My experiences with Windows Media Center (version 1), were rather poor. I played with a system my friend built, and even had the official remote for. And the remote was one of the worst ones I have seen. The ATI Remote Wonder has me sold on RF for computer control, not IR like the Media Center. Even the old Gateway Destinations had this right, in bundeling an RF keyboard and remote with the system.

Beyond that, the problems with the DVD player not outputting a digital surround signal even when the symbol was clearly on the screen was irritating. The need to actually quit the interface and run a normal DVD player was not good.

I never tried the PVR aspect, as the system was not set up to do so. My friend did not trust the software enough, and instead has a Dish Network PVR that works.