If you run Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate editions (why run anything other than Ultimate?), you may notice that Windows Update contains an update for Media Center on both 32- and 64-bit systems. You can download the update directly from the Microsoft Windows Update Web site or from the Windows Download Center (x86 or x64).
I'm glad to see the arrival of the April 2007 Cumulative Update for Media Center for Windows Vista, as it resolves the following issues, some of which have annoyed me:
- The video may appear to freeze when the movie begins in some DVDs
- When you rotate a picture during a slide show in Windows Media Center, the wrong photo may be rotated
- The cover art for recorded TV movies may not appear in the DVD library view
- When you delete a picture in Windows Media Center, you may receive an error message
- When you try to play a DVD by using Autoplay, you may receive an error message
The update also provides the following improvements:
- Online Media support has been added for Windows Media Center on 64-bit versions of Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate
- Video Playlist support has been added for Windows Media Center Extenders
- Improvements have been made to Online Media caching
There's also another change that affects those of you using Windows Media Center Extenders. Windows Media Center Extenders, such as the Microsoft Xbox 360, use network ports to communicate over the network to computers that are running Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate. This cumulative update contains updates to Media Center programs that may have been previously configured as "approved" or "allowed" by a third-party firewall. If you use a third-party firewall, you may have to manually update your firewall to let the new versions of these programs access the ports. If you do not perform these firewall updates, you may experience failures when you try to connect the Windows Media Center Extender to the Media Center computer.