Potential to make many people happy... "My Movies" for SageTV?

[jim22]

OK, I've had a quick play with My Movies - this is definitely doable:

I'm on Vista Business (No Media Center), with a MCE Remote and I've just installed my movies and restored the database and all of this works via IE.

I just need to find a way of launching an IE embedded browser via Java.

Off to read my Java books and look at Sage Plugins...

[vvulture]

Hey there Jim,
I was wondering where you were up to with this.
I have moved away from Sage until a My Movies solution could be found.

Any luck ?

cheers

[bassackwards]

This thread is fairly old but I thought I would throw in my opinion...

I'm currently a BTV / BMedia ( with DVDLibraray plugin ) user. BTV lacks a true TV and Media Center integration so I thought I would evaluate Sage. I was hoping to ditch BTV but as I review Sage, I'm finding that there is no good solution for a DVD style library such as "Mymovies" ( MCE ) or "DVD Library" ( BTV ). If I've missed something, please let me know.

If a "mymovies" plugin or something similar came out I would drop BTV in a heartbeat. Please please please someone come up with something. Maybe Sage will build something in? I can dream can't I?

-Brian

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by bassackwards

This thread is fairly old but I thought I would throw in my opinion...

I'm currently a BTV / BMedia ( with DVDLibraray plugin ) user. BTV lacks a true TV and Media Center integration so I thought I would evaluate Sage. I was hoping to ditch BTV but as I review Sage, I'm finding that there is no good solution for a DVD style library such as "Mymovies" ( MCE ) or "DVD Library" ( BTV ). If I've missed something, please let me know.

SageMC

[geogecko]

Originally Posted by stanger89

SageMC

Multiplied by 2.

A little old (using a new version of this theme), but the interface is generally the same. "My Videos" contains anything that is in video format, including ripped DVDs, etc.

[Quazeye]

How does it do with Box sets. Can I have 1 DVD cover and then click on that and have the DVD's with covers listed there? Is there anything like MyMovies or DVD Library? This is my only issue from switching to SAGE.. the WAF is good right now having 1 Baby Einstein DVD cover and all the rest hidden under that cover and it wouldn't be good to switch and not be able to do this.

Thanks,
Quaz
________
BMW R42

[geogecko]

Originally Posted by Quazeye

How does it do with Box sets. Can I have 1 DVD cover and then click on that and have the DVD's with covers listed there? Is there anything like MyMovies or DVD Library? This is my only issue from switching to SAGE.. the WAF is good right now having 1 Baby Einstein DVD cover and all the rest hidden under that cover and it wouldn't be good to switch and not be able to do this.

Thanks,
Quaz

You should be able to put some cover art on an overall folder, but I'm not sure where you would find such a thing, but I have exactly the situation you are describing. I have a Baby Einstein folder, then the 20 or so movies we have, have been ripped to the hard drive, and put into their own folder, under the parent B.E. folder. The B.E. folder just shows up like that, a folder, then once you are inside of that, the cover art for each B.E. move shows up.

[geogecko]

Here's a screenshot of it.

[Quazeye]

I don't see the screenshot... can you post it again?

Thanks,
Cyriel
________
DT125

[Quazeye]

Nevermind.. I see it now that I refreshed.. sorry
________
Triumph Thruxton

[mkanet]

Okay, now... I'm interested After I watched my first ripped blu-ray movie on SageTV, and figured how cheap it would be to store them on a virtual drive via iSCSI, I would love to see a "My Movies" with ripped Blu-ray movie support!! I totally see myself having an extensive collection of my favorite blu-ray movies on SageTV .

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by mkanet

Okay, now... I'm interested After I watched my first ripped blu-ray movie on SageTV, and figured how cheap it would be to store them on a virtual drive via iSCSI, I would love to see a "My Movies" with ripped Blu-ray movie support!! I totally see myself having an extensive collection of my favorite blu-ray movies on SageTV .

You're now going to need a lot more storage... :-)

[petereader]

Originally Posted by mkanet

Okay, now... I'm interested After I watched my first ripped blu-ray movie on SageTV, and figured how cheap it would be to store them on a virtual drive via iSCSI, I would love to see a "My Movies" with ripped Blu-ray movie support!! I totally see myself having an extensive collection of my favorite blu-ray movies on SageTV .

mkanet,
I feel as though I'm missing something here. Oddly enough, I just set up something similar this weekend as well using this method:
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...5&postcount=32

...except that I was able to bypass having to use vbscript.

Now blu-ray and HD-DVD movies show up in the "My Movies" section with metadata. I can mount them and play them on PowerDVD using the external mediaplayer function, and it all looks realtively fluid. What am I missing that MM could provide? Are you referring to integrated Blu-ray support within Sage?

NEVERMIND: I just found your other thread here that sheds light to what you were talking about.
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=31692

Sorry for the confusion. It is Monday after all

[Firedog7881]

I don't know if there is another thread about this, and I hope there is, please let me know.

I am a Vista Media Center person looking to switch to Sage. I have been using MyMovies in Vista for a couple years now. It is the best thing I have found for the backend storage of DVD data for a DVD Library.

I am hoping that somebody has taken Brian up on his offer to create the API, I think he has created the API based on what I have skimmed on his web page (I am going back after this post).

I have no coding experience so I can't help with that part, but I am more than willing to do beta testing.

I have 300 movies in MyMovies and my friend has upwards of 1500 that we do not want to move into something else. Please let me know what is going on with this if anybody knows.

[Brent]

There is still work being done on an alternative, but for now as mentioned before you can have a Movie Library within Sage with the SageMC UI:

Part 1 of Movies with SageMC
Part 2 of Movies with SageMC

[sflamm]

I want to make sure we are not overlooking THE most important aspect of MyMovies:

It integrates all DVD types (DVD, BD, HD-DVD) in 1 media library

When you play a movie from within the Media Center (it provides a custom menu entry to do this) and it is not a standard DVD it:

1. Uses the automount configuration to mount the ISO from the movie folder (if necessary it unmounts any mounted image)
2. Leverages the autoplay of Windows to play the movie in your configured player (PowerDVD, etc)
3. Returns to the Media Center once the movie is complete (by pressing the green button)

This is all seamless through 1 remote (in my case a Harmony that is programmed to also turn on my stereo, and TV)

In this way it provides a complete unified experience, as if the HD playing experience were a part of Media Center.

Of course it also provides UI elements inside the Media Center to:

1. Configure basic layout of the movies
2. Collection Management (I dont think anyone would really use this since there is a desktop tool)

There is a desktop Collection Manager, that allows beyond the obvious features one to :

1. Configure which program you want automount with (i.e. Slysoft Virtual CD Drive)
2. Configure the program you want play the movie with (i.e. PowerDVD).

The Collection Manager provided is pretty sophisticated and far better than what SageTV currently has (and you have discussed somewhat above). Most important features of the Collection Manager:

1. Supports single and multiple disks per entry (boxes)
2. Allows for the specification of the folder with the DVD hierarchy or ISO for HD
3. Uses a web services to retrieve the customer supported full Meta Data (cover, descriptions, artists, etc)
4. Integrates directly with AnyDVD to allow ripping
5. Common local database accessible from all clients (on your network)

The Collection Manager, though awesome, is NOT what makes it so popular. It is the seemless movie information/selection experience and playing experience.

I personally would switch to SageTV from VMC but I can not do without a seamless movie experience. All the rest of the major differentiator features beyond the real 'core' SageTV has:
1. commercial skipping
2. multiple tuners (analog, digital)

In addition, SageTV has a much better model with real client/server that can run on any platform. It's handling of tuners is much much better as well. And of course the QUIET hardware extenders are nice (VMC has those).

This should be a NO BRAINER to switch to SageTV, but the lack of seamless support for the movie experience is a DEAL BREAKER.

Is it possible to provide this seamless experience? (PLEASE)

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by sflamm

I want to make sure we are not overlooking THE most important aspect of MyMovies:

It integrates all DVD types (DVD, BD, HD-DVD) in 1 media library

When you play a movie from within the Media Center (it provides a custom menu entry to do this) and it is not a standard DVD it:

1. Uses the automount configuration to mount the ISO from the movie folder (if necessary it unmounts any mounted image)
2. Leverages the autoplay of Windows to play the movie in your configured player (PowerDVD, etc)
3. Returns to the Media Center once the movie is complete (by pressing the green button)

This is all seamless through 1 remote (in my case a Harmony that is programmed to also turn on my stereo, and TV)

In this way it provides a complete unified experience, as if the HD playing experience were a part of Media Center.

Sage already supports playing DVDs, out of the box, and I believe there's a plugin or two for mounting ISOs/launching external players. I disagree though that launching something like PowerDVD/TheaterTek/etc is "seamless" or "unified".

This should be a NO BRAINER to switch to SageTV, but the lack of seamless support for the movie experience is a DEAL BREAKER.

Is it possible to provide this seamless experience? (PLEASE)

Frankly I've got no idea what you're talking about, at least in regards to DVD, Sage supports ripped DVD playback natively. You don't need complicated ISO mounting/program launching, you can just play a DVD. I've got about 500 DVDs on my system and i can watch any of them, seamlessly within SageTV.

If you're insistent on ISOs there are several plugins already:
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...ight=mount+iso


And the HD extenders support ISOs (DVDs at least, not sure about BD yet), and DVD/BD folders natively.

[sflamm]

You clearly have never setup or used the VMC with MyMovies installed in combination with Clone Virtual Drive and PowerDVD.

The experience is seamless.

1. You go to the Movie Library
2. You browse to the movie you would like to watch (full meta data)
3. You press Play
4a. If it is a DVD it plays directly in VMC and when your are doen your back to the media center (just like SageTV does)
4b. If it is a HD DVD of some type (BD or HD-DVD) it automatically loads the ISO in the background, launches the player, and your movie plays. When you are done you are brought back to the Media Center (in other words, the experience is little different from 4a (especially if you adjust the splash screen of PowerDVD to have the same background look as VMC)

*** The reason ISOs are used is that none of the players support playing High-def DVDs from a folder anymore (Cyberlink, Arcsoft etc) ***
For regularly DVDs of course they are saved in folders.
MyMovies supports both folders and ISO so that there is no inefficiency for regular DVDs and support for HD-type DVDs

Of course SageTV does 4a. Which Media Center does not?! Although the Library manager in SageTV is not nearly MyMovies and it is much more complicated to get the Meta Data in...

It is 4b that folks care about.

If you dont believe me then take a survey. I've been building these for years and a seamless DVD library experience regardless of the DVD-type is what is desired.

Hopefully the Win7 media center will natively play BD (I doubt it will, but we can always pray). If it does then it will do what everyone wants.

Having extenders that play everything is of course the next logical step... but you dont need a hardware extender if you can use the Software Client.

It is very typical for Windows Media Center users to have mutliple VMCs that share the same storage on a NAS (sometimes the Windows Home Server). That way they are all sorta clients in that they can see/play everything exactly the same. The only downside is that they do not have a unified scheduled recording. Most users have a primary media center that does all the recording to get around this small problem.

And in conjuction with 1 or more HDHR boxes, the multiple media centers can all tuner without stepping on each other.

[PLUCKYHD]

I have used media center and first my movies is terrible, OML or media browser ar far beyond and better then my movies

Sage supports more than my movies or media center. You don't need ISO as native blu ray playback is supported through extenders and works great.

The interface is a little prettier on media center but with movie infor and sagemc not much to make up for the difference.

As the other poster said sage supports native dvd playback via extenders someting microsoft will never have let alone dvd.

[PLUCKYHD]

If you dont believe me then take a survey. I've been building these for years and a seamless DVD library experience regardless of the DVD-type is what is desired.

To comment on this I have already built 2 sagemc WHS server systems for clients since switching myself one left media center as did I. Sage is a better integration for customers because of the extenders support and no need to transcode or use video redo to watch dvd's in other rooms.