If you are like me and have been wanting more options in the MCE SDK it appears your requests have been answered. The new SDK for Diamond (MCE in the vista timeframe) which is available on MSDN now offers developers the chance to leverage the same rendering that MCE itself uses. Check out the sandbox for more info.

http://blog.mediacentersandbox.com/PermaLink,guid,817c2b05-2a9e-47ac-80c9-1c4db5b26c18.aspx