Author: Serkadis

By Scott M. Fulton, III, Betanews

Typically when you upgrade a computer from one operating system to the very next level up, you don’t want the new system replacing or deleting anything without your knowledge and approval. Windows 7 thus far seems to be quite good on this score. But perhaps it’s too good in the case of its new and somewhat enhanced Windows Media Center, whose new reliance on an upstream recording prevention mechanism that’s part of its PlayReady scheme, among other things, renders obsolete Vista’s media settings.

As a result, if you have a TV tuner in your Vista-based PC, and you follow all the instructions for migrating to Win7, the new Media Center could insist you don’t have a TV there at all. Betanews was able to reconstruct the conditions of a situation some upgraders are reporting where their built-in tuners disappear. Luckily, we also have a solution to the problem that worked for us, and that may hopefully work for you if you’re in similar circumstances.
But let’s concede right off the bat, it’s not an easy or intuitive solution, so don’t blame yourself thinking there’s something you missed.

Betanews recreated the problem using a Vista-based dual-core Intel PC, and a Hauppage WinTV PVR-350 tuner card. This is an older card that takes in analog signals in SD, not HD, from cable or antenna, although we found some TV tuner card users had other models. Device Manager clearly recognizes the tuner card for what it is. But after switching on Media Center for the first time, the program complained that it could not find the TV tuner.

It’s a problem that was reported as early as last May by a Windows 7 tester, who reported to Microsoft at the time: “I upgraded to the RC of Win7 and everything went beautifully. Even stressed the install by ‘having’ a four-year-old turn off the machine in the middle! When I got to the end, I was checking out how stuff was working and went into Media Center. When trying to play live TV, I get a message that it can’t find the tuner card. No update for the driver thru [Windows Update].”

More recently, there was this from the SageTV Community: “I had installed Win 7 the first time with the [Hauppage] PVR-350 installed in the machine, so I thought the driver install was messed up so I removed the card and did a fresh install of Windows 7 without it and then installed the card but same outcome. The Device Manager shows Video Capture Device as not installed and when I try to update the driver it fails to install.”

Microsoft MVPs suggested to many individuals that they try installing an older version of the WinTV drivers, preferably one intended for XP, using Compatibility Mode during the installation. We found no evidence of anyone attempting this and succeeding. Then we tried this ourselves with no success either. As we discovered, this method is actually guaranteed to fail.
Other willing assistants from Microsoft and elsewhere have offered what seems like sound enough advice at any time: Find and install the latest available drivers. But here is where folks were running into problems too: Microsoft established its Windows 7 Compatibility Center to direct individuals to the drivers and support software they need for their components and software to run in the new OS. But Microsoft doesn’t actually host the files itself — that would be a Herculean task. So it directs users to the manufacturers’ Web pages where the files should be found.

At the time of our test, the Compatibility Center notified us that the PVR-350 is compatible with Windows 7. (This turns out to be quite correct.) But the download link takes us to Hauppage’s US Web site, where the same “Compatible with Windows 7” badge appears as shown on Microsoft’s site. However, Hauppage reports, “WinTV-PVR is not certified for use with Windows 7, though it will work in many systems with Windows 7 32-bit version.”

This is somewhat ominous sounding for folks who remember the experience with “Vista Ready” and “Certified for Vista,” the distinctions between which customers were expected to determine intuitively. In any event, the Hauppage US site then leads customers to a download page, where the most recent drivers appear to be for Vista.

Installing these drivers will also ensure the tuner card does not work with Windows 7. Realizing that Hauppage was a UK-based company, we tried the same route on the British site. There we located the absolute latest version of the driver, which we would later discover will work with Windows 7, without the need for any Compatibility Mode.
Once you’ve downloaded the proper driver for whatever TV tuner card you have, there’s a proper order for getting everything set up properly. Here’s the method that worked for us:

1. Uninstall the current tuner card driver. Make sure Media Center is exited when you do.

2. Clean any instance of the driver files from your computer. You don’t want Windows 7 automatically re-installing the drivers you just uninstalled after you reboot. With the Hauppage driver kit, there’s an .EXE file for doing just this, called HCWCLEAR.EXE. Then reboot the PC.

3. Let Windows 7 try to reinstall the driver automatically and fail. It will create an entry for “Multimedia Device” in your Device Manager, and put a little exclamation mark icon next to it. Let that happen, but do not use Device Manager to try to reinstall the newer driver — in other words, avoid any temptation to right-click on this entry and “Update Driver.”

4. Install the latest driver using the TV tuner card manufacturer’s setup file. Hauppage offers its driver packages in two forms, one of which contains the WinTV program; we’ve noted that WinTV and Media Center are typically incompatible with one another anyway. So if you happen to have the larger package that contains WinTV, skip the on-screen step that asks you to install WinTV.

5. Reboot the PC again. But don’t start Media Center, not yet.

6. Open a command line with administrator privileges. I keep a link to CMD.EXE on the Start Menu, then right-click on it and select Open as Administrator.

7. Navigate to the Media Center directory. (Yes, you’re using the old cd command.) Typically you’ll find this in a folder under your Windows home directory, usually \windows\ehome
8. Run the following command: mcupdate -MediaCenterRecoveryTask You won’t get an on-screen response, so don’t worry when you see nothing happen.

9. Launch Windows Media Center. At this point, you will have erased the setup that should have been erased during the Windows 7 upgrade process — the setup that only pertains to Vista anyway. Yes, you have to start from scratch and re-introduce Media Center to your TV tuner. But hey — it’s there! And in a few minutes, you’ll be able to watch — and more importantly for your setup, record — live TV.

On a related note: XP and Vista users had discovered they were able to network their set-top boxes to their PCs using a Firewire connection, and with the aid of some remarkable drivers called ExDeus created by a private citizen, record HD digital shows using Media Center. Unfortunately, many of these users are now reporting that these private drivers (nor their predecessor, another private effort called FireSTB) are not working in Windows 7. So for the meantime, some folks are sticking with Vista until either someone takes the time to rewrite the drivers, or another relatively reasonable digital recording solution makes itself available.

Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009

It seems like when you watch movies where there are scientists out in the field, they inevitably have a hard-case laptop bag that they just set on a rock and open up. Boom, laptop! Well, those big ol’ chrome suitcases may look cool, but they’re a bit unwieldy. Better to get something a little smaller and softer, yet robust enough to withstand a few kicks. The Viper from Booq (not to be confused with the harder Vyper) seems to fit the bill.

I’ll be checking one of these out soon, which will be a big change from my usual shoulder-bag tendencies. Personally, I’m just excited to get out in the wilderness or something, and suddenly set this thing down on a log and open it up — no thanks guys, I’m just going to play Megaman 2 for a while without taking the laptop out of the bag, you go on ahead without me.

The Viper is available now, in sizes that fit both 15″ and 17″ laptops.

An extremely popular Internet radio service has finally acknowledged two of the top social media sites.  Thanks to a new feature, Pandora users can now easily spread the word (or note, as it were) about good music to their Facebook friends and Twitter contacts.

A post on Pandora’s official blog explained, "[W]e’ve added a sharing toolbar above the player so you’re always just a click away from sharing a song or a station with your friends on Facebook and Twitter.  The first time you share on one of these networks, you’ll have to go through a series of pages that will connect your Pandora account with your Twitter or Facebook account.  After that, it’s a just a simple click to share."

As for what’ll happen next, the paragraph then continued, "When you post songs to Facebook your friends will be able to listen to samples right in their news feed.  On Twitter we’ll post a shortened link to a page featuring just the song or station you shared."

This feature is likely to get a lot of use, given the overlap in the Pandora-Facebook-Twitter user base.  It’s almost sure to result in people spending more time on all three sites, too.

What’s interesting to think about (even as the Pandora blog post mentioned MySpace widgets) is if the sharing toolbar’s existence might affect the Facebook-MySpace content-sharing negotiations that are supposed to be taking place.
 

Related Articles:

> Facebook, MySpace May Share Content

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The Associated Press: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is making plans to release on Thursday morning the House version of sweeping health reform legislation, depending on the outcome of a Wednesday afternoon meeting with House leaders.  “The rollout would cap months of arduous negotiations to bridge differences between liberal and moderate Democrats and blend health care overhaul bills passed by three separate committees over the summer. The developments in the House came as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid tried to round up support among moderate Democrats for his bill, which includes a modified government insurance option that states could opt out of.”

The House’s final product includes “new requirements for employers to offer insurance to their workers or face penalties, fines on Americans who don’t purchase coverage and subsidies to help lower-income people do so. Insurance companies would face new prohibitions against charging much more to older people or denying coverage to people with health conditions.” It’s price tag, which exceeds $1 trillion over 10 years, “would be paid for by taxing high-income people and cutting some $500 billion in payments to Medicare providers. The legislation would extend health coverage to around 95 percent of Americans.” House leaders would like to begin debate on the measure next week with an eye on finishing before Veteran’s Day.

“In the end, Pelosi, D-Calif., and other House leaders were unable to round up the necessary votes for their preferred version of the government insurance plan — one that would base payment rates to providers on rates paid by Medicare. Instead, the Health and Human Services secretary would negotiate rates with providers, the approach preferred by moderates and the one that will be featured in the Senate’s version (Werner, 10/28).

MSNBC  is also reporting that House Democrats will hold an event tomorrow morning to announce “the outline” of the health bill they plan to move to the floor. “And it looks like the “robust” public option is a bust: The measure is not expected to include the reimbursement rate to medical professions based on Medicare, plus 5%. Instead, it will include a public option based on rates negotiated region by region (Viqueira, 10/28).

The Hill: “Majority Whip James Clyburn’s (D-S.C.) office has acknowledged that the liberal public option does not have the votes to pass, and an internal whip list that was leaked on Tuesday night put the tally of robust public option ‘no’ votes at 47, nine more than Democrats can afford to lose” (Allen and Soraghan, 10/28).

We’ve discussed in the past how reporters often contribute to misconceptions about the patent system and patent disputes. They commonly report that those sued for infringement are accused of “copying” or “taking” an invention from another company, when it’s much more common for infringement lawsuits to involve independent invention. Now we’ve got another example. Red Bend Software is the latest in a long list of companies suing Google for patent infringement, claiming that Google violates its patent 6,546,552 on “difference extraction between two versions of data-tables containing intra-references.”

Specifically, Red Bend claims that Google’s Chrome browser violates this patent by including an algorithm, called Courgette, that lets Google push compressed software updates. Of course, plenty of companies have come up with various ways to push compressed software updates over the years, so I’m at a loss as to why it requires a patent… but that’s a different issue. The problem here is the reporting on this lawsuit by Mass High Tech and reporter Galen Moore. First, he claims that this lawsuit suggests Google’s “open-source Chrome browser isn’t so open source after all.” Huh? I’ve read that sentence over and over again and I can’t figure out how a patent dispute would mean that Chrome isn’t open source. This kind of reporting suggests that a patent simply wipes out the type of license covering a software.

The second questionable bit is in talking about how Red Bend (like plenty of patent holders putting forth lawsuits) is claiming willful infringement, which gives a company triple damages if found to be true. So what’s the evidence of “willful infringement.” A claim that “Google has known about the conflicting patent since September 7.” September 7th? That’s a month and a half ago. The patent was issued in 2003. And Courgette was first used in July. It’s difficult to see how anyone could claim with a straight face willful infringement when you just informed them of your patent, and that happened after the software was already in use. You don’t even need to know much about patents to at least point these facts out.

But, of course, you wouldn’t know any of that from the article. Instead, your average reader would likely read this, thinking that Google somehow “took” this invention from Red Bend and that somehow negates Google’s “open source” license on Chrome.

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The European PlayStation Home is throwing a party, guess what, and you’re all invited! crowd cheers And wherever there’s a Halloween party, there’…

A new law in Ontario, Canada has banned the use of handheld devices while driving. This includes cellphones, GPS devices, MP3 players, etc. Slight problem: the law is broad enough that you can construe it to include doing things like changing the radio station or reaching for a cup of coffee.

Someone caught breaking the law faces up to a C$500 fine. And this isn’t 15 years ago: C$500 is about $460 right now. Pretty serious money to lose because you need to text your friend WTF.

As for that cup of coffee gimmick that Slashdot originally brought up, I sincerely doubt a police officer is going to waste his time and pull you over for sipping a cup of coffee at the traffic light. Unless, of course, Canadian cops are like their American counterparts and have unofficial quotas to meet at the end of the month.

That’s it, really. Don’t text and drive, friends. It’s not safe, no sir.

via Slashdot

It’s no secret that institutions of all stripes focus their communications on certain messages day to day. We thought it would all be a little more open and transparent if we went ahead and published what our focus will be for the day, along with any related articles, documents, or reports.

Supporting video: "What’s Good About Health Care Reform for Seniors? A new series of videos addresses how health care reform would safeguard Medicare," AARP

Talking Points: Strengthening Medicare through Health Insurance Reform

President Obama is committed to protecting and strengthening Medicare for America’s seniors – anyone who tells you different is trying to scare and deliberately mislead you.  Health insurance reform will not cut Medicare benefits.  Period.
 
Medicare is a sacred trust with America’s seniors and the President’s health insurance reform plan will ensure that trust is never broken.
 
Not a dime of the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for reform. 
 
Instead it eliminates waste to strengthen the financial health of the program.

It will end wasteful overpayments to insurance companies through Medicare Advantage. There is no evidence these overpayments improve the quality of care for seniors, yet they contribute to higher premiums for all Medicare beneficiaries.
Eliminating these overpayments adds years to the Medicare trust fund.
 

Reform will make care more affordable for seniors.

It will substantially reduce the cost of prescription drugs for seniors who fall into that gap in coverage known as the Donut Hole.  And the President is committed to closing that donut hole altogether. 
It will make preventive services free.
And it will aggressively attack fraud and abuse that raise Medicare costs for all seniors and taxpayers.
 

Reform will also improve care for Seniors.

It will move Medicare toward a system that rewards high-quality care and invest in innovations in primary care.
It will result in better coordination of care and an end to the duplicate tests and bureaucracy.
It will make long-term care services more affordable.
And it will eliminate the imminent physician payment cut that threatens to constrict doctor choices for seniors.

The current top article on Yahoo’s homepage may be about a former NBA player’s "sad turnaround," but the story of the homepage’s recent overhaul is a happy one, according to Tapan Bhat.  Bhat shared some impressive statistics at Yahoo’s Analyst Day Meeting.

Bhat is a senior vice president at Yahoo, in charge of both "Integrated Consumer Experience" and "Front Doors, Community, and Network Services," so the redesign was very much under his purview.  We wouldn’t be surprised if he’s given more power, too, on the basis of the following stats.

Joseph Tartakoff wrote, "SVP Tapan Bhat said . . . that so far page views were up nine percent and time spent on Yahoo.com was up 20 percent."  Also, "The new page includes third-party ‘apps’ that users can add to the home page to get quick access to services from Yahoo and third-party sites – and Bhat said that 40 percent of new home page users were using between 6 and 11 of them."

Then here’s one more interesting point: "As for monetization, Bhat said that the click-through rates on the main ad on Yahoo.com were up 10 percent."

All in all, this represents an important success story for Yahoo; the company’s effectively demonstrated that it isn’t just running on autopilot until Microsoft swoops in.

Related Articles:

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> Yahoo Undergoes Another Exec Shuffle

When Hideo Kojima wrote on his blog, promising that he’ll work on the next installment to Zone of the Enders, interests piqued by the news were not …

The ban hammer is about to smash UK file-sharers. Legislation there is set to take effect in April that would, as a last resort, kick illegal file-sharers off the Internet. Very exciting~!

The deal is that the Government, ISPs, and intellectual property owners will work together to kindly remind you that not all forms of file-sharing are on the up and up. If they find you sharing something that you shouldn’t be, you’ll be sent a letter saying, essentially, “please stop.”

You’ll recall this was a hot-button issue during that Digital Britain debate.

That’s phase one. Authorities will check back one year later to see if the letters were effective in stopping illegal file-sharing. If it’s determined that the letters haven’t cut the piracy rate by 70 percent (man, set a high bar much?) then out comes the ban hammer.

You’ll then receive up to two “please stop” letters before you’re disconnected from your ISP.

All well and good, but wait till Brussels hears about this. Appeal, appeal, delay, appeal.

This should come as no surprise — as it was pretty clearly a foregone conclusion after his dinner with David Geffen, but UK Business Secretary Peter Mandelson (who prior to that dinner didn’t seem to care about this issue at all) has decided to totally ignore the Digital Britain report, as well as the widespread outcry from individuals and ISPs, and will implement a plan to kick file sharers offline using a “three strikes” system. While he says there will be an appeals process, there’s no indication that there will be a due process system that allows for innocence before guilt. Instead, it sounds like the other way around. It’s pretty clear, of course, that Mandelson was simply blowing smoke when he claimed he was merely asking for feedback around such an idea, rather than definitely endorsing it.

In defending the new proposal, Mandelson continues to state things that just don’t make sense. He claims that he was “shocked” to learn that only one in twenty downloads were authorized, but fails to note that stat has little basis in reality. Meanwhile, he again insists that downloading is “economically unsustainable,” ignoring two recent studies (one from Harvard and one from the UK’s own PRS) showing that the overall music industry is growing. How is that economically unsustainable?

But, honestly, the biggest issue is that he fails to address the huge question that I keep asking, and which no one wants to answer:

How will kicking people off the internet get them to buy more product?

That’s because there is no answer. Will it make some people participate less in file sharing? Perhaps — though, it’s likely to just drive more people further underground. But just because they stop file sharing it doesn’t mean that people will buy any more. In fact, continuing this war on music fans is only going to make people less interested in buying. This is exactly the opposite of what the music industry needs right now. Taking the war against consumers up a notch only ensures that they’re even less interested in giving any money to the entertainment industry. Instead, they’ll find those who treat them right and actually give them a reason to buy (rather than trying to limit them) to give their money to.

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NASDAQ, the world’s largest exchange company, has launched its own social networking site called NASDAQ Community, aimed at people in the financial sector.

"NASDAQ Community promotes market transparency and investor education through active engagement among people with shared interests," said John Jacobs, Executive Vice 

NASDAQ-Community

"With rich content and powerful tools, NASDAQ Community empowers investors — from sophisticated to novice — and enables them to interact in a variety of ways and become better investors. NASDAQ OMX is pleased to bring more innovation and greater transparency to the markets."

Features of NASDAQ Community include:

    *   Create a profile and add friends;
    *   Rate stocks and connect with other members to
    *    view their stock picks and interests;
    *   Go beyond the data and gain investment insights with commentary from experts
    *   Find the latest news and community events;
    *   Follow favorite authors; and
    *   Ask other Community members questions about financial needs.
 

>Social Networks Blamed For $2.25B In Lost Productivity

> Making Money With Social Media Marketing

> Using Facebook Traffic To Drive Brand Loyalty

Several CEOs at large U.S. companies criticized the public insurance option as Congressional Democrats push to figure out which version should be included in their version of health reform legislation.

Reuters: “Some of the nation’s largest companies pushed back against U.S. Democrats’ plans to deliver a government-run insurance option in a healthcare overhaul, decrying it as a step backward that would drive up costs for employers and their workers. … The Business Roundtable, comprised of chief executives at Verizon Communications (VN.N), JPMorgan (JPM.N), General Electric (GE.N), Wal-Mart (WMT.N) and other companies that together employ more than 12 million people, said the federal government is inefficient and would underpay providers. That would result in providers boosting prices for private insurers and employers, the group said on Wednesday” (Heavey, 10/28).

The Hill: “Although the health insurance industry’s opposition to the public option has received the most attention, business and healthcare groups are practically unanimous in their opposition and have been since the beginning of the debate. Now that Congress is inching closer to final action, business groups are stepping up their messaging campaigns. The business community has become increasingly anxious as the prospects for the public option have improved on Capitol Hill. … Unlike the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is rolling out television ads to fight the public option, the Business Roundtable plans no so campaign” (10/28).

It seems Sony is pulling out all the stops in order to get the God of War III demo out and into peoples’ PS3s. Those who don’t want to spring for…

One of my favorite games of all time, Catan, is now available as a $5 download for the iPhone and iPod touch. As board games go, The Settlers of Catan is a psycho-erotic thriller capable of hooking even the most un-hookable of gamers.

Maybe “psycho-erotic thriller” isn’t the most accurate phrase. It’s a fun game, let’s leave it at that.

Those of you who have never played Catan before may very easily pass this one by but those of you who are into the game and own an iPhone or iPod touch will have little reason not to purchase it for $5.

It’s not without its drawbacks – there’s no Wi-Fi or internet-based multiplayer and the game board is downright tiny on the iPhone’s screen – but for five bucks, it provides a nice quick fix for Catan addicts in between real-life or Xbox Live rounds.

Here’s a quick hands-on showcasing the interface and whatnot:

Catan [iTunes via Pocket-lint]