Included in all CD orders of the 600 dpi "Cowboys & Critters" series is a folder containing a shareware copy of MediaCenter. It is located inside the Autorun folder: AUTORUN > MEDIACNT. The, already created "Cowboys & Critters" thumbnail album (.alb) is located there as well; AUTORUN > MEDIACNT > CCTHUMBS.ALB. And in some cases, the "Christmas Cuts" album (.alb) is located there as well; AUTORUN > MEDIACNT > XMTHUMBS.ALB. Depending on what Windows version you are running... and if Bill Gates will quit changing things every two years... you should have a "Splash Screen" that opens up automatically after you insert the CD into your drive. This "Splash Screen" will give you "button" choices representing steps such as; Launch Windows Explorer, Launch MediaCenter, Purchaser's License Info., Display Guidelines, Online Tutorials and Quick Guide. Click the "MediaCenter" button (link) and it should open the MediaCenter program that is on your CD. (If not... please read the "Updates" information located below). If it does open "MediaCenter"... here's how to set it up for your system. Once clicked... you should see a full screen of the MediaCenter program with a "Ad-blurb" box telling you it's name and version... etc. Click the "OK" button and the "Ad-blurb" box will disappear and you should now have just the MediaCenter screen and an array of "tool" button icons at the top left of the screen. Most will be "grayed" out except for the "Create New Album" button (looks like a sheet of paper with the top right corner bent down)... and the "Open Album" icon (looks like a open folder with a bent arrow above it). Once you "open" some album... all buttons become active. Click the "Open Album" icon and you will get a "Open Album" dialog pop-up box. There will be two small windows to the left and right. The right window is where you direct MediaCenter to go to find the (or any) album (.ALB) files and the left window is the list of .ALB files that will be contained in whatever folder you opened in the right window. First... use the "Drives" drop-down selection box (lower right of "Open Album" dialog box) and direct MediaCenter to the CD drive letter of your system. Mine happens to be "E" drive... many are "D" drive. Once you have selected your CD drive letter... you will then see the list of folders contained on your "Cowboys & Critters" CD in the right window. Select the "AUTORUN" folder... and it will show you the sub-directories it contains of MEDIACNT and DOCUMENTS. Double click the MEDIACNT folder and the .ALB files will be displayed in the small left side window. Select "CCTHUMBS.ALB" with your mouse cursor and then click the "OK" button (top right of the Open Album dialog box) and the MediaCenter screen will now fill with the thumbnail images of the "Cowboys & Critters" series. NOTE: Your CD may also have the "XMTHUMBS.ALB" listed in the left window display. This is a "seasonal" package I generally offer during the Christmas holidays... and the full-sized image are not included in the CD unless you have requested to purchase them. IMPORTANT..!!! These are just thumbnail images in .JPG format. They are basically "thumbnails" of "thumbnails". They were created strictly for quick viewing of the images so you can "see" what number corresponds with which image. They are NOT to be used as the images to import and trace in your cutter system software. They will not work. "HOW TO" INSTRUCTIONS: If you would like MediaCenter to create an .ALB file for the actual full-sized .BMP series you have purchased on your CD... here's how to do it. I would suggest creating a folder on your "C" harddrive and name it whatever you wish... just as long as you remember where it is. I would then copy ALL .BMP images from the single WM-Set 1, WM-Set 2.... etc. folders located on the CD to the ONE newly created folder on your harddrive. You can now either leave MediaCenter on the CD... or move a copy of it to your harddrive (recommended). Either way... you can now open MediaCenter... select the "Create New Album" icon... you will get a dialog pop-up box titled "Album name". Ignore it and just click the "OK" button. You will now see a "Add File By" dialog box. Make sure the "radio button" next to "Selecting Files" has been selected.... click the "OK" button and you will now get the "Add Files" dialog box. Direct MediaCenter (same steps as above) to the new folder on your harddrive that now contains ALL the full-sized .BMP images in it. Once there... and you can see the list of .BMP image names in the left side window (wm-ez001.bmp, wm-ez002.bmp... etc.). Click the "Select All" button and MediaCenter will now start creating a new thumbnail .ALB file of the full-sized .BMP's. Since these will now be the full-sized .BMP images being "thumbnailed"... it will take a few minutes for MediaCenter to finish the process. Once it has completed this task... you can go to the "ALBUMFILE" (very top left of screen)... click and select the "Save As" option. You will get a "Save As" dialog pop-up box where you can direct MediaCenter to the location you wish to save the new .ALB file you just made. For simplicity sake.. I would save it in the newly created folder in which you have the images stored. Type in a name you can remember (western.alb) and click the "OK" button. Now each time you need the thumbnail previews of the full-sized "Cowboys & Critters" images... you can activate MediaCenter... select the "Open Album" icon and direct it to the new folder (on your harddrive) in which you have saved the .ALB file (that you created with the above steps) and click (highlight) the album name... click the "OK" button. The MediaCenter screen will now fill with the thumbnail versions of the full-sized images. It will load the MediaCenter screen much faster now that the .ALB file has already been created. Also... it will "remember" the path to take and will default back there each time... or until you ever direct MediaCenter to a different .ALB file somewhere else. It will then "remember" that path. It always "remembers" the last .ALB file you visited. What you gain by doing this...? First of all is speed. You can now select thumbnails of the full-sized images... single click (highlight) the image you need... select the "MediaFile" button (top of screen)... select "copy"... and send a copy of the full-sized .BMP formatted image to another drive, CD... etc. Saves time getting the correct image to your cutter. You can also prowl under the "AlbumFile" button (top left of screen) for MediaCenter viewer options. Such as... under "Preferences"... you can select the thumbnail "sizes" being displayed on the MediaCenter screen. Under "Preferences" > "General"... you can set the viewer to show a larger version of the thumbnails on the MediaCenter screen when you double click any of the thumbnail(s). I suggest selecting the "if larger, shrink to full screen" option. When finished viewing... simply "click" the mouse again (either button) and the screen returns to the thumbnails. WORD OF CAUTION: Under the "Tools" at the top of the MediaCenter screen... there is a "delete" function under both "AlbumFile" and "MediaFile". Should you have a thumbnail selected (highlighted) on the MediaCenter screen and click the "delete" option under "AlbumFile"... the thumbnail will be removed from the MediaCenter screen... but the image will still exist in your folder on the harddrive. It can be placed back in the MediaCenter screen by simply having MediaCenter "re-read" that particular .ALB file again. If you use the "delete" option under "MediaFile"... the image will be physically REMOVED from your harddrive..!!! Be careful. Of course, you can replace the image since the original is still on your CD. MediaCenter is a great little program. I use it daily around here. I hope it works for you! Update: I have feedback from some of my clients that MediaCenter is working great on thier Win 95/98, Win ME and XP systems... but not even opening in Win 2000. If Win 2000 is your system... might head to my Digital Camera page and look for another Free thumbnail viewer program called "Image Guider", or a commercial one called "BR's PhotoArchiver". It is supposed to work on all platforms. Update 2: I've been getting some reports that certain versions of Windows XP are not including a .DLL file named CTL3D.DLL in thier Windows/System directory. This is a "have to have" file for MediaCenter to work! If this .DLL file is missing, a quick search on Google should find you a free download copy. Check your Windows/System directory first and make sure that this .DLL file is missing... and DO NOT overwrite an existing copy of CTL3D.DLL should you already have it in your Windows/System directory. If you wish to try a different copy of the CTL3D.DLL file... be sure and save your original on a floppy disk...!!! I will be including a copy of the CTL3D.DLL file as of Jan. 01, 2005 in any mail-out CD order. The file will be located in the Autorun folder under: Autorun > MediaCnt > CTL3D.DLL. Or you can download a copy here: Download CTL3D.DLL (12,343 bytes - WinZipped) For my Download delivery clients You can download a WinZipped shareware copy of MediaCenter here. (817,945 bytes)