Toys: MythTV clients

D. Hugh Redelmeier hugh-pmF8o41NoarQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org
Sun Feb 28 02:48:10 UTC 2010


This long message contains some field notes on my experiences with
different MythTV backends.

I have a couple of MythTV backends.  These machines record programs
TV for me off Rogers Cable (SD, analogue) and serve them to MythTV
Front Ends (AKA clients).

My main client has been a Small Form Factor Dell GX115 (Pentium 3
866MHz, 512M, ATI video card with TV-out).  This works fine for SD on
my old TV.

So why do I want to change front-ends?
- the Dell makes too much noise
- TV-out has been difficult (support in X comes and goes)
- the SFF isn't small enough
- the Dell probably won't reasonably support our new 1920x1080 digital
  TV (our main TV is still the old one)
- it is fun to muck about (sometimes)

Things I'm experimenting with:
- WDTV-LIVE
- AppleTV
- Acer Aspire Revo "nettop"


WDTV-Live:

- ought to be wonderful: cheap ($129), small, low power, HDTV-out is
  possible, runs Linux

- does not seem to understand our Myth boxes' UPnP server.  UPnP is
  probably a bad choice anyway since it may not support fast forward and
  reverse.  I've heard suggestions that it is better to run a
  different UPnP server on the myth backend but I haven't tried that

- I haven't gotten SMB to work.  Not a lost cause yet: I haven't tried
  hard at that

- does not seem to play a myth file even when it is delivered via USB
  flash memory stick

- the failures did not come with useful diagnostics.
  <http://www.mythtv.org/pipermail/mythtv-users/2009-December/275129.html>


AppleTV

- small, quiet, cheap (only about $180 for the 40G refurb model from
  the Apple Store; Apple refurbs come with the same warranty as new)

- although it is an Apple product and locked down to force you to get
  stuff from the iTunes store, the security has been broken.  It runs
  a stripped-down version of an earlier release of Mac OSX.

- The AppleTV is a little PC, mostly.  It runs a low power Core Solo
  processor.

- It never powers off so it is always warm.  Lots of folks dislike the
  constant draw of 17W (roughly).

- can run MythTV, but the port is missing something to start it up
  properly

- I run XBMC (originally known as XBox Media Center).  It can talk to
  MythTV backends.  My two backends run different versions of MythTV
  so no Myth box could talk to both but XMBC can.

- The AppleTV can drive analogue and digital TVs.  In currently using
  component out to drive my old TV.

- The AppleTV may not be able to drive 1080i, at least not while
  decoding some kinds of video.  Some AppleTV / XBMC folks have
  figured out how to replace the MiniPCI wireless card with a Broadcom
  Crystal HD card to speed up the decoding.  I don't need one at this
  time.

- The AppleTV can play Youtube videos, iTunes podcasts, and internet
  radio.  I've found that mildly amusing.  (My computers don't have
  Flash so Youtube is a bit of a novelty.)

- the remote is confusingly small.  Very few buttons.  It does work.


Acer Aspire Revo AR1600 "nettop"

- not too expensive: I paid $229 + some tax from an NCIX sale.

- single Atom core, 1G RAM, 160G 2.5" drive, nVidia ION video, "linux
  boot"

- was described as "linux boot" so I thought I was going to get my
  first machine to be delivered with Linux.  Not that I had much hope
  for Linpus.  Well, it was delivered with only OpenDOS!

- a very cute little box.  A little hard to crack (I added another 1G
  DDR2 SODIMM; $10 from the Source last week).  Came with a small
  wireless keyboard and mouse (the little USB dongle can be stowed in
  the mouse).

- it came with a mounting bracket that lets you attach it to the back
  of a monitor if the monitor has VESA mounting holes.  I was
  surprised to learn that TV monitors don't come with VESA holes.

- the Atom is probably about as powerful as the AppleTV's CPU.  But
  the ION is good for decoding video.  So the Revo is better than the
  AppleTV for driving a TV.  The Revo cannot drive analogue (eg.
  component out) so the AppleTV works with my old TV but the Revo will
  not.  I use HDMI to connect both video and audio of the Revo and my
  digital TV.

- I run Ubuntu 9.10 + XBMC.  Few problems.  Turn off desktop effects
  because they confuse XBMC.

- Flash does not exploit the ION on Linux (I think that there is a new
  version that can do so on MS Windows).  So Flash doesn't work as
  well as it should.

- the remote (keyboard and mouse) is confusingly large.

- takes longer to start than the AppleTV since the Revo can actually
  be turned off


XBMC

- seems pretty cute.  Lots of capabilities that I've not explored.

- I don't like the presentation of the list of available recordings as
  much as Myth's own front-end or even MythWeb's

- does not allow scheduling recordings the way Myth front-end and
  MythWeb does

- can actually talk to several Myth back-ends and they need not be
  matching versions (all MythTV systems talking to each other must be
  running the same version)

- great community: I got help via IRC and their web forum, some from
  the actual author or porter.

- great that it can run on Linux, MacOSX (including AppleTV variant),
  and MS Windows.  I think that only older versions support the
  (original) XBox and do it with Linux.
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