Is that a Windows error message or PowerDirector? Vista home basic doesn't support Media Center, but Home Pro does, so that may be intentional from Windows. MediaShow Expresso will convert it if you want to go a commercial route. However, it looks to be supported by PD 8, so that may not solve your problem. I'm not sure that helped at all, but I hope it didn't confuse you. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

Hi Craig -

I just read in a Microsoft forum the you can right click on the .wtv file and there's an option to convert it to dvr-ms (she's one of the "expert" columnists, so I'll take her word for it).

Check it out at http://www.microsoft.com/communities/newsgroups/en-us/default.aspx?dg=microsoft.public.windows.mediacenter&tid=00011e72-1301-421e-9156-5d16d0476fde&cat=&lang=&cr=&sloc=&p=1

Cheers - Tony
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Thx for the info, though I guess I could be clearer on what my rig is. Basically I have 3 systems, 2 of which Windows Vista Ultimate normally. One of the Vista machines i am running Windows 7 Ultimate RC7100 until the offical release in October. I am already upgradeing atleast one of my machines to Windows 7 for Media Center updates, and i might upgrade the other one as well.

To add a little bit more confusion to the mix I am running an HD PVR from Hauppauge. I am able to link it into media center using a software called DVBLink. It works great the majority of the time and is finally a none OCAP way of getting hd content into the comp. It is also a fully hardware encoder based solution for h.264 video encoding. I believe that is were the problem starts

Some are not aware but the *.wtv format was designed for a few different reasons one of which was to support newer video streams beyond Mpeg2. That is why the HD PVR can work and store it's video streams in *.wtv files. The HD PVR wasn't even an option with Media Center until the Vista TV Pack 2008 was released and added *.wtv file container. Windows 7 just brings it to the masses.

The convert to DVR-MS tool mentioned by Tony is an option as long as my streams aren't recorded over my HD PVR. My tunner card still has a Mpeg2 Encoder. The problem is that the convert tool doesn't work with the HD PVR recorded shows as the h.264 stream is compatiable with DVR-MS container. The key with DVR-MS is that there are already numerous tools out there for manipulating those files that would automate encoding and make it much easier. If i could stick strickly with it i wouldn't even be asking for an encoding tool for *.WTV files.

My suspicion is that if they do have some support for *.wtv files they aren't taking into account the possiblity for the different streams it can be a container for. I say that but last night i couldn't get it to work with a file recorded over my Tuner card as well so i don't know.

They show *.wtv as a supported media file when browsing for media, so i would expect it to work. If it doesn't work then I would expect them to fix it as it is shown in the supported media files. I am considering buying PD8 if they can get this going. I really am hopeing that GPU Accelleration can decrease my transcode times. I do have another companies video software that is able to manipulate *.wtv files but it is cpu only, and takes for ever to do a single video in HD quality.

Does support look at these forums, or is this purely community based.