.
2012-02-20, 20:44
im looking at getting a zbox aswell cyberman so was interested to see theyve got some new ones coming out this month,
are you in the UK mate?
are you in the UK mate?
2012-02-21, 07:49
I bought the ad04 directly from zotac. Had some issues with xbmcbuntu detecting video drivers finally built manually, but 1080p was sluggish.
Tried openelec daily build and it working great. No issues at all.
Tried openelec daily build and it working great. No issues at all.
2012-02-21, 18:45
i have set up 3 AD04s and never had a problem with high bitrate 1080p, all running XBMCbuntu now
2012-02-22, 00:18
i made a bootable usb stick with unetbootin, i got the .iso from here: http://mirrors.xbmc.org/releases/XBMCbuntu/
booted the machine to usb (had to set the boot order in the bios), and selected install XBMCbuntu. didnt install any drivers, works out of the box
followed all the instructions during the install
after that it was just a matter of selecting the right audio output in the system settings menu. i didnt have to make any extra files or anything, just a little trial and error to get the right one depending on your audio output.
the thing is super quiet, apparently you can fiddle with the bios settings for fan speed, but i dont want to bother. mine sits in a cabinet, so i dont hear it, my inlaws' site on their tv stand and cant hear their either
i can reboot just fine, and shut down fine. i dont use the suspend feature, so cant comment on that
booted the machine to usb (had to set the boot order in the bios), and selected install XBMCbuntu. didnt install any drivers, works out of the box
followed all the instructions during the install
after that it was just a matter of selecting the right audio output in the system settings menu. i didnt have to make any extra files or anything, just a little trial and error to get the right one depending on your audio output.
the thing is super quiet, apparently you can fiddle with the bios settings for fan speed, but i dont want to bother. mine sits in a cabinet, so i dont hear it, my inlaws' site on their tv stand and cant hear their either
i can reboot just fine, and shut down fine. i dont use the suspend feature, so cant comment on that
2012-02-22, 20:47
cyberman Wrote:Thank you!
So finally I bought a ZOTAC ZBOX AD04 PLUS. I thought about getting the barebone one and putting a ssd inside, but the barebones are not yet available here in Germany..
So I hope the build in HDD isn't too slow.. I will try out the suspend mode!
is that one of the new ones cyberman?
you want to let us know how you get on with your new zbox mate, im still undecided on what to get
2012-02-26, 03:10
I've got two of these boxes - one is the AMD/ATI Zotac AD04, and the other is the Atom/nVidia box. Both are working well at the moment. The AMD based system had some fan noise to begin with - I increased the temperature sensitivity from the default of 30 to 40 in the BIOS and that has stopped the fan from being on nearly constantly. (Arguably, I could have left it a bit longer to see if it would 'settle'). The drivers were a bit of a pain for the GPU, and needed a manual download and build from the ATI/AMD site.
The Intel/nVidia system also seemed to think that my HD TV was best suited at 1280 x 768 for some reason, and I needed to modify xorg.conf to enable Twinview so that I could use nvidia-settings to use the correct 1920x1080 resolution. When this was done, the screen calibration was off, and needed manually adjusting via nvidia-settings (calibration set to 80) to make the screen 'fit' my display. The nvidia-settings.rc file was then not loaded correctly (needed an edit to remove the hostname:0 prefix to the settings to get it to work correctly.
And finally ... the nVidia HDA audio (for audio via HDMI) was muted by default, and needed unmuting in alsamixer.
Overall, I'm pleased. Suspend seems to work, although I need more time testing to make sure that it does wake up correctly via the remote (I've had a couple of non-waking tests). Some fine tuning and all should be sweet. I'd definitely recommend these boxes.
Just for further info: the Intel/nVidia connects through a Pioneer surround sound system vi HDMI (which made screen detection in Linux a bit confusing at first, as the screen was detected as Pioneer and not the Philips TV). The AMD based system just connects directly to a Sony TV via HDMI. One system has 2GB of RAM, the other 4GB (no real difference though), and I've put a 128GB SSD in each, with movies/tv/music/pictures fed from an NFS server.
EDIT: Both run XBMCbuntu Eden beta3
The Intel/nVidia system also seemed to think that my HD TV was best suited at 1280 x 768 for some reason, and I needed to modify xorg.conf to enable Twinview so that I could use nvidia-settings to use the correct 1920x1080 resolution. When this was done, the screen calibration was off, and needed manually adjusting via nvidia-settings (calibration set to 80) to make the screen 'fit' my display. The nvidia-settings.rc file was then not loaded correctly (needed an edit to remove the hostname:0 prefix to the settings to get it to work correctly.
And finally ... the nVidia HDA audio (for audio via HDMI) was muted by default, and needed unmuting in alsamixer.
Overall, I'm pleased. Suspend seems to work, although I need more time testing to make sure that it does wake up correctly via the remote (I've had a couple of non-waking tests). Some fine tuning and all should be sweet. I'd definitely recommend these boxes.
Just for further info: the Intel/nVidia connects through a Pioneer surround sound system vi HDMI (which made screen detection in Linux a bit confusing at first, as the screen was detected as Pioneer and not the Philips TV). The AMD based system just connects directly to a Sony TV via HDMI. One system has 2GB of RAM, the other 4GB (no real difference though), and I've put a 128GB SSD in each, with movies/tv/music/pictures fed from an NFS server.
EDIT: Both run XBMCbuntu Eden beta3
