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[benn600]

Can Media Center be run on a modern, Intel Mac?  Does it require something I've heard about called Parallels?  I would want it to run while the Mac is on, obviously!  How does it run?  Does Parallels cost money?  Are there any free solutions?  I'm considering buying a Macbook Pro and this info is important to me.

Thanks.

[benn600]

Well, looking back at my post...sometimes all you can do is laugh.

Anyway, I bought a Macbook Pro and am now seriously questioning media.  My requirements are simple: FLAC, folder.jpg cover art support, and VIDEO_TS DVD playback support (with cover art).  So please direct me on a usable player or if I should buy Parallels for a whopping $80 ... I'd rather pay that to JRiver for a Mac version.

[gummbah]

Well, looking back at my post...sometimes all you can do is laugh.

Anyway, I bought a Macbook Pro and am now seriously questioning media.  My requirements are simple: FLAC, folder.jpg cover art support, and VIDEO_TS DVD playback support (with cover art).  So please direct me on a usable player or if I should buy Parallels for a whopping $80 ... I'd rather pay that to JRiver for a Mac version.

If you succeed in finding a good media player for Mac please report back here, because I have not yet been able to find a decent player and media manager for mac besides Itunes (which I do not like for various reasons).

[glynor]

Anyway, I bought a Macbook Pro and am now seriously questioning media.  My requirements are simple: FLAC, folder.jpg cover art support, and VIDEO_TS DVD playback support (with cover art).  So please direct me on a usable player or if I should buy Parallels for a whopping $80 ... I'd rather pay that to JRiver for a Mac version.

VMWare Fusion is better.  And the 2.0 beta is free right now until it comes out of Beta.  What I have on my Macbook Pro is this:

1. BootCamp install of Windows XP (where you can reboot to full XP).
2. Mediafour MacDrive install in Bootcamp XP to give me access to my OSX partition from inside Windows.  All my media is stored on the OSX partition (in /Users/Shared/media/)
2. VMWare Fusion Beta installed in OSX, with my Bootcamp partition loaded as a VM.

In VMWare, if you turn off the "debugging mode" (after you get it all installed and set up) and turn ON the Graphics Acceleration feature, MC works just fine from inside OSX, including using it in "Unity" mode and playing video and whatnot.  Works beautifully, actually, though a little slow.

Eventually you'll have to pay for VMWare, but it is probably going to be worth it when it comes out of beta.  I use a full Bootcamp install of XP because sometimes "full" Windows with no emulation can't be beat for certain situations (games, for example).  Since the Macbook Pro has a good enough video card to actually play some games, it is worth having a good copy of Windows there and available at all times.

All this takes a pile of hard drive space of course, so I also grabbed a 320GB laptop drive and threw my old 160GB original drive into a drive case (which I use for most of my laptop music and media).  A great laptop drive is the WD Scorpio Blue 320GB....

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136197&Tpk=WD3200BEVT
$109.99

Tech Report gave it their editor's choice in their recent 2.5" drive roundup: http://techreport.com/articles.x/15079/15

If you want a little faster drive, the WD Scorpio Black or Seagate Momentus are also good choices.  I got this drive case for my old drive, and it works fantastic (and made cloning over to the new drive a breeze): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817332014

If you do this, I recommend you buy the new drive before you install Windows.  I had to move my Windows partition over, and while it was possible, it certainly wasn't real easy.  Carbon Copy Cloner will move the OSX partition without issue.

[benn600]

Now we're getting somewhere.  I've got 200GB in mine and will wait to see what I want to do.  The big dilemma is that my FLAC amounts to about 350GB so I can't quite consider keeping it all.  So I'm thinking about encoding my entire collection to mp3.  But MC is acting strange right now...taking 5 times as long to encode a song as I'm used to -- bug report??

How much does it cost for the 320GB drive?  Is it difficult to install?

I'm trying a few different virtualization utilities.  But honestly the biggest annoyance with the Mac is that the built in apps are what make is so integrated -- iTunes, iPhoto, etc...but when they aren't good enough you're back to square one.  I was fully aware of this going into buying my first Mac and am prepared to re-start this desperate search for USABLE apps on Macs now.  Oh well, it's a long journey uphill from here (it's not downhill).

[hit_ny]

I was fully aware of this going into buying my first Mac and am prepared to re-start this desperate search for USABLE apps on Macs now.  Oh well, it's a long journey uphill from here (it's not downhill).

You had everything working fine beforehand.

Now you have to work to get to where you were.

That is what is known as switching cost.

Kinda makes one wonder why you even considered a Mac in the first place.

[benn600]

Because I want to develop for the iphone.  And I prefer the Mac in many cases...even though I started using one heavily only 2 months ago at work.  I'm starting to get tired of complexity, too, and can see myself giving up the advanced nature of my computer use--things could be so much simpler with mp3s for instance.  We'll see how it goes.

[benn600]

Using CrossOver I was able to get Media Center installed.  When I tried to connect to my server, it just crashed repeatedly.  I experienced a few other random crashes.  Either way it wouldn't be adequate at this point.  I'll stay tuned.

[newsposter]

http://www.virtualbox.org/ is wholly free.

[benn600]

I'll try that.

The program Play does a decent job.  It supports FLAC.  However, it doesn't support cover art or DVDs from what I can tell.  VLC is AMAZING on Mac.  It is so polished and the effects really spice it up...something you rarely see on a PC.  Of course it's not a MC replacement by any stretch of a joke.  We've all got some serious searching to do!  Or maybe they'll surprise us with a native Mac version and we'll see it skyrocket to the top of all the download lists.

[benn600]

The biggest annoyance is that Mac software just seems to work so well and perfectly, with a limited but polished feature set.  But then, with the app Play, I notice the play/pause, etc. buttons don't work.  The very SECOND you stray from highly fine tuned Apple or costly programs (some just don't exist) then you're losing that tight integration.  Say I use MC for photos--then I lose the iPhoto integration to allow me to sync with my iphone....it's just a huge mess.

But I'm willing to sacrifice a bit to try the Mac fully.  I think I can cope.  We'll see.