Something about this looks vaguely familiar…

(for an even better caption, click here.)

For the second year in a row, a Life|ware installation is the winner of the Windows Media Center Ultimate Install Contest!

The winning installation was done by cyberManor, a Los Gatos, California integration company, and submitted by the company president, Gordon Van Zuiden.

CEPro has the whole story, with slideshow. Enjoy!

Says Gizmodo Australia. Need we say more?

CEPro has some more must-share CEDIA news about Life|ware’s new High-Density Television initiative. Basically, we are announcing a new Life|media, the LMS-810, which will have support for up to 8 CableCARDs and 10 Media Center Extenders.

The LMS-810 is a pretty sweet machine, with up to 12 TB of storage and the aforementioned support for 8 CableCARDs and 10 extenders using our new Life|tuner.

CEPro has the story, or check out the press release (along with some of our other CEDIA news) here.

What’s the main issue with general adoption of Media Center? According to Wired’s Gadget Lab blog, it’s nuts-and-bolts issues.  

Media Center users get stuck on the fact that they can’t set a TV tuner preference for an individual channel or that it lacks a record HD content-only feature.

Microsoft’s new venture, the Media Center Integrator Alliance, aims to help integrators and users address those issues by providing more information about how to maximize their Media Center experience. But the Gadget Blog is more interested in Exceptional Innovation’s new Life|medias.

The Lifemedia comes with customizable UI’s, support for the iPhone (to make it a useful remote control), and a fully integrated wireless connection. Basically, the promise is that if every Vista owner had one of these boxes, the ‘Vista Sucks’ jokes would be hard to come by.

The newly-announced Life|media LMS-172 and LMS-175 provide premium service for much-less-than-premium prices.

Wired’s article here.
More on the new Life|medias (did you know they have a 5.1 surround-sound amplifier, ZigBee control technology, and support for iPhone as a remote?) at CEPro.