How good can it be, if it isn’t HD?

Dell loves to under promise and over deliver and although my new XPS 420 wasn’t expected to ship until the 14th, it is on track to arrive today via FedEx. Let’s just hope my ATI CableCARD tuner arrives in 1/3rd the time as well.

Unlike my TiVos, I’m sure I have a lot of setup to do. I plan to initially connect it to my desktop display until I think it’s ready to connect to the TV. Here’s what I know I have to do up until now, can you think of anything else?

1. Try to repartition drive to make it easier to reinstall Windows, may need to re-install.
2. Uninstall crapware
3. Uninstall A/V and firewalls, disable Window’s firewall
4. Update drivers on Dell’s site, then check manufactures’
5. Install Windows updates including SP1
6. Install and configure my HDHomerun as a tuner and setup MCE
7. Install Ultra VNC and test from my Mac — since Vista doesn’t include RDP, might install hack later
8. Setup two users, one admin and one to auto login VMC as
9. Configure VMC to auto load in Media Center mode using the switch and startup
10. Finally, move to rack and connect to my HDTV, maybe via HDMI, maybe component, depending on which works better

My primary objective is to replace my Series3. After I’m satisfied I’ve done this, then I’ll pick up an extender for my second HDTV. Then I’ll start to look at plug-ins and explore the other VMC features. Unless of course there is a plug-in that I need to replace the functionality of my TiVo.

Stay tuned for my impressions of how things go.

You read that right, my XPS 420 with CableCARD finally has “In Production” status and while the XPS420 is expected to ship within two weeks — also crazy — the ATI CableCARD tuner isn’t expected to ship until May 22nd. That is almost two months from now. Is ATI that back ordered that it takes two months to receive one? I know Dell always tries to under promise and over deliver, but wow.

For the past week I’ve been going back and forth about trying to use Vista Media Center to replace my two TiVos and today I finally decided to take the plunge. After spending some time with my friend Dave’s setup today, it really just came down to price. With all the deals Dell runs, I didn’t want to pay too much. With Apple it’s easy, no one gets a deal; but with Dell, you have to be more careful. In the end it was a combination of a $400 off deal via Fatwallet.com and no interest for 12 month — you know I’m a sucker for those. The only downside is I had to buy a 22-inch display with it, so you can look for it on eBay in a few weeks.

As for the specs — I’m waiting on the Blu-ray player and the extender until I’m sure it’ll be a good replacement for my wife and I, but I’m getting started with a Quad-Core 2.4Ghz, 3GBs of Ram, 500GB HDD, ATI Radeon HD3650 256MB GDDR4, and a single ATI CableCARD tuner. Ohh and free 2nd day air shipping, but who knows when it’ll actually ship.

All said and done, it’ll cost me $1200 to my door with tax. So after I sell both my TiVos, it’s $400 out of pocket. Of course I’ll only need one CableCARD from FiOS and no more TiVo tax, but even with the $24 a month savings, it’ll take me about 17 months to break even.

I’ve been a TiVo users since the first TiVo HD for DirecTV was released — used ReplayTV with commercial advance before that. But lately I’ve been seriously considering selling my three HD TiVos (2 Series3s, and one TiVo HD — thanks Steve!) and buying a Dell XPS 420 with a single CableCARD tuner. Then I’d add my HDHomeRun, as two additional OTA HD tuners for a total of 3 tuners. Add a Media Center Extender for my other TV and a Blu-ray player with WinDVD 9 and I’d have a really nice setup.

My main motivation is to converge all my media on to one box. I can have all my HD, TV shows, my Blu-ray movies, and stuff I download all accessible from the same UI — for me I find that I’m less likely to consume media if I have to switch inputs, so if it’s not on my TiVo it doesn’t get watched. Add to this the new DirecTV HDPC-20, and I’d have a really sweet system. Plus, this would save me from buying a new AV/R as I’d have access to TrueHD and DTS-HD content via analog outputs, thanks to the latest WinDVD 9 update.

The problem of course is the price. If I sell all three of my TiVo’s and my BD-P1000 I’ll get about $1200. A Dell XPS 420 with a CableCARD tuner, is $1300 — assuming I can’t find a better deal. Plus, I’ll need a at least one extender for $300 and a Blu-ray drive at $130. This makes my grand total at $1730, minus my eBayed items, leaves me at $530 out of pocket.

If given a choice, I’d just wait on the CableCARD tuner, as I don’t really need it until football season kicks off — damn ESPN and the NFL Network. But according to a Dell XPS rep, it can’t be added later.

Of course the lack of TiVo tax is a factor, but I’m not sure if it’s worth it. I’m not sure Vista Media Center is ready to replace my TiVos.

The fanboy phenomenon is really interested, just think about people who attach to a corporation and defend it online despite all logic, it really is like a religion. We dealt with them on EHD all the time during the format war, and I’m sure Joystiq can tell you some stories about about game console fanboys — the PS3 fanboys have come after me a few times and all I can say is wow. But who’d a thought there were provider fanboys.

Yesterday I saw a post on a forum — I won’t say which, ’cause I know they wouldn’t want to be associated with the poster — where a DirecTV fanboy was taking great pleasure in taunting Dish Network subscribers because of Dish’s failed satellite launch the other day. It’s hard to believe he has anything to personally gain from Dish’s failure, but even then, the language he used was as bad or worse then I ever saw used on EHD, and definitely one we would’ve deleted without hesitation. Despite this loser’s comments, I still hope the best for DirecTV’s launch tomorrow.

In the second edition of my fav EHD comments we have a really smart guy who decides to correct me.

Here’s Andy Sullivan in response to my Why Blu-ray will be the next DVD post.

First of all, blu-ray is not competing with DVD. Blu-ray is DVD. It is competing with SD DVD. And unless it can come very close in price for players and movies then too many consumers won’t even pay attention to it.

I really hope you’re joking Andy, as the two aren’t anywhere near the same thing. I’ll give you that they both contain movies and are the same size, but that’s pretty much were the similarities end.

We do agree on the price part, though.

Ever since I bought my first Mac, I’ve shared my love and I’m not sure if it’s me or those around me, but I’ve only been able to get a few people to switch, but the biggest failure hit me today. I’ve worked on getting my wife to use a Mac for almost four years now, and I just can’t break her. I even try to strong arm her — yes, I feel guilty about it — but it didn’t work either. I thought it was OS X — cause like many Windows users, no matter how much better something is, if it’s different it’s a barrier — so I even offered to install Windows XP on it. So today I gave up, and against my better judgement I helped her pick out a pink Sony Vaio. I know Jeremy, I know.

The reason is the funny part — although she loves pink gadgets, I’m sure I could’ve convinced her to send it off to Colorware. No, the problem was one that can’t be fixed, and honestly I completely understand. The problem is there’s no right click button on MacBooks. Yeah, she knows you can can control click, or tap with two fingers or rest two fingers while clicking, she doesn’t care. She likes to click on the buttons and she there’s no way to add it.

So how ’bout it Steve? You lost this one and you know it, why else would you’ve include the right click on the Mighty Mouse and all the MacBook shortcuts, so give in already and add the button? Like we all need a three inch click button or something.

Now that the format war is over, I’ve had a few people ask or make suggestions about the future of Engadget HD. I’m not sure if they were just making fun or if they really think our site was only about the format war. Sure, we covered the format war a lot, but it was never our identity — but HD movies is a big part of it. All the writers of Engadget HD do it because we love it and while the format war was fun, it was never the reason we got into HD.

Chris Tribbey was working on a piece that was published in this weeks Home Media Magazine and asked me this very question and although he chose to quote me in his most recent article about the format war, he didn’t use the one I think sums up our future, “Sure, eventually when everyone has a HDTV, the digital transition is over, and every channel is available in HD to the point that SD is like black and white, then we’ll run into concerns.” I think as more and more people buy HDTVs and go looking for content and technical information they’ll find Engadget HD and our readership will continue to see the fantastic growth it’s seen over the past few years.

I was glad to see that Tyler from Format War Central was quoted as well and while I do think his site may have reason to be concerned, Tyler is very familiar with the format war. In fact, he is one of my greatest resources on the subject and there aren’t any technical format war posts on Engadget HD that he didn’t help me with.

So it finally appears that the format war is over and while the outcome is what I expected, I’m left feeling a little sad. Sure I knew it would end and I knew someone would win, but I’m sad because HD DVD’s interactive features worked so well and maybe if the two camps would’ve gotten together before hand consumers would’ve been better off if both BD-J and HDi were part of the BD spec.

As odd as this might seem, I really enjoyed watching it all play out. With each announcement was a new debate and although I always thought Blu-ray would win because it has more industry support, HD DVD did have me wondering a few times.

In the end, I believe the consumer would be better served if HDi was added to the BD spec. I doubt this will ever happen, but I think it would be a nice option for the studios, especially when you consider that Warner still says a few titles like The Matrix Trilogy isn’t available on Blu yet because of where BD-J is.

If you follow me on Twitter, then you probably saw that I’m not happy with the Apple TV 2. While I couldn’t wait to get the Apple TV, I wait with baited breath for every update to see if I will actually get the main feature that I bought the stupid thing for. No it’s not the video, the quality just can’t compare to Blu-ray so I’m not interested, the thing I really wanted, was a way to enjoyable look at my photos on my 60-inch plasma. Sure my TV has a memory card slot, as does my Blu-ray player, but I said enjoyably. This hasn’t been the case for the Apple TV in the past and it’s not the case with that latest update. To sum up my issue with the Apple TV’s photo experience, I’d like to share a little IM chat I had with my friend Tyler from Format War Central.

Tyler: so the apple tv still sucks?
me: I’m just bitter that they didn’t fix my biggest grip about the photos
Tyler: what do you mean?
me: go to photos on your iphone and select an album, you see thumbnails of all your photos right?
Tyler: yeah
me: If you hit play you can watch a slide show right?
me: how often do you watch the slide show and how often do you just thumb through your pics?
Tyler: never watch a slide show
me: well on the ATV, you can only watch a slide show
Tyler: thats retarded
me: so even though you can browse all your movies and tv shows with thumbnails filling the screen, you can’t look at your pictures with that UI
which makes it useless

So how about it Apple? Can we please browse our own photos like we’ve been able to in iPhoto, the original iPod Photo and the iPhone? And just like we can browse movies and TV shows on the Apple tV? Is that really too much to ask?