From EngadgetHD

"Microsoft invited us, with a few others, to tour the eHome team office and lab's and of all the great things we saw -- pictured in the gallery -- the one that got us the most excited was to see the rumored DirecTV HDPC-20 USB tuner in action. Our dreams were a little dashed though, as we were reminded on numerous occasions that although Microsoft tests lots of hardware, not everything makes it to market. So in other words, the presence of any hardware in the lab is no way an announcement of future products. But this here tuner wasn't the only thing we saw, as there were even a few indications that DISH Network was being tested as well, and while we did see DISH multi-switches and a DISH TV screen up on a Media Center PC, we didn't see any specific DISH equipment connected to Media Center. This could mean the tuners are internal or maybe the tuners were just cleared out before we came through. More pictures of the HDPC-20 in action after the jump."

http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/11/19/the-media-center-directv-hdpc-20-caught-in-action/

 

Wow - looks impressive!

Have to wonder, do all the pcs, xboxes etc get switched off at night, if so, how long does it take!!!

Tony

Ps. finally found somewhere that looks worse than the back of our tv

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AMD64X2 6000+ | 3Gb Ram | 750Gb Maxtor SATA TV | 200Gb Samsung Spinpoint for Vista | ASUS M3N 78 PRO | FloppyDTV + Dragon CAM | Pinnacle 7010ix | XFX 8600GT Silent Video Card | LG Blu-ray/HD DVD Drive | Xbox 360 | Arcsoft Total Theatre

Tony_Park:

Ps. finally found somewhere that looks worse than the back of our tv

LOL hahhahahhahahhahahahhahhahaha

Tony_Park:

Ps. finally found somewhere that looks worse than the back of our tv

Cool pics,. I could live there !

Back of my TV was worse than that...but, about a month ago and about 7 hours,$10 worth of straps, it looks nice not : )

TV, Home theater, Media Center, DVD, Laserdisc (yea, yea, yea), and 4 game systems, trust me, it's a mess back there, even with the cables nice and clean...

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-Dave

MCP, MCSA, MCSE 2003
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Technologists
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Sales professionals

Home theater specialist (10+ years)

I remember spending about 3 hours one day organizing cables with zip ties, velcro and all manner of organization tools.  I thought everything was pretty tidy and pushed the entertainment center back.  Went back a few days later and pulled it out and it all looked like a horrible, jumbled mess. 

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XPS420 w/ 2 ATI OCURs
HDHomerun
DMA2100 Extender x 2

I really hope this comes to market!    I've invested in DCT's for my media center setup, but DirectTV just has so many more HD channels for my 50inch screen.

I gave up on trying to tidy up cables.   Seems like every time I wrap everything up, I decide to rearrange things, and end up undoing it anyway!

I don't even go back there any more,....

I'm afraid I wont come back out again ;)

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i7 920 | ASUS P6T Deluxe | Triple-Channle DDR3 3x1GB | MSI GTX260 | Seagate 750GB | OCZ 600W Stealth X | LG GGW-H20L| XBox 360 | XBox 360 HD DVD Drive | HDHomeRun | Hauppauge HD PVR | Vista Home Premium

Montyward:

I remember spending about 3 hours one day organizing cables with zip ties, velcro and all manner of organization tools.  I thought everything was pretty tidy and pushed the entertainment center back.  Went back a few days later and pulled it out and it all looked like a horrible, jumbled mess. 

The advice here is try not to change anything after doing that. As soon as you get neat, some new hardware needs to be changed or you need to add a cable somplace, that is how the mess starts again....

Trust me as an installer, I know this WAY too well

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-Dave

MCP, MCSA, MCSE 2003
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Technologists
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Sales professionals

Home theater specialist (10+ years)

Well, at least we know these things aren't complete vaporware.

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Media Browser (Formally Video Browser) Developer
http://code.google.com/p/videobrowser/

Dear MS Santa,

I would like to beta test an HD PC20 for Christmas.

Platup:

Dear MS Santa,

I would like to beta test an HD PC20 for Christmas.

Me too, I've been good all year

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-Dave

MCP, MCSA, MCSE 2003
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Technologists
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Sales professionals

Home theater specialist (10+ years)

DavidinCT:

Platup:

Dear MS Santa,

I would like to beta test an HD PC20 for Christmas.

Me too, I've been good all year

I've been good too and would like to test. However, trees seem to hate my house and I can't get DirecTV anymore unless I spend lots of money cutting down giant walnut trees (or move)!

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jhale83:

DavidinCT:

Platup:

Dear MS Santa,

I would like to beta test an HD PC20 for Christmas.

Me too, I've been good all year

I've been good too and would like to test. However, trees seem to hate my house and I can't get DirecTV anymore unless I spend lots of money cutting down giant walnut trees (or move)!

I have trees too but, I'll cut them down to get 100 HD channels, at least trim them back !

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-Dave

MCP, MCSA, MCSE 2003
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Technologists
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Sales professionals

Home theater specialist (10+ years)

DavidinCT:

jhale83:

DavidinCT:

Platup:

Dear MS Santa,

I would like to beta test an HD PC20 for Christmas.

Me too, I've been good all year

I've been good too and would like to test. However, trees seem to hate my house and I can't get DirecTV anymore unless I spend lots of money cutting down giant walnut trees (or move)!

I have trees too but, I'll cut them down to get 100 HD channels, at least trim them back !

I hope I'm considered as well.  I already have Directv, and in fact got it more than a year ago in anticipation of this.  I even have 2 lines already run from the dish to the basement where my HTPC is.  I could be up and running in minutes...