[Tekniques]

Hi all,

new here and have been reading all forums for a few weeks now. I am a Windows guy and run XBMC on Vista which is my main PC used to store all of my video/audio content (Divx/Xvid/mp3). I have 2 other TV viewing areas that I am looking to add either a HTPC or the cheaper, smaller and quieter option for one of the bedrooms is to use XBMC on Apple TV.

Apple TV out of the box needs to sync with ITunes on your PC as I understand it to enable streaming. I don't want to install iTunes on Vista and have to convert files to MOV and import all media again to yet another media library. If the following questions are possible it will determine whether I build a HTPC or just get Apple TV:

1. Does XBMC on Apple TV give me the same functionality as XBMC on Windows when it comes to playing Divx/Xvid etc... ?
Reason: I want to be able to "add sources" from my Vista PC and stream divx encoded files through XBMC on Apple TV.

2. Can I export my XBMC on Vista Library, and re-import it to XBMC on Apple TV?
Reason: I have spent some time getting the library right in Vista and want to have one central library to manage only instead of going through the whole process again on other XBMC platforms.

advice most welcomed!

[Plan9]

The answer to your fist question is Yes.
All of my media is on a Vista machine and I watch it from the ATV.
Divx is no problem, most of my content is downloaded avi files.

As far as exporting and importing your existing library, I don't know.

[JDizzy]

New here too!

I have all media on external drives hooked up to Vista machine and networked to my ATV.

I initially installed with a patchstick from 'Patchstick.ca' and will add XBMC through their installer to my ATV.

I already have XBMC installed on my Vista machine and have it configured with all the media directories.

Questions:
When I install XBMC on the ATV, will I need to configure it, or will it see my settings on the Vista machine through the network?

Do the visualizations for music work through the ATV?

I have many ripped DVD (movie only, VOB files) in their seperate folders. Is there a way to play a DVD from Video Menu (clicking on coverart) without having to move through directories until you finally get the the actual movie.ifo file? (like a shortcut to movie file....hope that makes sense...)

Oh!, Also... does the little white ATV remote work well with XBMC installed?

Thanks!

[aedile]

@Tekniques:

To answer question 2, it all depends on how you manage your library. If you are doing things with .nfo files, then you can set up XBMC on your ATV to read the same .nfo files that your other installs are reading and that should make things CLOSER to what you are asking for. I am in a similar situation with 2 apple tvs connecting to a single share and I use .nfo files to keep things centralized. AFAIK there is no way to share the actual library SQLite files across multiple installs.

@JDizzy
So you seem to be new here so I am gonna give you a quick lesson in etiquette for the forums. When you have a question, first always search the forums (which we will assume you haven't very thoroughly since the questions you are asking are answered at least in part in previous posts). If you don't find the answer, then you should start a new thread. What you have done here is post your own unrelated questions in another person's thread. This is known as thread hijacking and is generally frowned upon, if for no other reason than the next person who wants the question you are asking answered will find the answer more difficult to find in a thread jacking situation. Since you are new here, I'll go ahead and answer your questions, but please be mindful of thread hijacking in the future.

1)You will need to configure it. Indeed you will want to as I am sure the ATV won't be able to handle nearly the number of bells and whistles capable on a well-tuned vista machine.

2)Visualizations work fine on my ATV.

3)Try using library mode. This should directly link to the actual movie file.

4)It works fine, if you are cool with a limited number of buttons. Check out some of the tutorials on using the learned remote commands or a universal remote to get better functionality.

[Tekniques]

Thanks AEDILE... until your post I was not aware of nfo's. I have since used Media Companion and created all NFO's with Thumbs and Fanart on the media server, got it all right, then scanned the locations from 2 XBMC's, one on Vista and the other on my Apple TV.

Works a treat.. effectively giving me a "centralised media library".

I noticed media companion only does Movies and TV. Is there something similar for scraping music and creating nfo's?