Perhaps the size allows use in tight places like the kitchen and bedrooms. Windows Media Center has no devices now that fit this essential use case, which is absurd. The $100 Apple TV device works in only one location, though. In order for one to cut the cord for their house, they would have to outfit each room with the streaming-only device. Content rented for one unit cannot be transferred to another family unit, so there is absolutely no “whole-home” aspect to it.

Another feature that presented well was Apple’s imitation of Windows 7’s PlayTo. After 10 months of heavy Windows Media Center use with a PC, extenders, and laptops, this feature is something I never use.

Unless you can deliver live, HD sports, you blew it. Cable sports channels are, at this point, irreplaceable. We aren’t going to cut the cord for this device or any other with the current sports model. ESPN’s contracts with cable companies don’t bode well for change any time soon, either. The Cable companies have ESPN (and HBO for that matter) locked down, and aren’t going to let ESPN shunt content to viewers using new technology for many, many years.

Cable is here to stay and any “game-changer” is going to have to have hybrid abilities as we slowly cut the cord. At this point the upcoming Google TV looks like the best suited device, but still misses the mark wildly. Windows Media Center is the most stunning whole-house DVR, but only one room gets to enjoy streaming internet content. Microsoft is oh-so-close to knocking this one out of the park, but seems deathly afraid to connect a few simple dots. Therefore their system in its current state is a mess.

The new Apple TV is an improvement over the last version, and the pricing for the device and content is a very welcome change. In the end, the device doesn’t allow most people the opportunity to change the way they watch TV. It allows one a bit more freedom to buy content for a second time. Sure, that does give a consumer a bit more freedom, assuming the content is really there (Big Bang Theory still isn’t available for streaming on CBS’ own website. Will full episodes be available on AppleTV? Will they be available in time for me to watch them before my next encounter at the office water cooler?). Is it really even worth $100 plus rental fees for this freedom? It’s almost like presenting a sexy scooter and saying you "bought some wheels" so you can pretend you have a substitute device for a car.

I found that the Rhapsody iPhone app allows full downloading of this CD, actually. Get to it by going to the Recent Releases page. Long-press on the CD’s name, and select “Add To Playlist…”. In the next screen select New Playlist, an type a name for the list. Because it is a new CD that I want to access quickly, I’ll call it “00thenational” so it appears in the top of the Playlists list. In the next screen hit “Download” and all 11 tracks will download to your phone.

This technique requires at least a $10 subscription to Rhapsody. If you are a $15 subscriber, your iPhone will count as one of your authorized devices.

Because people are keeping their cars 4-8 years, it makes little sense for auto manufacturers to try reinventing the driver-interaction wheel. By the time their product goes to market it will be outdated. Factory-installed GPS devices stand as shining examples of this. In very little time these expensive systems wind up as outdated relics compared to the continually current offerings on Android phones and the iPhone.

Ford introduced its excellent Sync system by Microsoft which features Bluetooth stereo connections and a fully functional wired iPod interface. However it insists that it do all of the heavy lifting and comes with many strings attached. For example, in order to use the system’s hard disc drive to store music, one must sit in their car and rip all of their CD’s one by one. Didn’t the consumer already go through this laborious process in their house a few years ago when they committed to a portable mp3 player? For’d Sync system can deliver weather and traffic information, but it requires a subscription. Why would I buy these when my iPhone gives me this data for free? Sync also offers integrated Sirius radio, but if I rarely exit 3G wireless coverage zones, why would I buy this when I can get Pandora for free on my phone?

With the turnover rate of portable devices being roughly 1/3 of the turnover time for car ownership, there really is no reason for auto makers to even try to compete on these fronts. With internet access more ubiquitous in the ensuing years, there is no way car makers can continue with their model.

Advanced control systems in cars usually divide their functions into four categories: 1) Diagnostics and controls, 2) Climate Control, 3) Navigation, 4) Audio/Phone. There really is no reason for the car to run these latter two. What should auto makers pursue? They should pursue a large in-dash screen that acts as a capacitive-touchscreen client for a docked mobile smartphone. While the car maker could continue to make their own GUI for the first two sections, the car’s 5-7” in-dash screen should simply be an external display for the iPhone in the other two realms. Let the newer devices featuring user interfaces more familiar to the driver do the heavy lifting.

Of course, safety is a big concern. So, the phone should be aware that it has been docked to a car system, triggering a “Car Mode”. This mode would only enable apps that have been approved for moving cars. The iPod interface should only have large print type, and remain extremely easy to navigate while moving. The phone’s navigation system in this mode would disable most of the NAV controls when the car is moving. Other music apps, like Pandora and Slacker, could work fine in this mode, given that they prioritize button size and function over large album art.

Honestly there really is no reason that the carmaker couldn’t sell or give apps for its diagnostics and climate controls, too. The car’s system could come with a standard UI for non-smartphone users. However the smartphone versions of those apps could feature upgraded and customizable interfaces that run in place of the standard UI in the presence of the docked smartphone.

We are on the verge of some sweeping changes in the auto industry. Auto makers have pretty much mastered safety as well as planned obsolescence. What they have failed to do is excite car buyers in the last 15 years. There are only minor differences offered to consumers in today’s car market. The next frontier in design, though, is in the cockpit. The automaker who makes a driver experience that best leverages already popular and quickly-evolving mobile devices will gain an enormous advantage over its competition.

Thankfully there is Windows 7. Panasonic and Sony selected the AVCHD format for their videos, but previous versions of Windows were not able to manage this codec. Not only does Windows 7 include native support for AVCHD, but the new Windows Movie Maker, a free download from Windows Live, can easily publish these files to YouTube.

In order to publish one of the SD9’s videos to YouTube, one must first move the video files onto the computer’s hard disk drive. Insert the SD card into the card reader, and navigate to that drive using Windows Explorer and look for the folder: X:\PRIVATE\AVCHD\BDMV\STREAM  (where "”X” is the drive letter for the SD card). Each scene recorded by the camera will appear as a .m2ts file. (These files include the video and the audio, by the way.). Select all of the .m2ts files, and move them to a temporary folder location you’ve created on your hard drive. (I set up \Users\Public\Videos\UnprocessedVideos as mine, and put a link to it in the SendTo list).

Next, open Windows Live Movie Maker and drag all of the .m2ts files of interest into the workspace in the right half of the screen. Drag the scenes around to put them in order. Then, for each scene that begins with a transition, put the cursor at the beginning of the scene and select a transition (by going to Animations and selecting a transition.)

To publish the video, click on the Home tab, and select the YouTube logo in the Sharing section of the ribbon. You’ll have to enter your YouTube account name and password for each upload. After a few minutes you will be notified of the publishing success with the option to view the video in YouTube. It will take YouTube a few minutes to complete its transcode, and the job will be done.

In order to obtain the driver, U.S. customers must call (800) 626-4686, hit option “8”, and give the service advisor the scanner’s Part # and Serial #.

The ScanSnap S510 scanner is a football-sized masterpiece that unfolds to reveal an excellent sheet-fed scanner. The S510 works at about 3 seconds per sheet, and scans both sides of the paper into several formats. The scanner comes with a copy of Adobe Acrobat Standard 8, so obviously .pdf outputs are a snap.

Beware, though. Adobe does not support Acrobat Standard 8 in Windows 7, and I have had mixed results installing it on two different machines. Adobe says that Acrobat 10.2 and up are supported in Windows 7.

Nevertheless, the scanner is a workhorse. I have used it for two years, now, scanning every receipt, bill, dental school notes, and daily logs that we used to keep in large notebooks.

There are dozens and dozens of tools out there designed to help people organize and display photos, so there are many organization schemes, some excellent. When I was inventing my wheel, I defined two high priorities: quick access and cheap price. I’ve been extremely happy with this system after over a year, and hopefully others can integrate it and enjoy it as much as I have.

ACCESS

Being able to find that specific photo is made easy by a great system. Was that photo I love of my daughter on the boat at the beach in 2008 or 2007? Was it the May trip or was it the June trip? We had a yard sale a couple of years ago. Did we have that in October or September, and do the photos of the unsold items include the old popcorn popper? Where is that early construction photo of the RBC Center? Where are those favorite 15 photos from Disneyworld? These types of questions can be answered quickly with a good system in place.

What about those times when there are guests in the house? The last thing you want to do is lug them into your liar and have them huddle around the computer screen while you search and search for a photo. That’s why we really enjoy accessing photos through Windows Media Center (pictured above). With our setup we have the den TV directly connected to the central Media Center PC, and all of the other TVs have Media Center Extenders. This allows us to access our entire photo collection from any TV in the house, which is a huge convenience, especially when guests are in the house. This isn’t a requirement, but makes the system far more powerful.

ORGANIZATION

Whether one is browsing through pictures of a lost pet or searching for a photo of a specific place, a collection of photos that is efficiently tagged will save loads of time and add a tremendous amount of value to a photo collection. The key is file tagging.

What is “tagging”?

In the old days we took a developed photograph and placed it into an album, usually arranged chronologically and/or by subject. With digital photos one can tag a photo with as many organizational tags as they wish, and the single photo will appear in any number or applicable search results. For instance, if I have a photo of my nephew, my daughter, and my cat taken on the dock at the family beach house during my sister’s birthday party, I can tag the photo as “Drew”, “Lindsay Anne”, “Maddie”, “BeachHouse”, and “Kim’s 35th”. When I use software that can quickly display all of the photos tagged “Maddie”, the party photo appears in the collection. When I look at the “Drew” photos, the photo will shows up as well. So not only is tagging great for finding a particular photo that has known qualities, but also it is excellent for putting together “virtual” photo albums.

There are many tools for photo tagging, but I’ve found that Windows Live Photo Gallery is the best. Not only is it a free download, but it also writes the tag information in the .JPG file itself. Most other photo programs, like Picasa, store this tag information in a separate database file, making the database only usable in that one particular piece of software. If the tags are stored in the photos themselves, however, one can transport a collection of photos to another computer without losing all of the tagging information.

Once one installs Live Photo Gallery and points the software to a folder structure containing photographs, the next step is to create a set of frequently used tags. The second big asset for Live Photo Gallery, is that it allows tag hierarchies to be formed. I created five top-level tags under which all photos fall: Events, Objects, People, Places, and Other. (literally entered as “ZOther” in order for force it to the bottom of the alphabetical list.) Under People, I have a hierarchy of tags: People:Family, People:Famous, People:Friends. Under People:Family, I have these tags: People:Family:Immediate, People:Family:McCall, People:Family… Under People:Family:Immediate, I have a tag for each of the 4 family members (including the cat).

A major problem with Picasa (and several other software programs), is that it does not allow hierarchical tags. Therefore once tagging is complete, one will find a list of tags that are not organized. Unrelated tags like “Beach”, “Ballpark”, “Ben”, and “Beerfest” will all appear together in a giant list of tags. While a hierarchical tag structure requires a viewer to drill downward through three or four layers, typically, it is still extremely manageable and efficient.

Going through thousands of photos, tagging each for the relevant people, places, and events shown is not a quick process, so I recommend only doing a couple hundred at a time, depending on the size of your collection. The good thing is that this is not a particularly intellectually challenging project that requires 100% focus, so it can be done during football games with great ease. Remember, too, that these because the tags are written to the JPGs themselves, this project can be done across a network, so it can be just as efficient to sit at a laptop in the den as it is sitting at a desk at the house’s main computer.

File Location

So, the virtues of tagging should be clearer by now, and that leaves one question: how to I physically organize the JPG’s themselves on the hard drive? I once tried organizing the photos by the event or main subject of the photo, and it was a disaster. Tagging serves this purpose much better. So if we are dealing with, essentially, a database and search system all the time, I ought to be able to just dump all of my photos into one giant folder, right? Not so.

There are two problems with a blind dump. One is that cameras create filenames usually based on a sequence by that particular camera. What if a family has more than one Canon camera, all using the same numbering scheme? What if a camera’s numbering sequence accidentally gets reset? In both cases there will be filename duplicates, creating an unacceptable situation in any operating system.

Another problem with a blind dump is every operating system’s inabilities to efficiently display a folder containing thousands of files. If you like watching hourglasses and throbbers, be my guest and create large folders.

The most efficient system I have found is to rename each file as it is being put into the file structure. First, move the files off of the camera’s data card into a designated temporary folder with Windows Explorer. The folder I created for this is:

C:\Users\Public\Pictures\UNPROCESSED_PHOTOS

To save time, I placed a shortcut to this photo in my “Send To” context menu (see post about editing the SendTo list). By selecting all photos on the card, and Shift-selecting Unprocessed_Photos using the Send To shortcut, I can move photos to a designated spot in one quick action.

The next step is where the magic lies. I use a small, free piece of software called DIM.jar to move the photos to their final destination. (DIM requires that Java is installed). I use DIM to read the date of the photo, rename it based on a YYYYMMDD-XXX.jpg format, and copy it to a folder hierarchy in Public Pictures that corresponds the year and month of the photo.

Go into the DIM settings and change the output filename code to “YYYYMMDD-%2c.jpg”. The result will create a file with the year, month, and date in the filename. Because one may do a quick series of photos that takes 2 photos in the same second, I don’t feel the timecodes of HHMMSS are worth the bulk they add to the filename. Instead, I prefer an arbitrary 3-digit number that is assigned for the photo in the batch. A photo called 20081225-134.jpg is the one from Christmas in ‘08 with an arbitrary 134 attached. (That three-digit number gets reset each time DIM is launched)

Once you have verified that the photos copied correctly, then go to UNPROCESSED_PHOTOS and delete its contents. I do not recommend having DIM “move” the files, as sometimes there are glitches (ie. date setting was wrong on camera, some setting in DIM setup wasn’t quite right).

One important thing to remember is to NOT touch your files before sending them through DIM. This especially includes rotating the file in Windows Photo Viewer! Any time a change like rotation, cropping, contrast, etc is made, the JPG file is rewritten such that the metadata reflects the editing time as the time the photo was taken. This create inaccurate filenames and can result in photos being in the wrong folder on the hard drive.

This sounds like a big endeavor, but it really isn’t. I’ve trained myself to follow this sequence every Sunday:

1. Insert photo card into computer’s card reader
2. Open Windows Explorer, and move the photos to the Unprocessed folder (Shift-select Unprocessed folder in the SendTo menu)
3. Open DIM from Start Menu shortcut
4. Quickly double-check DIM’s settings
5. Hit “Process”
6. Verify that photos are in the correct month folders
7. Erase contents of Unprecessed

Occasionally (and I mean once or twice a quarter), I’ll sit down with my laptop in the den while somewhat paying attention to a sporting event, and tag photos across the network.

The result is a system that is very easy to navigate from all over the house. If I want that photo of us from the tailgate party before the 2002 hockey playoff game, I can go to the “RBCCenter” tag and quickly peruse the couple of dozen photos from there. If I want to copy this photo to a website like Flickr, I’ll simply note the filename and easily find it using Windows Explorer. This is a snappy process given that any one month folder only has, maybe, a couple hundred files.

Having an organized, accessible photo collection is a giant luxury. I certainly realize this when I look through old family photo albums that only have a few dozen photos. They are hard to find, in small collections, not backed up, and organized using only one method. Ironically the amount of effort with the system described takes less time and effort than it did in the old days.

The road over the past three weeks has been rocky, but as crazy as it may sound, it has been more rewarding finding out the caveats of new hardware and software than it was banging my head against a wall with the old equipment and abandoned, malfunctioning drivers.

The following is a guide based on the state of hardware and software as of Thanksgiving in 2009 (Windows 7 has been officially released for 1 month). I use Dentrix, Dexis, and CAESY as my main workhorses in the office. Hopefully the information here will help to guide you in purchasing or waiting to purchase specific hardware.

I’ll first begin with software, and how it performs on a myriad of both equipment and versions of Windows 7 in my office. Each software package has been installed on a 32-bit and a 64-bit machine. On the 64-bit machines, both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 7 have been tested. Remember, you can install a 32-bit version of Windows 7 on a 64-bit machine, but you cannot install a 64-bit version of Windows on a 32-bit machine.

DENTRIX G4 (Power Pack 6)

32-bit Win7

• 32-bit machine - Dentrix seems to work fine with Win7 Pro and Ultimate on 32-bit hardware.
• 64-bit machine - This is my "server" and it is running 32-bit Win7 Pro. Things have been rocky, as the machine seems to not be able to handle 7 connections in the standard installation. The problem seems to have been corrected using the information in the "Networking Error…" section below.

64-bit Win7

• 32-bit machine - N/A
• 64-bit machine - Dentrix Patient Chart does NOT work currently in this environment. With two instances I was unable to get all of the submodules, especially the Treatment Planning module, to appear in the Patient Chart. The answer here, for now, is to use XP Mode, which only works on certain machines. (See XP MODE note below)

DEXIS 8.0.7

32-bit Win 7

• 32-bit machine - Dexis and the PCMCIA-based sensor are working fine in this environment (Win7 Ultimate)
• 64-bit machine - Dexis software accesses existing chart images well. However the PCMCIA-based sensor seems to be a 16-bit device, and will therefore NEVER WORK ON A 64-BIT MACHINE. So, a 64-bit machine is not a current solution in an operatory where Dexis radiographs are obtained.

64-bit Win 7

• 32-bit machine - N/A 
  64-bit machine - Dexis software did not install correctly in this environment. In order to use Dexis on this machine, it must be run in XP Mode, which only runs on certain machines. (See XP MODE note below). Also the PCMCIA-based sensor seems to be a 16-bit device, and will therefore NEVER WORK ON A 64-BIT MACHINE. So, a 64-bit machine is not a current solution in an operatory where Dexis radiographs are obtained.

CAESY

32-bit Win 7

• 32-bit machine - CAESY installs without fail, launches correctly, and displays CAESY’s still artwork gallery, but is unable to launch Windows Media Player 10 to play videos. Therefore CAESY WILL NOT WORK in this environment.
• 64-bit machine - CAESY installs without fail, launches correctly, and displays CAESY’s still artwork gallery, but is unable to launch Windows Media Player 10 to play videos. The only way to make CAESY work in 64-bit Windows 7 is to run CAESY in XP Mode, which only works on certain machines (See XP MODE note below). (There are apparently Windows Media Player 9 "downgrade" solutions on the internet, but none of the sites offering the downloads seemed trustworthy, so I did not test the possibility of downgrading to WMP9.)

64-bit Win 7

• 32-bit machine - N/A 
  64-bit machine - CAESY installs without fail, launches correctly, and displays CAESY’s still artwork gallery, but is unable to launch Windows Media Player 10 to play videos. The only way to make this work is to run CAESY in XP Mode, which only works on certain machines (See XP MODE note below)

* * *

In setting up these applications, I ran into several caveats in Windows 7 that perhaps others will face:

XP Mode

Windows 7 (Professional and Ultimate) can run XP Mode on certain newer machines. In order to test your hardware, use Microsoft’s tool posted at their XP Mode download page.

XP Mode installs a virtual computer on the machine that runs Windows XP SP3 in a window. Once installed, this virtual environment needs to be nurtured with updates and virus protection just like our old 2001 computers did, in addition to your care for the Windows 7 environment. What’s worse, is that XP Mode natively only runs in 16-bit color mode, which means that it is completely unusable for displaying images and videos (Dexis and CAESY). Don’t despair, though! A registry hack to enable 24-bit color in XP Mode is out there, and works great. It is applied to regedit in the XP virtual machine, not Win7’s regedit!

Therefore if one plans to run CAESY (at all), or Dentrix (in 64-bit Windows 7), one should install all three of the apps in XP Mode, and live in a virtual environment until CAESY and Dentrix can get their software packages running in Windows 7.

Networking Error In Windows 7

When my Dentrix Server was installed on a 32-bit machine running Windows 7 Professional (32-bit), the system seemed to work very well. After shifting some computers around to satisfy Dexis’ 16-bit hardware requirements, the "server" is a 64-bit machine running Windows 7 Professional (32-bit). Soon after completing this installation I began getting this error in my two operatories that are running Windows XP SP3 (could be a complete coincidence):

"Not enough server storage is available to process this command."

When the error notification appeared, both XP machines in operatories would lose their mapped drive connections to the server, but did NOT lose connections to CAESY, an old computer running an intranet in the office, or the internet. Since adjusting the IRPStackSize registry entry on the Server (Win7 Professional machine), the problem seems to be solved. More information on this change is available here: http://winhlp.com/node/40

* * *

Therefore, at this point there is no Windows 7 solution that currently will run all of Dentrix, Dexis, and CAESY correctly. The hardware restrictions put forth by Dexis’ outdated sensor technology will be a major problem for offices in the ensuing couple of years. We all thought that the sensors would eventually die a physical death, however most of these sensors will end up dying death of obsolescence.

When will these three get on board with the operating system that Microsoft released to developers over a YEAR ago? The best clues I have gotten from Dentrix and CAESY point to Microsoft’s SP1 timetable. All Dexis support would tell me is that they do not support Windows 7 and that I should not be using it. (This, along with attitude of the technical support advisor, will kept fresh in my mind when my sensor needs to be replaced).

Here is my setup:

• RECEPTION - 64-bit machine running Windows 7 Professional (32-bit). This machine has a 500GB HDD which hosts all Dentrix and Dexis databases.
• OP1 - 64-bit machine running Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit OEM). This machine has no x-ray head in the room, so we only need Dexis to view images. Because of Dentrix Chart and CAESY’s limitations, all three apps are run in XP Mode hacked for 24-bit color. This machine has a 500GB HDD and will host all Recorded TV for Windows Media Center.
• OP2 - 32-bit machine running Windows 7 Ultimate (32-bit). This machine takes films from a PCMCIA-based Dexis sensor. It cannot run CAESY, as it cannot run XP Mode.
• OP3 - 2 year old 32-bit machine running Windows XP Professional. This machine takes films from a PCMCIA-based Dexis sensor, and because it is running XP, runs CAESY normally.
• OP4 - 3 year old 32-bit machine running Windows XP Professional. Because it is running XP, it runs CAESY normally.
  DR’S OFFICE - New 64-bit HP laptop running Windows Ultimate RC Build 7001 (32-bit). This machine runs Dentrix and Dexis fine, but won’t run CAESY videos, which isn’t important in my personal office.

The reason I am installing Ultimate in the operatories is to have Windows Media Center (the world’s greatest DVR) available for patients to watch recorded TV and internet TV on the overhead monitors.

Good luck with your setups! I hope this guide helps everyone to find a solution quickly and quietly. PLEASE contribute to the information here with your own experiences, because as far as I can tell, our specialty software vendors are being anything but aggressive in adapting their software to the needs of today’s new hardware customer.

I was able to get the sound working in Windows 7 by disabling the front panel jack detection. The way you do it isn’t intuitive. First download and install the latest audio drivers from Intel’s website (here is the link for the DG33BU). Then:

• Open Windows 7’s Control Panel (Start| Control Panel)
• Open the "Realtek Audio Manager" (not to be confused with “Sound”). (In order to display this, be sure that "View By" in the upper right shows "Large Icons" instead of "Category"
• In the navigation bar in the far right, there is a little yellow folder icon. It is just below “Device advanced settings” and above “ANALOG”. Click the folder icon.
• Click “Disable front panel jack detection” so that a yellow check mark shows up. Hit “OK”, and close the Realtek HD Audio Manager. That should re-enable the sound.

Imagine living in this house! It is 17,000 square feet and features 13 zones of audio, 5 of which have full surround sound arrangements. The system uses Windows Media Center as its core, with Crestron distribution hardware.