The following WiunTV-HVR and WinTV-DCR modela can be used with Windows Media Center:

All WinTV-HVR models are Media Center compatible, including the WinTV-HVR-955Q, WinTV-HVR-2255, WinTV-HVR-1265 and the WinTV-HVR-930C.

The WinTV-dualHD and WinTV-soloHD

WinTV-DCR-2650 and WinTV-DCR-3250

For Europe, any version of WinTV-HVR-930, WinTV-HVR-1100, WinTV-HVR-1200 and WinTV-HVR-2205.

WinTV-PVR MCE Kits are also available and compatible. The Kits include the Microsoft IR Blaster remote control.

Your PC will need a software MPEG-2 decoder in order to watch TV or play DVD movies in Media Center. All new Media Center computers come with the correct MPEG decoder pre-installed. But if you are building a new PC, Microsoft requires an approved DVD decoder to be installed on any MCE system with a TV tuner in order to view TV.

A Microsoft approved graphics card with the latest graphics drivers is also required.

If you will use a Cable Box or Satellite box with the Composite or Svideo inputs, you will need a Media Center remote control kit, otherwise it will not let you proceed.

Windows Media Center does not support digital TV service in Canada so you would need to choose United sates as the region and select a US zip code close to your area to setup ATSC.

You may use Sage TV, Beyond TV or any of the other excellent third party TV tuner applications with a WinTV Media Center product. These programs allow you to have similar Media Center functions.

If you simply want to watch TV, the Hauppauge WinTV v8 application can be used. This software is available on our web site in the Support Applications section.

From the main menu in the Media Center application, go to Settings. Then choose "TV", and "Set Up Your TV Signal". Choose yes to continue, and then choose Next to proceed. MCE should indicate your correct region/country. Select yes if it is correct, and next to continue. Choose no to select a different region and next to continue to choose your region from the list.

It is recommended to configure your signal automatically. Choose this and select next. MCE will then scan for your connected input and should indicate if you have a cable TV line, antenna, or set top box connected to your WinTV card. If you do not see "Analog TV tuner" listed, see the next FAQ item for more information.

Choose Yes if the results found are correct, and you wish to use these results for your TV signal.

You may now either set up your local TV guide listings in MCE or return to your TV settings. TV Signal setup is complete. Click Finish.

Note: You must set up an analog tuner in Media Center before you can proceed to set up a digital tuner.

If you running TV Setup in Windows Media Center and do not see "Analog TV tuner" listed in the TV Tuner Setup result page, then most often the SoftMCE was not installed properly. To reinstall SoftMCE, run SoftMCE.EXE from your WinTV Installation CD-ROM , where it can be found in the MCE_soft_encoder directory.

Connect the IR receive/blaster "beanbag" to an open USB port on your PC. The drivers should automatically load. Check your device manager for a "Human Interface Devices" listing, which should contain: HID-Compliant consumer control device, HID-Compliant device (3 instances), and Microsoft eHome Infrared Transceiver. If the device does not get detected or fails to install, try a different USB port(s) on the PC or refer directly to Microsoft. Also try installing Microsoft's "Rollup Update 2"

No. Media Center does not offer you the ability to capture from the external inputs using a VCR or a camcorder unless you trick it by telling it that you are attaching a satellite receiver or a cable box to the external input at which point the tuner is then disabled. After capturing from your VCR you would then need to set up the tuner again in Media Center in order to use it.

A different PVR program such as BeyondTV or SageTV does not have this limitation. You can also use WinTV v7 or WinTV v8.

After you have installed the WinTV application, you can watch or record from either the TV tuner or the composite and S-Video inputs.

This is apparently an issue within Media Center, which you should be able to solve by going to start/set program access and defaults. Choose custom, and go to the ‘default media player’ section.

In here it will have Media center radio listed. If it is not checked for “enable access to this program”, put a checkmark here, and click OK. Start Media Center and see if radio has been added.

If “enable access to this program” was already checked, uncheck it, click OK, and go into Media Center. Then close Media Center, go back to these settings, and check it, click OK, and return to Media Center again, and you should now have the radio option.

Two tuners total can be installed and configured for use in Media Center. If you are using a set top box, then you would need two set top boxes connected to two separate WinTV cards (or the dual tuner PVR 500MCE with the A/V connector) to configure them in MCE.

Run the HCWCLEAR utility and choose the "removal all WinTV files and registry entries" as well as the "search INF files" option. Click ok and wait for the screen to disappear. Next go to start/search/for files and folders. Choose all files and folders. For the file name enter: *.INF for a word or phrase in the file enter: Hauppauge Be sure the look in directory is your C:\ drive and in the advanced options that Search System Folders, Search hidden files and folders, and Search Sub Folders are all selected. Delete any of the .INF files (with Hauppauge text) that are found, and reboot the PC. The drivers should now install correctly.

These errors are not related to the TV tuner, but either to the DVD Decoder application installed on the system (be sure you have one of the Microsoft approved DVD decoder programs installed), or a VGA driver issue. Try reinstalling updated VGA drivers for the graphics card in the system.

"Tuner Not Found" error after installing roll up 2 for MCE?

Microsoft has addressed this issue, which can be found here.

The Microsoft Media Center remote control is designed for Windows Media Center. However, it can be installed and will support most of the functions in the WinTV application by following these steps:

1. Download "Update Rollup 2 for eHome Infrared Receiver for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 (KB912024)" from here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=B39D53F1-0AC9-433B-B488-4CAB82F31DC8&displaylang=en
2. Run the update but when the installer appears on the screen do nothing, do not continue the install.
3. Open the file called kb912024.log which should be in the C:\Windows directory.
4. The fourth line of log will give you the path to the update installer.  (example: C:\a322f65d95b36cee5249db67\\update\update.exe).
5. Navigate to root of that directory (example: C:\a322f65d95b36cee5249db67).
6. Go into the SP2QFE directory and you will find the irbus.sys file.
7. Go into the IP directory and you find the irbus.inf file.
8. Copy these two files to a temp directory.
9. After copying the files you can then click on cancel on the rollup installer. This will remove the directories listed above so it is important that the files be copied properly.
10. You can then plug in the MCE receiver and point the wizard to the temp directory to which you copied the two files.
11. The wizard goes through five or six devices, simply point them all to that same directory,

The remote will not be able to launch the WinTV application, so the WinTV application must be running, and then most of the remote control buttons will now control the WinTV.

Microsoft has released Windows Media Center patches for the "Low bit rate" error message.
Click to view the information from Microsoft.