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RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - kamla - 2014-05-08

(2014-05-08, 22:12)underworld123 Wrote:
(2014-05-08, 22:04)xiaNaix Wrote: I think it's a problem with the XBMC repo. I was having the same issue earlier today on both Fire TV and PC installs.

Yes, googlecode seems to be having issues with git repos today. Give it some time...

ok ...
Thax
Kamla


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - schwang - 2014-05-08

Trying to add a network location. When I select browse, the working wheel just keeps spinning forever. What am I doing wrong? This didn't happen with other versions of xbmc. Am I forgetting something here?

Plz help


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - underworld123 - 2014-05-08

(2014-05-08, 22:28)schwang Wrote: Ok. Now when I try and add a share folder from my pc, it freezes up. Not happy with Gotham so far.

This is not a Fire TV specific issue, so kindly take this discussion to generic Gotham thread.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - tential - 2014-05-08

(2014-05-08, 22:54)schwang Wrote: Trying to add a network location. When I select browse, the working wheel just keeps spinning forever. What am I doing wrong? This didn't happen with other versions of xbmc. Am I forgetting something here?

Plz help

Manually type in the SMB file path or set a username/password for the share and give the FireTV access or whatever.

In short, it's a PAIN with gotham and I'm not sure why as it worked perfectly in Frodo.

(2014-05-07, 15:50)hdmkv Wrote: Thanks, will try that and report back shortly. But, it's odd that container would matter. Hopefully, if just container issue, it should be fixable in XBMC.

Update: Just tested 'The Dark Knight Rises' and 'Django Unchained' in m2ts containers and perfect playback! Great, but why not in MKV?!

Well your best bet would be to post DEBUG logs. Then people could give you a reason why it isn't working.

(2014-05-07, 20:22)who.is.matt Wrote:
(2014-05-07, 20:13)lartomar2002 Wrote: I do not think Amazon will ever support XBMC on the Fire because they can not generate any revenue from it. Just the opposite, they will lose revenue because most people will use XBMC rather than rent or buy videos from their site. Also they will lose what ever moneys they get from Netflix when someone rents a video.

So why do they allow developers to submit free apps? Why do they even offer a "free app of the day" program? Because even if Amazon isn't directly making money from an app, more apps make the devices more useful, and therefore more appealing to customers. The more that customers use the device, the more likely they are to use Amazon's services.

XBMC fills the same role as Plex, which is fine software but a lot of people aren't going to want to pay $5 for an app that requires them to also install Plex Media Server on another computer before they can really use it. So that leaves a lot of customers either not interested in the Fire TV since it otherwise can't play local media, or else sideloading XBMC. I'm hoping that Amazon will see the wisdom in putting a launcher for XBMC in the Fire TV's App menu, considering the alternative is exactly what a lot of people have been discussing in this thread: using other side-loaded apps like Llama to bypass the Fire TV interface entirely.

To gain a .01% additional market share? XBMC doesn't have enough users to justify Amazon going out of their way to appease XBMC useres. XBMC devs will have to go out of their way to get XBMC launchers/XBMC apps in the Amazon store and XBMC devs have already expressed 0 interest in doing so.



(2014-05-08, 04:01)D3w4yne Wrote: The MPEG-2 de-interlacing issue still exists in the stable release of Gotham.

In case anyone was curious.

Came specfically for this man thanks. I wanted to replace a set top box with an Amazon Fire TV. What a shame. Can't wait for this to work.
Edit: You mean the deinterlace issue where it only doesn't deinterlace one obscure (relatively for mea nyway) format or does it not deinterlace anything?


Volume control - pmcd - 2014-05-08

Does anyone know how to control the volume via the FTV remote? You'd have to go via the amplification setting I suspect as just changing the volume via a keymap.xml change doesn't actually affect the volume. You see the decibel change but it does nothing. This is with the release Gotham which otherwise works great, although there are slight overscan issues with Amber. Confluence doesn't have this issue as it has a tool for fixing that issue.

Philip

Solution: in the keyboard.xml just use

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<keymap>
<FullscreenVideo>
<keyboard>
<up>volampup</up>
<down>volampdown</down>
</keyboard>
</FullscreenVideo>
</keymap>


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - who.is.matt - 2014-05-09

(2014-05-07, 20:22)who.is.matt Wrote:
(2014-05-07, 20:13)lartomar2002 Wrote: I do not think Amazon will ever support XBMC on the Fire because they can not generate any revenue from it. Just the opposite, they will lose revenue because most people will use XBMC rather than rent or buy videos from their site. Also they will lose what ever moneys they get from Netflix when someone rents a video.

So why do they allow developers to submit free apps? Why do they even offer a "free app of the day" program? Because even if Amazon isn't directly making money from an app, more apps make the devices more useful, and therefore more appealing to customers. The more that customers use the device, the more likely they are to use Amazon's services.

XBMC fills the same role as Plex, which is fine software but a lot of people aren't going to want to pay $5 for an app that requires them to also install Plex Media Server on another computer before they can really use it. So that leaves a lot of customers either not interested in the Fire TV since it otherwise can't play local media, or else sideloading XBMC. I'm hoping that Amazon will see the wisdom in putting a launcher for XBMC in the Fire TV's App menu, considering the alternative is exactly what a lot of people have been discussing in this thread: using other side-loaded apps like Llama to bypass the Fire TV interface entirely.

To gain a .01% additional market share? XBMC doesn't have enough users to justify Amazon going out of their way to appease XBMC useres. XBMC devs will have to go out of their way to get XBMC launchers/XBMC apps in the Amazon store and XBMC devs have already expressed 0 interest in doing so.
[/quote]

Amazon doesn't have to lift a finger. And neither do the XBMC developers. Amazon simply has to live up to its claim that the Fire TV has an "open ecosystem" (which was one of the points raised in the press conference that introduced the Fire TV). Anyone can submit an app to the App Store, and as long as an app submitted to the App Store doesn't violate the posted guidelines and restrictions, it should be accepted, right? That's what an "open ecosystem" means. If XBMC remote apps are accepted into the App Store (and there were 3 of them the last time I checked, including the official remote app), why wouldn't something like a launcher for sideloaded versions of XBMC? Neither violates any of the App Store guidelines or restrictions.

Amazon doesn't have to actively support XBMC on the Fire TV. It just doesn't have to actively oppose it.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - xiaNaix - 2014-05-09

Instead of incessantly spamming this thread about an "official" Amazon app store version of XBMC (which the developers already said WILL NOT HAPPEN) why don't you just start bothering Amazon about allowing sideloaded apps on the home screen? Problem solved.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - tential - 2014-05-09

Quote:
(2014-05-09, 00:17)who.is.matt Wrote:
(2014-05-07, 20:22)who.is.matt Wrote:
(2014-05-07, 20:13)lartomar2002 Wrote: I do not think Amazon will ever support XBMC on the Fire because they can not generate any revenue from it. Just the opposite, they will lose revenue because most people will use XBMC rather than rent or buy videos from their site. Also they will lose what ever moneys they get from Netflix when someone rents a video.

So why do they allow developers to submit free apps? Why do they even offer a "free app of the day" program? Because even if Amazon isn't directly making money from an app, more apps make the devices more useful, and therefore more appealing to customers. The more that customers use the device, the more likely they are to use Amazon's services.

XBMC fills the same role as Plex, which is fine software but a lot of people aren't going to want to pay $5 for an app that requires them to also install Plex Media Server on another computer before they can really use it. So that leaves a lot of customers either not interested in the Fire TV since it otherwise can't play local media, or else sideloading XBMC. I'm hoping that Amazon will see the wisdom in putting a launcher for XBMC in the Fire TV's App menu, considering the alternative is exactly what a lot of people have been discussing in this thread: using other side-loaded apps like Llama to bypass the Fire TV interface entirely.

To gain a .01% additional market share? XBMC doesn't have enough users to justify Amazon going out of their way to appease XBMC useres. XBMC devs will have to go out of their way to get XBMC launchers/XBMC apps in the Amazon store and XBMC devs have already expressed 0 interest in doing so.

Amazon doesn't have to lift a finger. And neither do the XBMC developers. Amazon simply has to live up to its claim that the Fire TV has an "open ecosystem" (which was one of the points raised in the press conference that introduced the Fire TV). Anyone can submit an app to the App Store, and as long as an app submitted to the App Store doesn't violate the posted guidelines and restrictions, it should be accepted, right? That's what an "open ecosystem" means. If XBMC remote apps are accepted into the App Store (and there were 3 of them the last time I checked, including the official remote app), why wouldn't something like a launcher for sideloaded versions of XBMC? Neither violates any of the App Store guidelines or restrictions.

Amazon doesn't have to actively support XBMC on the Fire TV. It just doesn't have to actively oppose it.

You're assuming that a press statement = what companies actually do. I'm sure if you closely follow tech companies you'll realize that press statements and press slides are a complete joke.

You realize right that if Amazon truly wanted an "open ecosystem" then they wouldn't make you sideload apps. You could just add them if you wanted. They added that level of complexity on an "open ecosystem" box.

Either way though, this has been discussed so many times and the end result is always the same. XBMC team doesn't have any interest in dealing with appstores.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - MrCrispy - 2014-05-09

Can we stop talking about this issue please? The fact is the tiny tiny percentage of FireTv buyers who are actually aware of XBMC are going to be savvy enough to sideload an apk. For gods sake, XBMC still isn't on the Play Store, what makes you think it will be in the Amazon app store?

People forget that for all the passion, this is still a very niche segment, new users are likely to learn about this via an Internet search/friend. Its certainly not going to be promoted by Amazon.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - navigates - 2014-05-09

(2014-05-09, 01:02)MrCrispy Wrote: Can we stop talking about this issue please? The fact is the tiny tiny percentage of FireTv buyers who are actually aware of XBMC are going to be savvy enough to sideload an apk. For gods sake, XBMC still isn't on the Play Store, what makes you think it will be in the Amazon app store?

People forget that for all the passion, this is still a very niche segment, new users are likely to learn about this via an Internet search/friend. Its certainly not going to be promoted by Amazon.

I'm building 3 for friends. 1 for parents and I personally use the Intel NUC because FireTV just came out. I have no issues with sync dts 5.1 or any other audio codec I've thrown at it yet.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - D3w4yne - 2014-05-09

(2014-05-08, 23:25)tential Wrote: Came specfically for this man thanks. I wanted to replace a set top box with an Amazon Fire TV. What a shame. Can't wait for this to work.
Edit: You mean the deinterlace issue where it only doesn't deinterlace one obscure (relatively for mea nyway) format or does it not deinterlace anything?

The de-interlacing options are grayed out during video playback. I believe someone had said that the options should be grayed out if MPEG-2 is hardware decoded and that hardware decoding should de-interlace on its own. However I guess we are not sure if the Fire TV is actually doing hardware decoding of MPEG-2 or if this is some sort of bug.

One option I am considering is buying a tv tuner that streams h.264 which should work fine. That was covered in one of the 5 trillion posts in this thread.

This is the tuner I was considering:

http://www.amazon.com/SiliconDust-HDTC-2US-HDHomeRun-Hardware-Transcode/dp/B00GY0UB6I

It's an option at least. I'll strongly consider it if we can't get deinterlacing worked out in the next couple of months.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - ixian - 2014-05-09

Yes, my Colossus capture cards output h.264 and live tv plays and looks fine on the FireTV.

I thought the MPEG-2 problem was with the AFTV not anything particular with XBMC. I doubt Amazon would pay the license fee, no matter how small it might be, if they never plan to stream content using it (and why would they?). Same thing with VC-1.

As for why XBMC won't do software deinterlacing on the AFTV that's still up in the air as far as I know, but it's definitely the same in Gotham final.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - corin99 - 2014-05-09

MPEG2 plays great for me. I'm using Gotham RC1 and playing 1080i/720p OTA recordings using ServerWMC/wmc.pvr. Deinterlacing is grayed out, but the video looks fine.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - D3w4yne - 2014-05-09

You know I hadn't even looked at the actual video. I just checked the deinterlacing options in the GUI.

I'll watch some TV for a while and see if it looks any better. Was 100% getting horizontal lines a couple weeks ago.


RE: Amazon Fire TV for XBMC - elmerohueso - 2014-05-09

(2014-05-08, 23:25)tential Wrote: Manually type in the SMB file path or set a username/password for the share and give the FireTV access or whatever.

In short, it's a PAIN with gotham and I'm not sure why as it worked perfectly in Frodo.
I've never had an issue with this. Works great for me.