I would say that I’d throw Windows Home Server on the file server, but I’m not certain that it will play nice with the streaming TV setup down to my dad’s laptop. It would also be nice if Media Center on a PC could act as an extender (like a 360 can) so that I could just cut out the software used for that, but alas, that might have to be a feature that just has to wait for Windows 8.