Below is a copy of a blog post announcing Windows 7 Support for Media Center Extenders.

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We are very excited to announce the latest version of tubeCore with full Windows 7 Support!

Here is the download link to tubeCore.

Over the last few months we have been unable meet our 100% Windows Media Center Extender support committment.

That was a drag.

As you may know, because of some security changes in Windows 7 tubeCore stopped working. Eventually we were able to get some W7 support working, but not Extender playback. We worked with Microsoft for months trying to track down the problem. Their support team did a great job, again. We are now pleased to announce Full Windows Media Center Extender Support on Windows 7 in version 1.0 of tubeCore. Fast forward, rewind, skip forward, etc are all available on any extender.

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The full blog post is available at http://tubecentric.tv.

Good to hear!  I'll be testing it later today.

     I just did a quick test of the latest version of tubeCore.  FF/RW for online content has finally come to extenders.  The shows buffer a little longer now at start up.  You can't skip anywhere want in the show.  Initially you can skip about one minute ahead.  The show continues to buffer as you watch.  It works great if you need to skip commercials or small sections but not so great if you want to skip to the middle of a show.  For those who haven't used TubeCore at all, I think the interface is nicer than VmcPlayIt.  TubeCore also seems less buggy (but not perfect).  VmcPlayIt does also does not allow you to ff/rw at all.  The status bar at the bottom of the tubeCore screen shows you how much buffer you have to skip, but does not show you where in show you are.  I would like to see a better main menu when choosing the server. 

  I'm very appreciative of free software like VmcPlayIt but the advantages of tubecore make it well worth the low $4.99 price.  It's a big step forward for those of us who use extenders and want online content.

I just tested it as well. One of the big issues with tubecore was how long it took to bring up folders with large amounts of shows within it (like Lost in Hulu). This seems to have been rectified. The fast forward and rewind is nice as there were problems before with the show "locking up" whenever a fast forward or rewind was initiated. This seems to have been fixed. Now, if we could get show names on the user queue in Hulu and the ability to resume play, all would be well with the world :) Thanks tubeCore.

lithium630

I'm very appreciative of free software like VmcPlayIt but the advantages of tubecore make it well worth the low $4.99 price.  It's a big step forward for those of us who use extenders and want online content.

Agreed.  I recently bought tubecore and am very happy with it. 

Nice job CLaRGe and the rest of the tubeCore team

This is another area where I am not very smart.  So I pay for a Netflix subscription, then pay for Play On, then pay for tubeCore, and I get Netflix on extenders?  If this is possible, why is there not an MC plug-in that gives me Netflix on extenders?  What magic is occurring in the PlayOn and tubeCore layers that Netflix/Microsoft can't do themselves in the Neflix plug-in?  What do I give up by having all these layers?

kingwr

This is another area where I am not very smart.  So I pay for a Netflix subscription, then pay for Play On, then pay for tubeCore, and I get Netflix on extenders?  If this is possible, why is there not an MC plug-in that gives me Netflix on extenders?  What magic is occurring in the PlayOn and tubeCore layers that Netflix/Microsoft can't do themselves in the Neflix plug-in?  What do I give up by having all these layers?

You add additional "real-time" transcoding. This is done by the PlayOn "server". But you gain a heterogeneous source for internet content.

kingwr

This is another area where I am not very smart.  So I pay for a Netflix subscription, then pay for Play On, then pay for tubeCore, and I get Netflix on extenders?  If this is possible, why is there not an MC plug-in that gives me Netflix on extenders?  What magic is occurring in the PlayOn and tubeCore layers that Netflix/Microsoft can't do themselves in the Neflix plug-in?  What do I give up by having all these layers?

Personally, I use it for YouTube, Hulu, SyFy, Marvel, and NickJr.  I don't use it for Netflix.  BUT-- I DO understand your frustration.

kingwr

This is another area where I am not very smart.  So I pay for a Netflix subscription, then pay for Play On, then pay for tubeCore, and I get Netflix on extenders?  If this is possible, why is there not an MC plug-in that gives me Netflix on extenders?  What magic is occurring in the PlayOn and tubeCore layers that Netflix/Microsoft can't do themselves in the Neflix plug-in?  What do I give up by having all these layers?

 

 

I agree.  It seems to me Microsoft COULD have done this easily, but the fact is they haven't.  My guess is because they want to sell more Xbox Live subscriptions.  That being the case it's nice that PlayOn and tubeCore took up the slack.

I guess its not as much about frustration as just trying to understand what I need.  I would like to have a Netflix or Amazon VOD option on my extenders.  I would likely not use both, and I have little if any interest in user-based content, such as YouTube, etc.  I DO NOT want transcoding, however.  Perhaps this is why the Netflix plug-in does not support extenders.  The other thing I want is consistency.  I want to access it the same way on the Media Center HTPC as the extenders.  So I am looking for the simplest plug-in for Netflix or Amazon VOD with no transcoding, as few moving parts as possible, and consistent user experience on extenders and the Media Center PC.

You are out of luck then, well we all are unfortunately. I'm not a fan of the transcoding or lack of HD support (AFAIK PlayOn does not handle HD streams) but I only have a single extender left and for the low price point it was worth it.

mikinho

You are out of luck then, well we all are unfortunately. I'm not a fan of the transcoding or lack of HD support (AFAIK PlayOn does not handle HD streams) but I only have a single extender left and for the low price point it was worth it.

 

 

I also find extenders more reliable.  Since I like to tinker with the htpc, its so easy to screw up codecs and such.  Since the extenders handle the video it's one less problem to deal with.   Not to mention I paid $100 at walmart for my brand new Xbox's.  Can't beat it.  I can't deny there are some sacrifices but I've gotten past most of them.

I think I just found what I've been wanting all along.  With this latest version of Tubecore, I can now stream Handbrake encoded M4Vs to my DMA2100.  And while I know it's getting transcoded as a MPEG2, the quality is still darn good.

Awrightus

I think I just found what I've been wanting all along.  With this latest version of Tubecore, I can now stream Handbrake encoded M4Vs to my DMA2100.  And while I know it's getting transcoded as a MPEG2, the quality is still darn good.

It is great that tubeCore gives you this but I don't understand why you need to. M4V are essentially MP4s except the private stream (DD5.1) in a mp4 is not valid where as the m4v it is. MP4 files are natively supported. in W7. Note: I don't mean to hijack the thread so if you want to discuss please start a new thread if you don't already have one.