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[jmone]

Firstly I should appologise for an earlier post (now deleted by a Mod) when I just had a winge...hopfully the following is more "constructive"!  My aim is to have by HTPC used by the Wife and Kids as with any other of the CE devices in our Home Theater setup (IR remotes etc) but the new UAC layer and how focus works in Vista if giving me the....

To that end I need some advice on how best to config my MC12 & Vista Ultimate 32-Bit PC the "best" possible way.  In particular I'm struggling with the following:
Runing MC12 on Startup:  At the moment you need to run MC12 as an "Adminsitrator" if you want to be able to record TV (Yaobing is looking at why this is but that is the way it is for now).  The problem is that:
1) Start Group will not let you run any application that is marked as an "Run as Administrator"
2) Even if you run it from the Desktop you still get the UAC Pop Up

MC12 Focus :  I've noticed a couple of issues under Vista:
1) I don't know why (and can not reproduce it) but sometimes even when MC12 T'View is visible it does not have the focus and key presses are not being processed.  You need to ALT-TAB back to it to get the focus back which requires you to get the keyboard out.
2) When playing a Video or DVD in T'View you see the Desktop for a period before the file starts playing.  I don't know why (and can not reproduce it) but sometimes the "Playing Now" screen is never maximised and you have to ALT-TAB to get if back which requires you to get the keyboard out again.
3) At the end of playing a video you sometimes just get a black screen, yet if you ALT-TAB back to MC12 you get your T'View back.

Suppressing Other Applications Dialogue Boxes:  (consolidated from another post - now deleted!) Is there any any way to suppress all other Windows Apps from poping thier Dialogue boxes up over the top of the Active Window when it is playing (eg Virus checkers, Update mgrs etc)?  As an example, we were watching a DVD and Windows Update Manager kept poping up a Window over the top the DVD asking if I wanted to reboot.  I had to get the keyboard out to push it into the background then eventally postpone it for 4 hours... "imjustagamer" suggeted http://www.personal-computer-tutor.com/abc4/v33/vic33.htm but this looks like it is more for getting rid of ballon tips that don't seem to be a problem for me.  I know I can config most in the relevant apps but is there a global setting in Vista?

Any suggestions are welcome!
Thanks
Nathan

[raym]

Hi Nathan. A couple of thoughts/questions spring to mind...

1. Setup just a single admin account with auto login enabled.  It's not clear by your original post but it seems you're not using an admin account by default? Do you really need (or want) multiple non-admin user accounts if this is strictly an HTPC?

2. Why not disable UAC?

3. While you're at it, disable Auto updates, balloon tips and all the other annoyances (plenty of reg hacks available for this).

At the end of the day, if you're not going to be using Vista Media Center, why run Vista at all? Perhaps you need Vista for some other purpose also? In that case, an XP/Vista dual boot setup is the go..

Just my two cents worth 

Cheers.

[jmone]

Thanks Ralf -
1. I only use one account on the HTPC (and it is the Admin by default). 
2. Turning off UAC however seems to have solved the problem with recording TV  . 
3. I'll keep turning things off as I find them (and I guess one day I'll have found them all!)

I went to Vista as the jitter on DVB-T is less than with XP

Still got the other Issues though....

Thanks
Nathan