Media Browser is a fantastic and free (ahh, the magic word!) plugin for Windows Media Center that takes your video, music, and other media files and displays them in a visually appealing user friendly interface.

Media Browser can be easily configured to display images, information, and other metadata automatically pulled from the Internet. This has quickly become a must have addition to my Windows Media Center setups in Windows 7.

Preparing for Media Browser

Assuming you want to take advantage of Media Browser’s ability to automatically pull info and images, you’ll want to have your movies and and TV shows properly titled ahead of time. This means you’ll need to have movie files named exactly the same as the movie title. If you aren’t sure of the exact title, check with a website like IMDB.com.  You can, however, change them later if you find some aren’t properly titled.

Example: My initial setup displayed no information or images for Spiderman 3. Upon checking IMDB, I discovered that the proper title was Spider-Man 3 (with the hyphen). After making the change to the file name, the movie graphics and information displayed properly. If there is more than one movie with the same name, leave a space after the title, try to put the year of the movie in parenthesis. For example, there are a handful of movies called Beowulf. So, if referring to the recent Beowulf, name the file Beowulf (2007). Even still, I have a few that are yet to display info, but it’s only 2 or 3 out of about 200 and I haven’t spent much time trying to fix it.

TV shows naming is a little different. Each TV series needs to have a main folder with the shows name, and a sub-folder with the seasons named. (Season 1, Season 2, Season 3, etc.) A Season 1 folder is required even if the show only has one season. Note: If you have several seasons of a particular show, but don’t happen to have Season 1, just create a blank season 1 folder.

TV Show Naming Format examples:

TV Shows\Seinfeld\Season 1\s01e01 – episode 1.avi

or

TV Shows\Seinfeld\Season 1\Seinfeld 1×01 – episode 1.avi

or

TV Shows\Seinfeld\Season 1\101 – episode 1.avi

For more detailed information, or if the above doesn’t make sense, check out the the Organizing Your Media Collection section of the Media Browser Wiki.

Installation and Setup

Download and install the Media Browser application. Requirements include Windows 7 & or Vista, and the Microsoft .Net 3.5 Framework. Take the defaults by  clicking “Next” and then “Install” until finished.  Leave the “Configure Initial Settings” box checked and click “Finish.”

Open Windows Media Center. You will notice that the Media Browser option should be available on the main interface. Click on “Media Browser.” The first time you open it you will be prompted to configure it. Click OK.

Here you will see a list of options:

Tracking – “Assume watched if older than”  This places a check next to items older than the date selected.

Metadata – “Allow Internet Based Providers” Keep this checked if you want to have Media Browser pull movie information and images from sites such as IMDB, etc. You’ll likely want to leave this checked unless you are using a different method to pull meta data information.

Automatic Updates – Leave this checked if you’d like to be notified when new version or updates are released.

Click “Continue” at the bottom right when finished. You will be notified that Media Browser will be restarted. These and other settings can be changed at any time by clicking on the little wrench at the bottom right corner in Media Browser.

Adding Media

Now you are ready to add videos or other media to Media Browser. Open Media Browser Configuration Tool by going to Start > All Programs> Media Browser Configuration Wizard. If prompted for confirmation by the User Account Control in Windows 7, click Yes.

In the Media Browser Configuration Tool, you have “basic” and “advanced” options at the top. Click on “Advanced” to display all the option tabs.

Now, to add movies, TV shows, videos, or other media to Media Browser, click on the Media Collection tab, then click “Add” below the “Add your media” section to the left, and then browse for a folder.  A media collection can consist of multiple folders. For example, if you create a “Movies” folder, you can include movie files from various locations on your computer or network locations.

To add more than one folder,  click on the name of the media collection on the left. Configuration Details will appear on the right.  The box in the lower right will show current media directories associated with the selected media collection. Click on the “Add” button to browse for additional media folders.

You can also choose  an Image for your media collection.  You can use an image you have already, search for one on the Internet, or you may want to check out some user created images offered for free by some of the folks on the Media Browser forums.

Note: It may take several minutes for the information to be downloaded and displayed in Windows Media Center.

The next step is to configure the interface view to your liking. There are several different view settings, some with additional options. Close out of the Media Browser Configuration Tool and open Windows Media Center. Click (or open with a Windows Media Center remote) Media Browser to open it. Click on the “View” option at the top and select one of the various view settings.

Here you see a basic “Cover Flow” view.

As you click on the various “Views,” additional options may be displayed below. These options can be selected or deselected by checking or un-checking the box.

Here you see “Poster” view.

A closer look a “Cover Flow” view.

“Thumb” view.

“Thumb strip” view.

Once you have chosen your view, you may want to check our the “Diamond” Visual Theme option. Update: This now needs to be installed through the Plug-ins tab first!

Select the plug-in from the list and click “Install.”

Once you install the Diamond theme, it will appear on the Visual Theme drop down list on the Display Tab in the Advanced options of the Media Browser Configuration Tool.

The Diamond Visual Theme is a very slick, impressive looking view that puts full images in the background. This can be toggled on and off in the Media Browser Configuration Tool and can also be accessed by clicking on the little “Wrench” icon at the lower right of the main Media Browser page.

As I mentioned before, I feel Media Browser is a must have plug-in for Windows 7 Media Center. There are some other options out there, but Media Browser is so slick and simple, it’s really hard not to love it.

Resources

Media Browser Documentation

Media Browser Download