Windows 7 and (new???) Windows Media Center

[goodphun]

So, Amazon announced today that Windows 7 is available for pre order.  On their product page for Windows 7 (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002DHLUWK/ref=pe_11480_12432090_emwa_email_title_1) there are numerous mentions of the ability to control and watch live TV, as if it were some brand new feature for Windows....  Kinda strange since XP had a Media Center that didn't look all that different from the one that shipped with Vista.

Anyway, I was curious to know whether anyone here has heard of any new Media Center functionality that is unique to Windows 7.  There is a short video on the Amazon site that shows a brief screen shot of what looks exactly like the Vista Media Center.  I am still debating whether to plunk down the case for 7 or not.  Vista works quite well for me... but new media center functionality would be a huge bonus.  I use it for my PVR, because my Xbox works well as an extender.

[Craig]

A couple of things that come to mind is that I heard it has support for up to 4 tuners now, and also it has native QAM support.

[nvanlaar]

Off the top of my head - OTA digital channel handling is much, much better.  All digital channels and sub-channels are automatically put into the guide and are in order/labeled logically.  It has the ability to drag the time-line slider while watching recorded shows/time shift tv/etc.  Microsoft really did a good job with fit 'n finish for Win7 Media Center.

 Pre-order of Home Premium Upgrade is only $50.  IMO you can't go too wrong with that.  Also-some features can be "de-activated" if not used, such as IE and a few others.

BTW- all premium versions (Home Premium, Pro, Ultimate) have media center.  The only worthwhile feature of Pro worth upgrading for IMO is XP mode (fully licensed XP SP3 VM), Ultimate is really just a standalone version of Enterprise edition.