Windows Media Center

[Lee Christie]

Is it posable to play Blu-ray Discs from WMC (I'm running Vista Ultimate 64-bit edition)? I have CyberLink PowerDVD Ultra installed. When I tell WMC to play the disc it says

"CANNOT PLAY DISC
No program is installed to play Blu-ray Disc in Windows Media Center."

I seam to recall (correct me is I'm wrong, it was a while ago) that back in the days of Windows XP, when you installed a DVD player program (I'm referring to SD DVDs) like PowerDVD XP, it meant you could play it though the program OR through any other program such as Windows Media Player - because it had installed a codec that other apps could use. It seams as if CyberLink PowerDVD Ultra hogs the decoding algorithm to itself and wont co-operate with Windows Media Player or Windows Media Center.. this doesn't seem right to me, what about people who have Windows Media Center-based HTPCs? They'd have to switch to PowerDVD to play a Blu-ray disc, then back again to WMC when they want to say.. watch TV or view their photo collection.

In short, is there a plug-in which tells CyberLink PowerDVD Ultra to talk to Windows Media Center? The way the error message is phrased, seams to imply such a plug-in exists somewhere out there. (it says "no program installed.." not "no program can posably exist..")

[BluDrew]

As far as I know, no you cannot, however there is a way to get PowerDVD Ultra to start up using media center. I think Microsoft might allows HD DVDs to play within media center (Vista) once Service Pack 1 is released, but as for Blu-ray that's still up in the air.

[Lee Christie]

how do you get it to start up using media center?

[phil]

I'll fool around with this and I'll get back to ya on it.

[Lee Christie]

I found out how to launch PowerDVD from WMC:

http://blog.mediacentersandbox.com/P...9670fe1ff.aspx

But its a little disappointing, I wanted to embed the video in WMC.

[videonut]

It is probably because Microsoft is a die hard supporter of HD-DVD and that they cause these problems so you will choose HD-DVD instead of blu-ray, which I think is a low blow.

[phil]

I think the rate at which Blu Ray is required to play is too much for Media Center to Handle via wirelessly.

[jorg]

actrualy blu-ray play back is not built into vista or xp you need another program (hd dvd play back is supported by windows)

[gvortex7]

Originally Posted by Lee Christie

Is it posable to play Blu-ray Discs from WMC (I'm running Vista Ultimate 64-bit edition)? I have CyberLink PowerDVD Ultra installed. When I tell WMC to play the disc it says

"CANNOT PLAY DISC
No program is installed to play Blu-ray Disc in Windows Media Center."

I seam to recall (correct me is I'm wrong, it was a while ago) that back in the days of Windows XP, when you installed a DVD player program (I'm referring to SD DVDs) like PowerDVD XP, it meant you could play it though the program OR through any other program such as Windows Media Player - because it had installed a codec that other apps could use. It seams as if CyberLink PowerDVD Ultra hogs the decoding algorithm to itself and wont co-operate with Windows Media Player or Windows Media Center.. this doesn't seem right to me, what about people who have Windows Media Center-based HTPCs? They'd have to switch to PowerDVD to play a Blu-ray disc, then back again to WMC when they want to say.. watch TV or view their photo collection.

In short, is there a plug-in which tells CyberLink PowerDVD Ultra to talk to Windows Media Center? The way the error message is phrased, seams to imply such a plug-in exists somewhere out there. (it says "no program installed.." not "no program can posably exist..")

I don't know how true that is because I have an XP media center pc and also have PowerDVD installed on it, but am unable to play dvd's through the media center. It always tells me that I don't have a dvd codec need for playback.

I think you need a special version of PowerDVD in order for it to work in media center. Like PowerDVD SE which you can buy though Microsoft's plugin site. I am not about to spend money on this though. Oh, and I guarantee that it is not yet capable of playing back Blu-ray, yet.