The couch potato in each of us dreams of eliminating the need to get out of the easy chair to change a DVD or tape. At my house, the remotes are within easy reach, magazines are piled next to my seat and if I had it my way food and drinks would be delivered right to me.
From my captain’s seat I have been looking at players for VHS, DVD and BluRay. Not to mention the set top cable box, gaming consoles, miles of wires and mess. Hidden under the entertainment center are all the CD’s, DVD’s, VHS tapes dating back to 1986, game discs, and many more wires. I was given the task of cleaning up the center; making it neater.
A few years ago I brainstormed how I can eliminate the clutter and came up with a media center computer to house all the movies in digital format. It was a great idea, but at the same time created the daunting task of transferring hours upon hours of movies onto the computer. This year, I was asked to finally clean up the mess and eliminate all the CD’s, tapes, and wires.
Our media center computer is powered by Microsoft Windows 7 which includes a Media Center. Within Media Center is the ability to do a lot of different tasks including watch and record TV, watch movies, and listen to music. Over the last year I’ve managed to start filling the computer with most of our DVD collection, home movies and some pictures.
Converting the VHS tapes to digital format is a very daunting task and means recording the movies at a 1:1 speed. In other words, if the movie is 90 minutes, I will have to monitor the movie for 90 minutes while it converts. I can’t imagine sitting through 200 movies. That means I have to actually get up from my chair and eject tapes.
I could think of a million things I would rather do than sift through boxes of old VHS tapes. I spent a half hour on Netflix looking through their movies to find they have almost all of our VHS collection in a digital format. My Windows 7 based media center has an option to watch Netflix directly from the computer for under $10.00 a month.
I figured removing the VHS tapes would free up the most space and eliminate a big piece of equipment. It took me five minutes to setup Netflix and show the kids how to use it. To my surprise it also made the biggest impact with my fiancée. My next task is to get rid of a handful of remote controls.
I’m looking at the Logitech Harmony remote as a Christmas gift for the house. It has the ability to control up to six items and has a built-in LCD which displays all the functions. One of the attractive things about the remote is its built in ability to turn on only the necessary items. So, if I want to watch a movie on the computer it will turn on the TV to the correct channel before it turns on the computer.
I played with Android based TV’s at a store this weekend. It looks like they have included a limited selection of media options similar to Media Center. The downside, in my opinion, is that Android is still a fairly new operating system and their platform is still somewhat clumsy compared to Microsoft’s version. The nice thing is that Android is built into the TV eliminating yet another piece of equipment.
Tech savvy users might enjoy building their own media center computers from an older computer. A reasonable option would be to use a Windows XP computer with Mediaportal, a free media center add-on. I have used this in the past and it has most of the options within Microsoft’s version. Linux versions are available for free too and can be installed instead of Windows.
Hopefully, by further adopting technology I don’t have to get up from my recliner more than once a night to go to bed. All I hope is that one of the kids doesn’t find the captain’s chair before I do. Now, if I could only come up with a way of working from home I would never have to give up my seat.
(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can e-mail him at remoquin@gmail.com or call him directly at (978) 919-8059.)