Another reason to update to Windows 7: Media Center PC

I am pretty happy with my new TV so far, and the interesting thing is that I don't seem to use it as a regular TV (to watch broadcast TV or cable TV), but rather use it as a gaint computer monitor, a display for my Wii, and utilize the media file playback capability. Once my media player Asus O!Play comes, I will be able to use the TV to play 1080p blueray quality mkv files and all the video files with strange codecs, particularly all those .rmvb files from mainland China.

Since I am getting ultra sensitive with noise these days, I start avoiding using my noisy desktop computer (very powerful though), and instead use my Tablet PC, hook up to the 40 inch TV, using wireless keyboard and mouse, and turn my TV into a giant monitor. Because my Tablet PC has Windows 7 Ultimate edition installed, I am take this opportunity to try out features that makes Windows 7 LCD TV friendly. So far, I like what I've seen.

To start, Windows 7 comes with a little utility call Magnifier. It allows you too magnify either the whole screen or partial of the screen. I find it very handy since, regardless of how big the TV is, I am still 10 feet away from it, so technically it's as if I was looking at a 6 to 7 inch screen on my lap. Even though I can bump up the screen font to large font size, it's still not big enough. So the magnifier comes in handy frequently.

Then, there is Windows Media Center. At first, I was not impress with it at all. The codec support is still far from perfect. Performance also suffer from time to time, like sometime the user interface will go totally sluggish after getting into the Internet TV area, or jumping from movie to movie. However, compare with the older version, the Media Center in Windows server added some nice features, like remembering my last playback position. You also don't have to use a Media Center remote controller, as long as you have wireless keyboard with some basic media buttons, like stop, rewind and volume control. The photo navigation is also very smooth (when it's not going slugglish all the sudden with no good reason). Overall it worthy of trying if you happens to have a PC with Windows 7 Ultimate edition installed.