Vista - Will Vista MCE start up upon reboot without having to log in?

I'm new to Media Center so please bear with me.

I have everything setup and I can watch TV as well as record it, setting up
schedules to record my favorite TV shows.

I found an option that starts MCE when Windows starts up. However, the PC we
use is a multipurpose PC that is used by my entire family, but mainly for
e-mail and such, so when they log in, I do NOT want MCE to be the first thing
that pops up.

What I want to do is in the case the PC reboots, I want to make sure that
MCE will STILL record without having to log into an account.

I guess my question is, if I've set up recording schedules and the PC
reboots and is sitting at the login window, will MCE STILL record my shows or
do I have to log into a user account and launch MCE? Is there a way to tell
Vista to run MCE as a service upon Windows starting up? Can I prevent MCE
from coming to the front if a user logs in as it currently does with the
setting I set in MCE?

Thanks!

"Ivan Samuelson" <IvanSamuelson@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:4AE885C2-DB1F-408F-8A3D-9ECD21A560F3@microsoft.com...
> I'm new to Media Center so please bear with me.
>
> I have everything setup and I can watch TV as well as record it, setting
> up
> schedules to record my favorite TV shows.
>
> I found an option that starts MCE when Windows starts up. However, the PC
> we
> use is a multipurpose PC that is used by my entire family, but mainly for
> e-mail and such, so when they log in, I do NOT want MCE to be the first
> thing
> that pops up.
>
> What I want to do is in the case the PC reboots, I want to make sure that
> MCE will STILL record without having to log into an account.
>
> I guess my question is, if I've set up recording schedules and the PC
> reboots and is sitting at the login window, will MCE STILL record my shows
> or
> do I have to log into a user account and launch MCE? Is there a way to
> tell
> Vista to run MCE as a service upon Windows starting up? Can I prevent MCE
> from coming to the front if a user logs in as it currently does with the
> setting I set in MCE?

Media Center will still record no matter if a user is logged on or not, if
the main Media Center application is on the screen or not. If the computer
is sleeping it will even wake it up to record.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User.
http://www.windowsresource.net/

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Paul,

Thanks for the info. I found this out last night as my scheduled recording
of "Rules of Engagement" kicked off without a hitch!

Luckily, even though my wife was doing e-mail and other administrative work,
it didn't miss a beat. I'm sure having an AMD64 X2 helps. I guess the next
thing is to see if there is a way I can have the Media Center application
utilize a particular CPU core for it's work and leave the other one alone?

"Ivan Samuelson" <IvanSamuelson@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:EA4AA808-A106-4497-911C-62C66F92C18B@microsoft.com...

> Luckily, even though my wife was doing e-mail and other administrative
> work,
> it didn't miss a beat. I'm sure having an AMD64 X2 helps. I guess the next
> thing is to see if there is a way I can have the Media Center application
> utilize a particular CPU core for it's work and leave the other one alone

If you're recording from a digital source (like DVB-T) it really isn't using
much in the way of CPU (a couple of percent), its just writing it to the
hard drive.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User.
http://www.windowsresource.net/

*Remove nospam. to reply by e-mail*