[Gink]

After years of XBMC4XBOX I'm finally upgrading, starting with an HTPC in the living room. I've picked my main hardware, just need a little advice on picking Remote/Receiver and choosing which way/flavor of XBMC to install.

This is a budget build... trying to balance performance w/price.

APU: AMD A6-3500 w/Radeon HD 6530D
Mobo: ASRock A55M-HVS
8GB PC1333 RAM

Planning to just go with the APU graphics for now, if I have problems with them I can add discrete NVIDIA later.

I want to run XBMC on Linux, and prefer to be able to exit XBMC and have a working Linux desktop to use if I want. I'm no *NIX guru, but I use Ubuntu 11.10 on a regular basis, am comfortable with command line, and performing tasks remotely through SSH, so should be able to do any tinkering necessary to get things running as long as I find guides and such. There seem to be a lot of choices for different Linux builds of XBMC though, so not sure where to start. Openelec seems to guarantee support for the AMD APU, but sounds like it's more of an "embedded" system so I wonder if it is limited as far as customization, add-ons, etc.

The Mobo has both an IR header and a CIR header. I've read a great many threads here about remotes and receivers and such, but seems like most are dedicated to sorting out remotes now that a lot of the stuff is included in the kernel and so I see reccomendations to find receivers, etc that will work out of the box, but not much mention of specifically what hardware works out of the box.

We are used to using 1 universal remote to control TV, Cable, and XBMC-Xbox, so would prefer not to have to use multiple remotes. We also use our PS3 for netflix and such regularly, so I wouldn't mind a remote that would also control it, but that's not necessary since remotes that do both IR and BD might be a challenge or cost prohibitive. Honestly I get a little boggled by the whole IR, CIR, RF, BD choices much less keeping straight what works best.

Any tips, links, etc are appreciated!

[Bstrdsmkr]

Whoa, 8gb RAM for a Linux build is way more than you'll ever be able to use for an HTPC. If it's just an HTPC, 2gb is plenty, 4gb if you want to be future proof. Now if you're planning on building a home server that happens to have xbmc installed, you could make the case for 8gb, but otherwise, save your money.

OpenElec is a dedicated distro, meaning that you can customize it to your heart's content and long as you stay within the scope of what it was meant for. You CAN do anything with it you could do with any other linux build, you just have to re-add the components they've stripped out

[mrdally204]

I'll chime in here. Download XBMCbuntu and be done with it. Its Lubuntu with XBMC built in. On boot-up it will boot to XBMC. You can then log out and into Lubuntu for a full desktop experience. Nothing more to install. Read a little about it, it sounds like they made this specifically for you! There was a trick tin installing it vs running it straight from the CD. I think it is when you see the XBMC with the . . . as it is booting into the environment you hit enter and then you can perform the install process. You can also try and run if from the CD the first time to make sure it is what you wish to use. If someone knows more please chime in!

[Gink]

Haha, yeah I know 8 is excessive, but there was only a $15 difference from 4 and I like to leave my options open. I've seen 4 recommended for XBMC with Windows, which hopefully I'll never have to do, but there are some things that work on Windows and not so far on Linux. I may at some point try to integrate a Live TV solution in, like adding a Ceton InfiniTV 4 card or somesuch, so yeah, probably overdoing it on future proofing, but I figured it shouldn't hurt anything.

So I guess my main install options are
1. Openelec... then adding in anything I need that is missing...
2. XBMCbuntu
3. Install Ubuntu (12?) and then install XBMC on top of it.

I don't really care about easy, more concerned with long term stability/flexibility. Mostly it'll be used for streaming HD video from a NAS, pretty simple, but I want to be able to use add-ons and new things as XBMC keeps expanding.

---

I'll chime in here. Download XBMCbuntu and be done with it. Its Lubuntu with XBMC built in. On boot-up it will boot to XBMC. You can then log out and into Lubuntu for a full desktop experience. Nothing more to install. Read a little about it, it sounds like they made this specifically for you! There was a trick tin installing it vs running it straight from the CD. I think it is when you see the XBMC with the . . . as it is booting into the environment you hit enter and then you can perform the install process. You can also try and run if from the CD the first time to make sure it is what you wish to use. If someone knows more please chime in!

I'll definitely look more into this one too, browsing around the forums for other things I feel like I've seen a million and one "problems with XBMCbuntu" threads, so thought maybe it wasn't the most reliable method, especially with the AMD Fusion and such.

I'm not going to have an optical drive in the final build, so installing from USB or somesuch would be optimal, but hooking up a CD/DVD drive to do the install would be easy enough too.

[Gink]

I think I'll start out with XBMCbuntu, give it a shot. If there are too many problems I can try openelec.

So, any advice on remote receivers?
Seems like for the mobo CIR header the only choices I've found are the ASRock adapter, which is just a USB adapter that requires plugging the USB port into the CIR header, reviews seem to be that the reception/angle on it aren't great. The other option is re-pinning the intel CIR adapter. Fine, but it costs $30. I guess this would give me the ability to start from off state with the remote, but not sure it's worth the price, though drilling a small hole and having the IR receiver internal would be preferred to having anything attached to external USB.

Or would I be better off looking into RF or Bluetooth devices?

[Bstrdsmkr]

Depends a lot on your preference/budget. Bluetooth is better than IR, and RF is better than bluetooth, and the cost usually follows suit.

I use my Nexus One, the wifey uses her Nexus S. The official XBMC remote app does everything we need, including starting from off with Wake On Lan.

I was under the impression (I run Windows on my main) that option 2 and 3 above are the same. XBMCbuntu is just Ubuntu with XBMC preinstalled.

I haven't looked at your mobo, but see if you could take that $15 from RAM and step up to 4gb @ 1666mhz. That's going to be a bigger improvement for you than the extra 4gb.

If your budget can stand it, look into one of these: http://www.logitech.com/en-us/1225/8439

[Gink]

Nice! The logitech device is pretty cool. I've been reading various remote threads for the last couple hours and my head is spinning now. Lots of options and a lot more feedback on what works with windows than on linux. I'll probably just look for something fairly simple and cheap to start with.

Good to know the remote app can use WOL to start it, wasn't aware of that. Have used the app some with xbmc4xbox, but it's never worked perfectly with that. But knowing there are other ways to start it up without walking across the room makes things easier. I'd still like to be able to control it with a universal remote sometimes though, but that shouldn't be too hard or expensive.

The inteset CIR comes with a universal remote for $30, not to bad, or there are the Ipazzport mini keyboard thingies cheap with RF or Bluetooth.
Still decisions to make, but getting closer. Thanks for the tips!

And yeah, XBMCbuntu is just XBMC on top of Lubuntu... a light install of Ubuntu, so it's just a difference of packages omitted or certain preconfigurations. Unlikely I would have problems to where I thought installing Ubuntu, getting everything configured, then installing XBMC on it would fix the problem... so, worst case scenario. I'd be more likely to try adding discrete graphics card if there are apu issues.

[Bstrdsmkr]

lol, if you REALLY want to take your wallet out in a back alley and beat it with a rusty baseball bat, check this out: http://www.iruleathome.com/
Now you're talking whole-home automation from your phone.

Yeah, a lot of function was lost for xbox when it started moving to JSONRPC. It works a lot better with mainline.

Most of those IR things will work with LIRC so you can probably use that with just about any remote and have it do whatever you want

[live4ever]

Seriously get an Nvidia card right at the start if you are planning Linux.

Also what is the "1 universal remote to control TV, Cable, and XBMC-Xbox" you are currently using (model # and pics)? I can tell you if you can program it to control XBMC.

[Gink]

Haha, nice Bstrdsmkr! I always dream of having the fully automated "smart" home, but am a loooong way off from it. Maybe someday.

I'm getting closer on the remote decision. Seems like plenty of things will work, I'm mostly muddling over what solution I want to go for. Getting a remote with IR and Bluetooth that I can use BD for the PS3 and IR for xbmc and TV, or using RF for XBMC and sticking with PS3 controllers for the PS3.

The little Ipazzport things seem pretty cool. Mini keyboard with some remote functionality... they've got one version that's got "air" mouse functions or something. Pretty cool for the $30-$35 range.

Right now I've just got my Comcast universal remote that works for the TV, DVR/Cable box, and works fine with the old Xbox remote dongle and is programmed for xbmc4xbox. I'm planning to pretty much ditch Comcast for TV at some point, so a new Universal remote will be necessary anyway. There's just no way I'm doing a $200 harmony at this point.

Whether I go for and RF Ipazzport, or maybe BD so I could use it with phones/tablets, etc as well... or whatever, I'm probably going to want to get an internal IR receiver at some point. My motherboard has separate headers for both IR and CIR so why not use em? So far I just haven't found a lot of receivers that do use the headers. Seems like the most common internal IR receivers are made to use USB headers, but I'm going to keep digging.

[Gink]

Well the inteset CIR receiver is $21.95, or $28.95 with a remote for it that'll control 3 other devices, is backlit, learns, etc... I want the CIR for remote power up/down, so for an extra $7 I'll just get it with the remote and have something that works for now and that should be able to control tv off/on/input and maybe even be setup to control the dvr. Gotta start somewhere.