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[benn600]

I was at my uncle's house yesterday helping him tweak a few issues with his new home theater system.  In an attempt to show off MC and potentially bring him to the MC camp, I took my Asus EEE (through VGA) and connected to my server over library server.

I started showing it off.  Luckily the thumbnails download very quickly because they are generated on the server--so it was fast and easy to show everything off.  (should point out that about 10% of them were not downloading for an unknown reason)

But when I was showing him the music, his FIRST question was if it was the same quality as CD or not.  It's less about can you tell as it is I want the same quality.  Period.  Especially with several thousand dollars in audio equipment!  A hundred-three hundred bucks is peanuts compared to the real equipment cost!

I informed him the issues of internet speed and said at home it is identical but at that moment, it would be converted to high quality mp3s.  Nonetheless their whole family was amazed at the MC theater view interface--especially when viewed with our 33,500 media files (FLAC,JPG,DVD).

One important distinction is that he has a Jukebox CD changer and this makes him less likely to switch to MC because he already has a working, decent solution.  So switching at the very least can't have any drawbacks--such as lower sound quality.

For those with smaller media collections building a server and running MC can be very reasonable!  A < $1,000 server could hold everything the average to below average user has (media wise).  I'll let what I showed them sink in.  Who knows, they may one day decide to have me set them up!

Another question of his was cost (for MC).  I said $40.  He thought I meant per month.  I should ask him for more details but it sounded like he thought that was a reasonable price (per month!) for the microsecond before I blurted out one-time!

He agreed that the price of MC is a bargain.

One challenge is Blu Ray.  With his brand new 1080p LCD, Blu Ray is the way to go.  I know Blu Ray support would be of interest to many people--including myself when we get a dedicated 1080p TV.  Of course even several terabytes is no match against 50GB per movie!  YIKES.

[hit_ny]

I heard that the tide is turning in Blu-Ray's favour, this means more ppl will think its here to stay.

Why exactly Warner & Paramount finally decided to *choose* Blu-ray is a mystery to me  ?

not that i'm bothered either way, 25GB a pop always sounded nice as a backup medium 

[johnnyboy]

Benn,
I dont know what business you and your family are in but you guys sure seem to have plenty of spare cash, you're always saying to pay more for it lol.

If you want to pay $40 a month for MC, you can send me a cheque, I'll take $20 a month for my services and every second month I'll use the $40 I then have spare and buy a new MC license and donate it to some kid who I think is worthy

[Mr ChriZ]

I think $40 is such a perfect price.
I'd agree it's worth a lot more than that
however $40 is the sort of money you spend on a fairly average night out,
ie it's not the sort of money you miss to much, and certainly more
hassle than it's worth trying to find Cracks etc which certain
student types might try if the license was nearer $80.

I'm much more enclined to buy software around the $40 mark.
Stuff around the $80 mark+ I tend to go without, keep searching
for a cheaper alternative, even if it doesn't hit the mark so well...

[gappie]

nice story benn. 
and, ah well, some people put there money in cars, some in computer stuff, some guitars (i do). im always amazed how much expensive guitars i could buy when i look at a medium priced cookiejar. 

Mr chriz, sometimes i think i disagree with that. i paid for so much cheap software that was so useless and crap in the end. but then, there was some incredable nice stuff between that, like mc.

[KingSparta]

I think I paid A Max Of $400.00+ For A Program

I Am Very Reluctant To Pay The Price For Visual Studio 2008

There Are Programs For Much More Than $40 That Do Far Less Than MC12

[JONCAT]

I love Library Server. I upped my connection to 15/2 and its been flawless ever since. I think I was even streaming .ape at one point over th WAN with no issues which makes ense, IIRC it looked like most were at 7-800kbps.

I know there are other more detailed threads on HD playback in MC but so far has been working great with Cyberlink x264 codec (and Haali splitter) for me to play back 1080P content. I don't have a BD/Blu-ray drive yet but it seems that since all the Cyberlink codec are options in MC once I get a dedicated drive, certain 3rd party applications in connjuction with MC12 should make hihg defintion video playback from a dvd-rom drive a reality.

DC

[Doof]

benn, here's a way to convince him that the MC route is better than his CD changer...

Have him play a mix of music from different CDs with his CD changer. Let him enjoy the pause between track changes as the changer loads up the next CD (unless of course it's a really nice one that can queue one up while the other is still playing).

Then do the same with MC and just for good measure, have the crossfade setting turned on. Oh, and make sure that Replay Gain is turned on as well. And while you're at it, have G-Force or a picture slideshow running at the same time. And then for good measure, pop out your wi-fi connected PDA and go into the next room and start queuing up different songs to play.

[benn600]

It's not so much an attempt to convince him of anything.  I just want to make MC known.  He (like me) is very unlikely to go with something unless he specifically makes his mind up often alone.

We had tons of major issues with lots of things.  That's why I didn't respond sooner (not that anyone expects same day replies)...but I started an Other Hardware thread explaining the horror...which is in progress as I write this.