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By creating a new folder in Windows 7 and renaming it with a certain text string at the end, users are able to have a single place to do everything from changing the look of the mouse pointer to making a new hard-drive partition.

The trick is also said to work in Windows Vista, although some are warning that although it works fine in 32-bit versions of Vista, it can cause 64-bit versions of that operating system to crash.

To enter “GodMode,” one need only create a new folder and then rename the folder to the following:

GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}

Source: CNET.com

Retail version of Windows 7 has two main primary type of licenses – full or full package product (FPP) and upgrade, where the most obvious differences between full and upgrade versions are different prices for full and upgrade license, and customers have to possess an existing Windows license to be eligible for upgrade license.

Officially, Windows 7 Upgrade version only allow an user to “upgrade” from a previous version of Windows operating system, via “in-place upgrade” or custom install, which replaces old Windows. Even if upgrade path from some versions of older Windows cannot perform “in-place upgrade”, and require user to perform a custom clean install, but it only means that user has to start the Windows 7 installation from within an existing Windows, and choose “Custom Install” during the course of Windows 7 setup.

Windows 7 Upgrade license wants to see an installed and activated copy of Windows XP or Windows Vista before installation is allowed. As Windows 7 setup does not ask for an existing CD or DVD disc of Windows, thus if user full formats and wipe XP or Vista installation so that the drive is empty and blank before using the upgrade disc, setup no longer able to see any existing installation, and will return “Invalid Product Key” error message.

Tip: User is allowed to create or delete hard disk drive or partition during the setup through Custom (advanced) -> Drive options (advanced) option (note: a 100 MB system reserved partition may be created by Windows 7 Setup), or let Windows 7 install wizard backup the existing Windows files to Windows.old directory, and then delete and wipe clean the whole partition volume prior to install Windows 7.

Many people believe that Windows 7 FPP (full version) disc media or ISO is different from ISO image or disc media of Windows 7 Upgrade version. In fact, the Windows 7 Upgrade disk and Windows 7 FPP disc may be similar, if not completely the same. Only product key represents the actual version of license bought, and Windows 7 will validate against the product key, as shown by Microsoft Product Key Checker.

Not everybody has a PC readily installed with a Windows for upgrade. And more people does not have time to install an operating system especially the time-consuming Windows Vista just to install Windows 7 Upgrade version. Good news is that Windows 7 upgrade media or ISO image and product keys can be used to perform clean install or custom install on a blank and emtpy PC without any prior OS installed. With the following clean install hacks or custom install tricks, which not only save the headache of users who need to install on a new or clean computer system, but also mean everybody just need to purchase an Windows 7 upgrade license, which costs up to $100 cheaper over a Windows 7 full edition price.

How to Clean Install Windows 7 with a Upgrade DVD Disc or ISO Image

Note: Users who has downloaded Windows 7 boxed ESD installation files should follow these steps to create a bootable Windows 7 ISO image from unpacked Windows 7 installation files and burn to DVD prior to follow guide below.

1. Boot up the PC with the Windows 7 Upgrade DVD disc media into DVD-ROM drive.
   • Note: May need to change boot sequence or boot order of device in BIOS, and/or press any key to boot from CD/DVD drive.
2. Follow the Windows 7 Install Wizard to install the operating system on the blank, empty and clean system.
3. During installation, when prompted for a product key, DO NOT enter the upgrade version product key.
   • Tip: This step is to prevent “Invalid Product Key” error. User can try to input the serial number to check if setup accepts the key. If it’s accepted, all the rest of steps can be skipped.
4. Unselect and unclick the Automatically activate Windows when I’m online check box during the installation process.
5. After Windows 7 is installed, boot up to desktop, and manually enter the Windows 7 upgrade product key to activate online or activate via phone.

Steps above, which is practically how to perform clean install with a Windows 7 full version media and product key, should work for some, if not most, users. On system that the system still does not accept an upgrade version product key, or face activation failure error code of 0xC004F061, try one or more of the following workarounds to get Windows 7 activated:

Workaround 1: Use SLMgr Commands to Insert Product Key and Activate

1. Open an elevated command prompt as administrator.
2. Use the following command to install product key:
   slmgr -ipk <upgrade product key>
3. Activate Windows 7 with the following command:
   slmgr -ato

Steps above have also been used to clean install Windows Vista Upgrade version. To check activation status from command line, use slmgr -dlv or slmgr -dli.

Workaround 2: Clean Install Windows 7 Upgrade with Double Installs

1. After starting up the just installed Windows 7 system, allow system to boot to desktop.
2. Insert the same Windows 7 DVD media into CD/DVD optical drive tray to start Install Windows wizard again. Alternatively, mount the Windows 7 ISO image to a virtual CD/DVD-ROM drive, or directly run setup.exe from the unpacked Windows 7 installation files.
3. Reinstall Windows 7 once again (both Upgrade or Custom Install should be OK), enter product key during installation so that Windows 7 can be automatically activated when user first online after installation is done.

Steps above is originally used as a workaround to clean install Windows Vista with upgrade media, and is less commonly used as it’s time-consuming.

Workaround 3: Clean Install and Activate Windows 7 with MediaBootInstall Registry Hack

1. After booting up, ensure that no Windows Updates pending task which requires a system reboot to finish installing.
   • Tip: Normally, an orange-colored shield icon will be displayed next to Shutdown button in the Start Menu Power Button or at notification tray area if a restart is required.
2. If reboot is required, restart the computer to allow any pending updates is installed.
3. Run Registry Editor (RegEdit).
4. Navigate to the following registry key:
   • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup\OOBE
5. In the right pane, change the value data for MediaBootInstall from 1 to 0.
   • Alternatively, just download and execute MediaBootInstall.reg to merge the value into registry.
6. Open an elevated command prompt as administrator.
7. Run the command below to reset Windows 7 activation status:
   slmgr -rearm
8. Reboot the computer.
9. Run the Activate Windows utility (accessible from bottom section of Control Panel -> System and Security -> System, or type Activate Windows into Start Search), type in the upgrade product key and activate Windows.

SOURCE: MyDigitalLife.com

Downloadsquad.com has listed a list of 40+ free Windows applications you can down load in 2 seconds:

Depending on your internet connection you might be able to download a
lot more (or a lot less) than 1Mb in two seconds – but calling this a
post about apps under a meg just isn’t quite as much fun!

No,
you don’t really need to pay too much attention to an application’s
hard drive footprint any more. After all, when you can buy a 1.5Tb
drive for less than $150US, what difference does a few megs here or
there make?

On the other hand, it’s amazing to see what some developers are able to accomplish with a very small amount of code.

There
are a ton of great, free applications that have been created in less
than 1Mb – I didn’t fully realize just how many until I started putting
this list together. This is by no means a complete list, so if your
favorite got overlooked make sure to share it in the comments!

Desktop/Shell Enhancements

Launchy (408Kb) – Hotkeys FTW! Launchy does more than hotkeys, of course, but even if you add a bucketload of plugins it’s still under 1Mb.

Open++
(114Kb) – Helps you tweak your context menu six ways from Sunday. Pair
it with another app like NirCmd for a nice one-two punch.

ViGlance
(198Kb) – Want Windows 7’s iconized taskbar in XP or Vista? ViGlance
pulls it off in just under 200Kb. It also swaps the start button for
the orb (on XP, of course) and does program grouping and pop-up window
lists.

VirtuaWin
(385Kb) – Most Linux distributions enable multiple virtual desktops by
default. Windows doesn’t support them out of the box – so you’ll need
an app like VirtuaWin. It’s a good way to keep your workspace organized.

XNeat
(797Kb) – No need to bother with separate apps to shuffle your taskbar
icons, roll up windows, or add transparency. XNeat does it all in a
single, tiny package. Also allows you to hide windows, minimize to
tray, create keyboard shortcuts, and a whole lot more.

Encryption

DiskCryptor
(740Kb) – One thing TrueCrypt can do that OmZiff can’t is encrypt
volumes. DiskCryptor can do it, too, and it’s well under the 1Mb mark

LockNote
(320Kb) – If the only thing you really want to encrypt are some private
thoughts and notes, Steganos’ GPL LockNote is a good choice.

OmZiff
(408Kb) – Protecting sensitive data with encryption is never a bad
idea. While OmZiff doesn’t have the massive featureset of TrueCrypt,
it’s one-tenth the size and provides all the essential functions and
includes a file shredder and password generator.

File Tools

7-Zip
(919Kb) – Sure, 7-zip’s main application window is ugly, but who uses
it? All the archiving and extracting power you need is just a
right-click away.

Everything
(334Kb) – A great desktop search tool, Everything indexes your drive
contents quicky and supports find-as-you-type. There’s a portable
version available as well, and it’s even smaller.

FastCopy
(194Kb) – Both FastCopy and TeraCopy are great, free apps that make
copying and moving large amounts of data easier. For me, FastCopy wins
because it’s free for commercial use, Open Source, and about one
quarter the size of TeraCopy.

Fling (230Kb)
- Those cheap hard drives make an excellent place to back up and
archive your files. Fling not only handles drive-to-drive sync, but it
also plays well with FTP servers and USB flash drives. It’s one of my
favorite discoveries this year.

QDir (439Kb) – If you can get used to the multi-pane crazines, QDir is an awesome tool for manually managing your files and folders.

Space Sniffer
(863Kb) – CCleaner does a great job of removing crap from your system,
but sometimes you need to dig a little deeper. Space Sniffer helps you
locate unwanted space hogs graphically.

Suction
(180Kb) – One great way to keep mess to a minimum on your system is to
consolidate similar directories – that’s exactly what Suction does.
It’s portable, too!

WinCD Emu
(783Kb) – Daemon Tools and Virtual CloneDrive are more well-known
programs for mounting ISO images as virtual optical drives in Windows,
but WinCD Emu provides almost the same functionality in a smaller
package. It handles ISO, IMG, CUE, BIN, and RAW files.

Internet and Networking

Ammyy Admin
(548Kb) – While it lacks TeamViewer’s speed and bonus features, Ammyy
still provides firewall-friendly remote control. There are no ports to
open, and if trust is an issue you can run your own Ammyy router (85Kb)
instead of using theirs.

GMail Notifier Plus (985Kb) – With kicked-up support for Windows 7’s jumplists, this is a useful, sexy helper app for anyone with a GMail account.

Hamachi
(989Kb) – Even though it’s about 50% bigger than it used to be, Hamachi
is still pretty dang small – and very useful. Its zero-config VPN makes
remote access to your systems a breeze.

HydraIRC (949Kb) – The installer
pushes HydraIRC over 1MB, but the portable version squeaks in under the
wire. Features a tabbed interface, skin support, DCC chat and
transfers, channel monitoring, and loads more.

iFTP
(838Kb) – I love the second line from the developer’s site: ” I
originally wrote i.Ftp to be the first freeware graphical client for
BeOS, but someone beat me to it by a few days and well nobody notices
who comes 2nd.” That might be true, but he still put together a very
capable FTP client with SFTP support.

NewsSifter
(262Kb) – An intelligent RSS feed reader that analyzes new items based
on content and sorts them into categories that you create.

Putty (444Kb) – Classic SSH/terminal client. ‘Nuf said.

uTorrent
(270Kb) – I’ve been using uTorrent as long as I’ve been downloading
torrent files. It’s got all the features I need in a client (and more)
and it’s well under the 1Mb mark even if you add the WebUI zip file.
Sure, there are other options, but uTorrent takes it easy on my system
resources and just gets the job done.

McAfee, one of the world’s largest security technology company, has revealed the most dangerous search terms on the internet and say that searches for Free Music Downloads, Lyrics, or Screensavers are very likely to lead to Adware or Malware laden sites.

McAfee researched over 2600 popular keywords and found that the riskiest set of keyword variations was “screensavers” – 6 out of top 10 search results contain malware! The single riskiest search term “lyrics” – one in every 2 sites will have malware!
Free is not exactly free – clicking on search results with word “free” has a 21.3 percent chance of infecting your computer with spyware, spam, adware, viruses and other malware. Even “Work from home” searches can be about 4 times riskier than the average risk for all popular terms.

Download the McAfee report – The Web’s Most Dangerous Search Terms (.pdf) and read the results in detail.

Source: Quickonlinetips.Com

Software improves lighting on digital photos

By Ian “Gizmo” RichardsA common cause of poor-quality digital photos is the lighting conditions present when the photos were taken. While there’s no magic solution for photos that are already ruined, with the help of some clever software you can get superb digital photos from near-impossible lighting conditions that would normally be regarded as impossible.

Digital photography’s dirty little secret

Digital technology has certainly brought about a revolution in the cost and convenience of photography. But amid all the hype about megapixels, image stabilization, and other technological wonders, there’s little mention of digital photography’s relatively limited ability to correct areas that are too bright or too dark.

This weakness is present not only in digital photography but also, to various degrees, in other digital media. Digital TV has a similar problem, and even audio CDs are challenged when reproducing volume ranges from very soft to very loud.

The problem lies not in digital technology itself but in the implementation of the technology. That’s good news, because it means we can expect enhancements over time. For example, when plasma TVs were first introduced, they were almost laughably poor at reproducing highly illuminated areas. Today’s models have improved greatly. Similarly, LCD TVs have always reproduced black and dark tones poorly, but the latest models give quite acceptable results.

Digital cameras have also improved, although most mass-market models still have serious limitations when reproducing scenes with stark contrasts in lighting. For example, try photographing a white Persian cat lying in the sun on a black velvet lounge. Almost certainly, all the details of the lounge or of the cat will be lost – and quite possibly both.

Old film cameras are generally better at handling these stark contrasts than digital cameras, but even they fall far short of the performance of the human eye, which is quite remarkable in its ability to handle huge ranges in brightness. Consider, for instance, how well the eye deals with a situation such as driving on a dark road at night while encountering an oncoming car with its headlights on. Most cameras would simply display such a scene as two formless white spots on a black background. Yet, thankfully, we humans still manage to see a considerable amount of road detail.

The superb performance of the human eye lies at the heart of many of the problems of digital photography. What the eye effortlessly sees may simply not be reproducible with a digital camera.

The limitations of digital image editors

Most digital cameras include free image-editing programs that can be used to improve the quality of the photographs they create. There are also some excellent free image editors whose features range from the most basic to fully professional tools comparable to Adobe’s Photoshop. However, I’ll focus here on what image editors can’t do.

Most digital editors allow you to make the dark areas of a photo lighter and the light areas darker. On the face of it, this seems like an easy way to fix photos that suffer from having some areas too dark and others too light.

Alas, it’s not that simple. You can indeed lighten the dark areas and expose more detail, but in the process those areas often become grainy and flecked. And when you try to darken the white areas, you may find that they stay white with no more detail revealed. The two images in Figures 1 and 2 are a rather extreme example of this phenomenon.

Figure 1. An image of fireworks on a bridge, prior to enhancing the lighting.

 

Figure 2. The same image with its light areas darkened and its dark areas lightened.

As you can see, it’s possible for a digital editor to recover some detail from dark areas, but it’s much more difficult to recover detail from white areas. This means that, when you take digital photos where the subject has a lot of light-and-dark contrast, you’ll generally have a better chance of improving the picture with a digital editor if your photo is on the dark side rather than too bright.

If your camera allows manual adjustments, try reducing the exposure. If it’s completely automatic, you may – if the light is good enough – improve the image by turning off the camera’s flash.

There’s a far better solution to this problem, however. It involves using advanced computer software.

New image editors improve picture balance

Figure 3. These three images show the same scene captured at different exposures by a digital camera.
__________

In the past few years, two new digital photo-processing techniques have become available to amateur photographers: high dynamic range (HDR) photography and tone mapping. Both techniques are related and indeed often combined.

The idea behind the technologies is to combine two or more shots taken at different exposures into a single photograph. If one photo is underexposed (too dark) and the other overexposed (too white), the computer can take the best information from each to produce a well-balanced composite.

I know what you’re thinking: “Why not simply take one photo that’s correctly exposed to start with?”

As I explained above, it’s not easy to do this with digital cameras when there are both very dark and very bright objects in the same scene. For this situation, HDR is an excellent solution.

Look at the examples in Figures 3 and 4, which are taken from HDRsoft’s Photomatix site. The three photos in Figure 3 were taken at different exposure levels and are combined into the single, superior image in Figure 4.

Figure 4. The three images are combined via HDR to create a single one with improved detail in both the dark and the light areas.

As you can see, the HDR composite has much better balance than any of the three photographs used to generate it. It’s also livelier and more appealing.

Taking two or more photographs at different exposures is not that difficult. In fact, many modern digital cameras have a feature called exposure bracketing that automatically takes a specific number of shots one after the other, each at slightly different exposure levels. Even if your camera doesn’t have this feature, you may be able to capture various exposures manually – providing, of course, that your camera has manual exposure controls.

For best results, you must use a tripod when taking your multiple photos. Still, acceptable results are possible if you hold the camera very steady.

Once you’ve taken the photographs, you need special HDR software to combine them into a single HDR photo. There are many HDR packages available, but before you buy any of them, try the free Qtpfsgui open-source package. (The name is derived from the Qt application framework and pfs back-end library, while gui stands for graphical user interface.) Qtpfsgui is all that most users will need; as a bonus, the program does tone mapping as well.

Qtpfsgui is available for Windows as a 3.8MB .zip file, which can be unzipped and run without an installation routine, or as a 9MB installer package. If you use the .zip version, you must also download a separate .zip file containing DLL files the program requires. Full details can be found in the readme.txt file included in the Qtpfsgui archive.

Please do try Qtpfsgui. Although free, it really is an outstanding program. Download your copy from the Sourceforge site.

Superficially, tone mapping works much like HDR, even though the underlying processing is quite different. Unlike HDR, tone mapping can be applied to a single image, though the results are usually inferior to those obtained using multiple images. However, if you don’t have multiple images, tone mapping is worth exploring. Just don’t set your expectations too high.

The best results I’ve obtained by tone mapping a single image were with Re-DynaMix, a commercial Photoshop plug-in (U.S. $16). You’ll find more information about the plug-in on the MediaChance site.

I suspect that Re-DynaMix is doing a lot more than straight tone mapping. As you can see in Figure 5, the resulting image is noticeably livelier and better balanced than the original. In many ways, the output is similar to an HDR image.

Figure 5. The Re-DynaMix plug-in for Photoshop improved the quality of the image on the left by applying tone mapping and other effects.

One thing’s for sure: HDR photography is here to stay. Indeed, the next generation of digital cameras is likely to include HDR processing in the camera itself. That’s fine, but personally, I like the flexibility of making the fine adjustments I want by using software running on my PC.

———————————————————

Ian “Gizmo” Richards is senior editor of the Windows Secrets Newsletter. He was formerly editor of the Support Alert Newsletter, which merged with Windows Secrets in July 2008.

Introduction to How to Build a DVR

The digital video recorder (DVR) is a wonderful piece of modern technology. While the VCR may have freed us from the rigid schedules of TV programming, the DVR has freed us from having to learn how to program our VCRs, not to mention trying to figure out what’s on that pile of unlabelled video tapes.

But DVRs have two major flaws — you have to pay for the privilege of using one, and you’re stuck with whatever capabilities the DVR you purchase happens to come with. If you want to expand the space on your DVR for storing additional programs, or want to tweak your user interface, there isn’t much you can do about it.

If you build your own DVR, you sidestep both problems. You won’t have to buy the hardware or sign up for a contract with your satellite or cable company for the device, you won’t have to pay for the service, and you can modify and expand your DVR all you want. And it turns out a DVR isn’t very complicated — you can easily build one with off-the-shelf technology. That’s because a DVR is basically a hard drive with a way to interface with your TV signal, plus some software to control it. If you have an old desktop computer lying around, you’re already halfway there.

In this article we’ll guide you through the steps of building your own DVR. It doesn’t take too much technical knowledge, and when you’re done, you’ll have a flexible, expandable DVR that won’t add to your monthly cable bill.

Laying the Foundation for Your DVR

The most basic element of a homemade DVR is a computer. You could technically use any computer for this, but you’ll be installing some new internal components, including a new hard drive, so a desktop is a better bet than a laptop. You could use a Mac, but you’ll generally find that you have more options with a PC.

How powerful of a computer will you need? Well, that depends on what you want to do with your DVR. If you’re just recording TV shows and movies in standard definition, then you don’t need anything very powerful. If you’ll be recording and playing back high-definition (HD) programming or want to watch Blu-ray discs, then you’re going to need a computer with a little more horsepower. There are five things to watch for when buying or setting up the computer that you’ll use for your DVR:

Processor - You don’t need a top-of-the-line quad-core processor to run a DVR. In fact, for basic DVRing, older and slower processors will work fine, especially since the encoding will be handled by a separate component (the TV capture card). The bottom line here is that the processor should be powerful enough to run a modern operating system. If you’re stuck running Windows 95 or earlier, you may have a harder time finding compatible software.

Hard Drive - You’ll be surprised how quickly hard drive space gets eaten up by recorded TV shows. A single movie in HD can use up several gigabytes of drive space by itself. Hard drive prices have dropped considerably in the last five years, so if you’re repurposing an old computer, you’ll want to swap out the old drive for something larger. Remember, you can’t have too much hard drive space, so buy as much as you can afford. You’ll want a speedy drive to avoid problems with video quality. Keep in mind that you can always expand later by adding an additional drive.

Video Card - It’s going to take a fairly powerful video card to process the video signal and send it to your TV. If we’re talking about HD and Blu-ray, the video card will need even more power. This is the part of the DVR that’s going to matter most to what you actually see on-screen, so if you’re going to splurge on any part of your project, this should be it. There are many video cards to choose from, with new ones coming out all the time, so your best bet is to check audio/visual message boards for tips on which card is best suited to your purpose.

Memory - A minimum of two gigabytes of RAM will help your DVR run smoothly, although upgrading to four gigabytes won’t hurt (and, again, might be necessary if HD is involved). Memory is inexpensive these days, and more RAM is almost always better.

Power Supply - A high-end video card and an extra hard drive can draw a lot of power, so you’ll need a power supply that can provide it. A good way to get a rough idea of how much power you’ll need is with an online power supply calculator like the one Journey Systems provides.

Next, we’ll choose and install a TV capture card.

TV Capture Cards

Always On? Desktop computers can be bulky and noisy. They’re not exactly ideal for living room furniture. There are, however, different form factors, some of which are designed to integrate with home theaters, although they can be more expensive or make upgrades such as installing a new hard drive difficult. Low-noise fans available as well. Why does it matter? You’ll need to leave the DVR computer running most of the time so it can record shows when you’re away or asleep.

A typical computer doesn’t have a video input that can accept a signal from a antenna or a set-top cable or satellite box. You’ll need a TV capture card, which has its own tuner to receive television signals, to take the incoming signal and read it. Better capture cards have onboard processors that handle the encoding of the signal into the digital format the show will be saved as. A capture card that does its own encoding takes a lot of stress off the computer’s main processor. In fact, if you use this type of card, you won’t need a powerful main processor.

One important thing to look for in a video capture card is the ability to accept an MPEG-2 transport stream in both DBV and ATSC, sometimes referred to as digital hardware cards. That technical jargon simply refers to the format that TV shows are transmitted in over digital broadcasting networks. With the United States and many other countries switching to all-digital broadcasting, you’ll want to avoid older capture cards that only accept analog signals. Many cards can handle both analog and digital signals.

A typical capture card will allow a user to record up to two programs at the same time while watching a third. If you want to record even more programs simultaneously, you’ll need to install an additional capture card. But remember to make sure your power supply can handle the extra load.

Installing a video capture card isn’t difficult. Most cards are PCI or PCI-Express cards — they fit into slots on the motherboard of your computer. After removing the cover of your computer, the card is installed by pressing it firmly into the appropriate slot. The card is then secured with a single screw. There are also video capture devices available that are even easier to install. They plug into to any available USB 2.0 port.

In the next section, we’ll find out what software you can use to watch and record TV programs.

DVR Software

Remote Control You certainly don’t want to deal with a mouse and a keyboard every time you watch TV, so how do you control your DVR system? Some video capture cards come with a remote and a sensor. The sensor connects via a USB port. The sensor for a wireless mouse and keyboard might be adapted for this purpose as well. In all cases, a programmable universal remote could be used, but remain cautious, as not all universal remotes are designed to work for this purpose.

There are several DVR software packages available, and some of them are even free. Some video capture cards come packaged with free DVR software as well, so if you like the program your card came with, you won’t have to buy any additional software.

The specific software you choose comes down to personal preference and the operating system on your DVR computer. If you’re running Linux, you can use Freevo or MythTV, which are free, or SageTV, which is a commercial application — that is, you have to pay for it. SageTV is a popular choice because in addition to Linux, it also runs under Windows, along with GB-PVR (free) and BeyondTV (commercial). Mac users can try Elgato’s EyeTV or Miglia’s EvolutionTV (both commercial).

The main differences between the programs lie in their interfaces and how customizable they are. Some programs use a dedicated server to send programming information to your DVR computer (which will have to be connected to the Internet, of course), while others use a Web browser to access program data. Additional features include online services, weather reports and the ability to convert video files to portable formats.

There is one other interesting option: you could use Microsoft Windows Media Center to run your DVR. You could even integrate a computer running Windows Media Center with an Xbox 360 using Windows Media Extender. This way, you control the on-screen functions through the Xbox, which solves the remote control problem (which we’ll address shortly). You can even purchase a special Media Center remote for use with the Xbox, but newer universal remotes can be programmed to work with the Xbox just as well. It’s even possible to have your DVR computer in another room, as long as both the computer and Xbox are connected to your home network.

Once all the internal components have been connected and the software is installed, it’s time to hook your DVR computer to your TV. First, attach your cable connection or satellite cable to the video capture card’s input.

Next, connect the DVR computer’s video card to your TV. If you plan to watch HD, you’d probably use an HDMI connection, although component, S-Video or VGA are also possibilities, depending on your particular system.

To get sound, you’ll have to connect the audio output of your computer to the inputs on your home theater system, or your TV if you don’t have a home theater system.

Finally, connect the computer to the Internet, turn everything on and let the program list load. You should be ready to watch and record TV shows with your own home-built DVR.

Source: HowStuffWorks

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