Thanks to Dave Bryce, a Hack7MC reader and AVForums member, we have a new theme available for download today. Dave sent us this theme via mhealy@hack7mc.com and you can send your themes in as well if youve got them! Just attach the MCT file from Media Center Studio and well post it here for our users to enjoy.

Daves theme, Streaming Light is currently being worked on and has an active thread available for comments over at AVForums. Be sure to drop in and leave comments, suggestions and praise in the thread. Weve got the latest version, 1.02, available for download right here in our Download Center. Youll need Media Center Studio installed in order to apply the theme.

For those unfamiliar with Media Center Studio simply run the program and select the Themes tab. From that tab select the Import Theme button and select the Streaming Light MCT file to add it to Media Center Studios theme listing. From there select the Streaming Light theme and press the Apply button. The theme will be applied to Media Center and should appear the next time you launch the program.

Easy as that! Thanks to Dave Bryce for sending in this theme and everyone else who does the same. Be sure to share your creations with the world, just send us your MCT files to mhealy@hack7mc.com or give us a link to your custom theme.

In case you hadnt noticed previously weve added a pair of new Media Center themes to our Download Center. Future themes and updates will appear in the Download Center section and users can email their themes as attachments to mhealy@hack7mc.com to have them added to the section. This new pair of themes comes from a Hack7MC reader, Steve Firestone (thewarm). Both themes are created to be used with Media Center Studio and since this program has been having issues lately adjusting the start menu items weve included a fix for this as well at the end. Hopefully well see further updates to the MC Studio program soon.

The first of the themes, called Black Desert, features a black background with 3D style blocks as well as a handful of custom start menu icons. To use the theme using will need to have Media Center Studio. Import the theme file from the Themes tab and youll see a new selection available on the main themes window. Select the new theme and press the Apply button under the Themes tab. That should be all there is to changing your Media Center theme.

The second theme, also from Steve, is called A Touch of Red. This theme is a variation of the original with a slightly varied layout of the blocks and a slight touch of red on the forward side.

Both themes are a sleek addition to any budding Media Center theme collection and are very usable inside the Media Center interface. Users may have noticed that a recent update to the Media Center software has left certain features of the Media Center Studio program not working. The update seems to have added what actually appears it may be a simpler replacement for editing the start menu items, though its not currently supported by the Media Center Studio software.

For now there are a few temporary fixes around though to get your start menu back the way you like it. The simplest solution is a handy tool created by Tyborg of The Green Button forums. Simply download the zip file, extract to somewhere accessible and run the program. This will make the changes (described in more detail later) necessary to allow MC Studio editing of the start menu possible once more. In order to keep these changes through future updates the author advises us to add the file to our startup folders or schedule the program to run regularly. Find even more details or follow the discussion here at TGB forums.

What the program does is to rename a couple of files created in a recent update to Media Center. If youve got an aversion to handy tools or it doesnt seem to work for you try the following. Open Windows Explorer and navigate to C:ProgramDataMicrosofteHomePackagesMCEClientUX. Inside youll find two folders: dSM and dSM-2 with files inside each. To revert to the old method rename the files in these folders. Users have reported more permanent success by created a set of text files with the names of the originals and removing all access to the files.

That should have Media Center Studios start menu functions operating again. Be sure to try out those two new themes and read a few more Media Center Studio guides here at Hack7MC.

Although there are a growing number of users who have dedicated Media Center systems, a large number of users are still using an all purpose machine. Often times these users will switch to a secondary set of outputs (a second monitor and audio outputs) when using Media Center for their entertainment. The problem for many of these users is the lack of audio or video output options inside Windows 7 Media Center. This makes changing output sources quite a hassle, needing to navigate the various system menus to switch the outputs. For audio output, however, theres a new plugin available that allows users to switch audio output sources from inside Media Center called Audio Renderer Updater (in english).

To get started using this handy little plugin start by downloading the proper version for you (english or french) from Media-Center.fr. Installation is pretty straightforward though English users will need to agree to a terms of use they likely cant read. Once installed, access the main program through the Extras Library from inside Media Center.

Once open, changing the audio output source is as easy as selecting the device youd like to use from the dropdown box and saving the new settings. In older versions this was the extent of the options available but with the latest version the author has added quite a few extra features to the plugin. For instance there are now options to determine when these settings will be applied. This way the end user is able to set the device to only be used when inside Windows Media Center or make this the new default device permanently (even after shutting down Windows Media Center).

Also included in this version is the ability to bind the remote controls Mute button to launch the plugin. Setting the Activate speedy playback device change mode option should make this the new behavior. Users will likely need to restart their machines in order for this new setting to take effect though. Also this would render your mute button inoperable as well so the plugin contains an option to actually mute the audio. Should this option not work there is a registry file available for download as well that will bind your remotes mute button to launch the plugin. Apply the files changes to your registry and restart the machine for the behavior to take effect.

Thats all there is to using this handy little tool inside Windows 7 Media Center. Questions and comments for the author can be made on Media-Center.frs forums here. For updates on even more Media Center plugins and tools be sure to subscribe to Hack7MC to get the latest!

Read/Leave A Comment – Find More on themes

Its an often overlooked feature of Windows Media Center, the Radio, but most likely everyone has at least one FM tuner available in their Media Center machine. If youre one of those people who frequently uses Media Centers Radio feature youre likely interested in backing up your lineup of Radio presets. There currently arent any programs available that incorporate Radio presets as part of their backup process so well need to do it by hand. No worries though, the process isnt difficult.

The first step is to open up the Registry Editor by bringing up the start menu and entering regedit in the search box and pressing enter. This should launch the built-in Windows registry editor. Once inside navigate to:

HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionMedia CenterSettingsRadiopresets

Right-click the presets entry and select the Export option. Save the file someplace safe. Now each time youd like to restore your Radio presets youll simply need to double-click this new .reg file to restore the registry entries. Confirm the addition of the data to the registry in the pop-up dialog and you should be all set.

For those of you who arent taking advantage of the Radio section of Windows Media Center due to a lack of good AM/FM radio antenna this can make a good DIY project. There are several guide to making your very own radio antenna available online, an antenna is just a length of properly sized conductive metal after all. You can find a few good guides to creating a radio antenna here in pdf form, from eHow, or in this more complete guide to everything youd possibly want to know about antenna.

Otherwise, just sit back and enjoy Windows Media Center knowing that your personal Radio presets are backed up for posterity. Thanks to Joe Hecht for sending us this handy little tip and thanks to all for reading Hack7MC. Have a tip youd like to share? Send it to us here on our Contact Page!

Today weve got a special surprise set of downloads available. First, the popular Brokeh theme has been updated with a modified background to make reading text on the screen slightly easier. The theme has also been converted into a Media Center Studio theme package. This should make it much easier to install for everyone. Finally, weve got four additional themes that have been converted to MC Studio packages. Additionally, Theme7MC.com will be redirecting to this page for a short period while the site is folded into Hack7MC official.

You can find download links for the five themes in the first pack available below. Download them individually by selecting them below or download the entire pack by selecting the package link.

To install the themes download them to your local Media Center machine. If downloading the entire pack extract them to the hard drive. Next, be sure to have a copy of Media Center Studio installed. Under the Themes menu tab select the Import Theme button and select the theme file to import.

Once imported into Media Center Studio select the theme from the Themes tab below and press the Apply button.

Hopefully this makes it much easier to distribute themes to users and eliminates much of the complications of the old way of applying the themes. If youd like more information on making your own Media Center themes start here or check out our recent article on changing your media center background. Thanks for trying out our themes and be sure to leave any comments below.

Dont forget to put your name in for our ATI TV Wonder HD 650 Dual TV tuner Giveaway! Entries are over this Saturday and you dont want to miss your chance to win free stuff from Hack7MC. RSS subscribers didnt get an entry form delivered to them during the original article so this time around just be sure to click the link and submit an entry. Remember, lets be fair and just one entry per household, international entries accepted and be 18 years or older. While youre on the site why not check out some of the recent articles as well:

• MCEBuddy Still Saving Space and Cutting Commercials now in WTV

• Remote Potato now Streaming Recorded TV and more

• Changing Windows 7 Media Center Plugin Icons

• Using MetaBrowser 2.0 to tag a Movie Library

Thanks for being a member of the Hack7MC Community!

Is Microsofts shoddy time keeping making you miss the beginning or end of your favorite shows? Sure in most cases being a few minutes off one way or another is no huge deal but when it comes to scheduling precise television recordings minutes count. For instance if your time is just a few minutes too fast you could very well cut off the epic ending of your favorite show. By default Windows is in regular contact with a dubious server at Microsoft that for quite a few years hasnt been able to keep good time. Luckily, fixing the issue is easy as pie.

In Windows 7 simply click the clock and date in the lower right hand of your task bar to bring up the calendar. Youll quickly notice you cant change the time directly on this screen (or even set handy reminders like doctors appointments to pop-up a notification later on, come on Microsoft please?) What youll need to do is click the Change date and time settings link at the bottom to bring up the time settings dialog.

Here of course you can set your time correctly and fix the problem, for a while. By default Windows will contact a remote server and request the time at which point youll likely be back to square one. The easiest fix for the problem is to select the Internet Time settings tab and then press the Change Settings button to set the internet time options. In most cases you can most likely just disable the feature and be all set. However, if youd prefer to simply try a different time server there are several choices listed in the dropbox.

If youre looking for a new time server you can also enter one manually by clicking the entry area and typing it in yourself. Rick Broida suggests pool.ntp.org while Ed Bott gives us an entire lineup of government servers to choose from.

Whichever method you choose youll be sure to be enjoying a much better recorded TV experience once youre able to watch your show from beginning to end as it was meant to be. Be sure to keep coming back to Hack7MC for even more tips as well as plugins, hacks and more for Windows 7 Media Center.

If you frequently pause TV to go handle other, more pressing issues, then come back to find the program has begun paying once again chopping off sections of watchable TV and just destroying the show you were watching youve likely been a victim of the paltry pause buffer assigned by Microsoft. By default the pause buffer is capable of holding somewhere in the neighborhood of 30-40 of show time. This amount of time is all well and good if youre on a DVR with limited disk space but, come on, weve got terabytes here.

Of course, we could go in and edit the registry manually increasing buffer time. Its not incredibly simple though and may even test your math skills a bit, not to mention cutting into your TV time. Luckily, theres a handy app available that will do the heavy lifting for you. MCE Live TV Buffer Manager from Doug Knox is a small app whose sole purpose is to increase the default live TV buffer size.

This little app based on code from Schmecky on The Green Button Forums gives you a handful of options ranging from 30 minutes up to 120 minutes of replay buffer length. Just choose the duration youd like to set and press the Apply button. Of course, before the new setting will take effect youll need to do a quick reboot of your PC as well.

Thats all there is to it. Now you can increase the live TV buffer in less time than i takes to make popcorn. Thanks to Schmecky and Doug Knox for making this incredibly useful little application and Rick Broida of PC World for bringing it to attention. Though the program doesnt specify working with Windows 7 Media Center, the changes needed to alter the replay buffer are the same as in previous versions of Media Center. Enjoy and be sure to stick around Hack7MC for even more handy tools like this one!

Though the demographic is likely small there are certainly a group of Media Center enthusiasts who have already started using a more centralized server setup to store movie media removing the need for a DVD drive on their actual Media Center machine. This goes for many main stream desktop machines as well, with the ability to buy practically any digital media online and download it directly the need for physical distribution is dropping quite sharply. If you happen to be one of these users but are in possession of the standard Windows 7 DVD though, how do we get the operating system onto our drive-less machine?

Though there are many versions of Windows 7 available for purchase on the Microsoft Store as a downloadable product most users will have picked up a physical version of the product (especially with lower prices to be had at retailers such as Newegg for OEM versions and 3-pack OEM versions). So the first step is going to be turning that DVD disk into something more portable. To accomplish this youll need at least one machine with a DVD drive in it and a program for creating a ISO version of the disk.

For this guide we suggest using OtivTechs Virtual Disk. The program is simple to use, just download, install and run, select the drive youve placed the disk in and press the Create ISO button. Even better its completely free. Creating the ISO file will take a while to complete, somewhere in the neighborhood of 15-30 minutes depending on the speed of your drive.

Why create an ISO file instead of simply copying the data straight off the disk onto our hard drive? It is entirely possible to never create an ISO of the disk and still get a perfectly working USB install disk but the advantages of having a single file copy of the disk that can be stored in a central location shouldnt be underestimated. Now is the perfect time to create that copy as well as it certainly wont be at the top of the priority list once the operating system install is complete. Also, we can use this ISO copy with programs like vLite to create a trimmed down installation as well (check back soon for a guide to slimming down Windows 7 installs to the basics for a Media Center setup!).

Once weve got our ISO copy created Microsoft has a handy little app designed to turn that file into an installation copy directly to a USB or DVD disk. Microsofts USB DVD Download Tool can be downloaded directly from the Microsoft Store and makes installation disk creation exceptionally easy.

Fist choose the ISO file we created then choose which type of media well be copying to, in this case a USB drive. In the next step youll have the a dropdown box with a listing of available drives to choose from. In order to create a standard installation disk for Windows 7 youll need a USB drive with a minimum of 4gb free space available. Just choose the appropriate disk from the dropdown and select Begin copying.

Once complete you can safely remove your USB disk and youve now got a complete working bootable Windows 7 USB installation disk.

Thats all there is to it! Check back soon when well also be covering the details of trimming out the excess programs installed by default with Windows 7 that simply arent necessary for a Media Center only setup.