[aaronb]

Since you are using a Harmony, one weakness I've noticed with Live is it's a bit more limited when it comes to customizing your remote. With Windows you can select an MCE keyboard as the device in the Harmony software, and that gives you a lot more options for assigning commands. I think you can do it in Live if you start editing LIRC files, but it's much easier on Windows.

[natethomas]

I respectfully disagree. I've tried XBMC under Win Vista, Win 7 and Live (linux), and Live is far snappier in general. As well as this there are loads more headaches with Windows due to the crapness of the OS itself. Plus linux is free.

Only recently have I been experiencing the whole XBMC Live on a Intel Atom processor thing, and I've got to admit, Windows really is a bit slower. As far as I can tell, it shouldn't be, and I'm much too lazy to try to figure out why there's a discrepancy, but there it is.

As far as headaches go, that's a ridiculous statement. Linux and Windows each have massive numbers of headaches connected with them, regardless of operating system or anything else. It is the nature of OSes. The reason we recommend choosing the system you are most comfortable with is because you are typically already fairly knowledgeable in regards to dealing with the headaches of your OS of choice.

[patm95]

I recently built an XBMC standalone media center. I contemplated using Linux, but ultimately didn't just because I am more familiar with windows so I can't compare the two systems. I can however say that there is a way to achieve pretty much everything you want here with windows. I am not sure what Spotify is so I can't speak for that. I have a harmony 650 and it works great. To get pvr to work I used a script and mapped a button on the remote to close xbmc and open live tv in windows media center. This has proved to work quite well. This forum was invaluable to helping me set it up. My entire media center can be operated with a remote once it was setup. My girlfriend uses it all the time now and loves it. We recently canceled our satellite subscription. Good luck!

[poofyhairguy]

How about spotify?

Here is a repo for it:

http://www.spotify.com/int/download/previews/

Is this emulator issue still a problem or is there a "standard" way of doing it?
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=65847

There is no "easy and standard" way to add emulators on any platform, but the new pluggins that address emulators are very nice.

And with the HP IR receiver I would get my Harmony One remote to work nicely with the live setup?

If you have the one in my sig, the receiver works out of the box in XBMC live.

EDIT: oh yeah, just to clarify the tech specs, the audio and video would go from the XBMC machine by HDMI to an AV receiver where the sound would be handled and the picture sent on to an HD plasma.

Right.

[HansP]

i wanted to buy a ASROCK E350M1 with Amd's zacato processor and HD6310
since there are no catalyst drivers available for linux at this point i want to use windows 7 ...

any1 working with AMD or ATI

i know absolutely nothing about linux , i'm a bit a computer freak but mostly hardware

[poofyhairguy]

i wanted to buy a ASROCK E350M1 with Amd's zacato processor and HD6310
since there are no catalyst drivers available for linux at this point i want to use windows 7 ...

any1 working with AMD or ATI

Yeah, AMD works great in Windows.

[HansP]

yeah but i see in this thread windows gets slow after a while ... even after only using it as HTPC ??
maybe due to remove - add - remove - add movies ? so disk frament needed ?

[Mindzai]

As far as headaches go, that's a ridiculous statement. Linux and Windows each have massive numbers of headaches connected with them, regardless of operating system or anything else. It is the nature of OSes. The reason we recommend choosing the system you are most comfortable with is because you are typically already fairly knowledgeable in regards to dealing with the headaches of your OS of choice.

Well, I am only speaking for myself of course, but I personally know both OSes equally well and I find Linux to much more headache free.

However, the question was not "which OS is easier", it was "which OS is better for running XBMC", and any objective person would agree that is Linux in the form of XBMC Live.

[HansP]

Well, I am only speaking for myself of course, but I personally know both OSes equally well and I find Linux to much more headache free.

However, the question was not "which OS is easier", it was "which OS is better for running XBMC", and any objective person would agree that is Linux in the form of XBMC Live.

soon Xbmc live 7 :p

ripped windows 7 with only needed parts and Xbmc

[Timo]

However, the question was not "which OS is easier", it was "which OS is better for running XBMC", and any objective person would agree that is Linux in the form of XBMC Live.

That's right. Well actually the question was "which OS is better for running XBMC with my needed features". I really did not and do not want this conversation to become a juvinile back and forth about which OS is best in general.
Like I said I have worked professionally with both OS's for years and as any expert will tell you they are both excellent products that will work with minimal problems when configured properly.

From reading this forum (and elsewhere) I see that users have had fine results with both OS's running XBMC. Of course each system is different and each XBMC user is likely to have a different set of needs.
I have now looked hard at all of the options and from what I can tell it would be best for my system to use Windows after all. I should be able to get emulators, Spotify, Harmony and uTorrent to work with the least amount of "extra" work.
The only thing that would need some tinkering is getting the system to boot up as fast as possible, but even that will most likely not be a problem since if the same machine will run the uTorrent server it will normally always stay on.

Thanks to everyone for their advice, I will be building the system up with Windows and will write a short description of all the settings and configurations when it is finished.

[HansP]

That's right. Well actually the question was "which OS is better for running XBMC with my needed features". I really did not and do not want this conversation to become a juvinile back and forth about which OS is best in general.
Like I said I have worked professionally with both OS's for years and as any expert will tell you they are both excellent products that will work with minimal problems when configured properly.

From reading this forum (and elsewhere) I see that users have had fine results with both OS's running XBMC. Of course each system is different and each XBMC user is likely to have a different set of needs.
I have now looked hard at all of the options and from what I can tell it would be best for my system to use Windows after all. I should be able to get emulators, Spotify, Harmony and uTorrent to work with the least amount of "extra" work.
The only thing that would need some tinkering is getting the system to boot up as fast as possible, but even that will most likely not be a problem since if the same machine will run the uTorrent server it will normally always stay on.

Thanks to everyone for their advice, I will be building the system up with Windows and will write a short description of all the settings and configurations when it is finished.

on usenet or torrents u can easily find windows 7 lite or something like it , i found one there that's stripped verry good and uses 700mb less space on the HDD , u can use your own key to be legal with it

i saw a bootup with such system in Windows 7 and it booted in less than 50seconds to XBMC

[snaaps50]

soon Xbmc live 7 :p

ripped windows 7 with only needed parts and Xbmc

I am also thinking about that, i have stripped already a lot of parts of windows.
What i don,t understand is that why for example when i click in xbmc on a windows pc on a ftp network location i must wait longer when the files dissapears on the screen then when i do it on a linux based xbmc pc.

mabey its a good idea to check of xbmc will run on windows PE or BartPE.
Only problom with that is that you can not install every windows software/programs it will return no valid windows OS

Hmm, i have here also a live windows 7 usb based version, its a full win7 OS runs on usb or hd.
I will check this today ho xbmc runs on that..

ps, why use window7 and no windows 2003?
win2003 is a lot faster, smaller, stable..


About Hardware:
Its better to take a solid state disk to boot and run xbmc, and a alternative extra normal HD for storage of media files and more.
For USB versions i have now a ADATA N005 USB 3.0 stick, this one can read with 68MB per second (tested with branchmark software) this usb cost me 119 euro,s, the best buy for me in the last months..

[HansP]

i think it's driverrelated ... ?
XP SP3 is fast too but poofyhairyguy says it does not work properly

i have it installed on my corporate laptop and all works fine exept normally u can download the subs in the program but he wont do that ... maybe it's XP ?

i'm gonna run windows anyway since i want the ASrock AMD board E350M1

i'll check the lite version of windows i found when i get my stuff ( board back in stock in about a week or so )

grtz

[Timo]

Ok, just to give a mid project report - i got the machine (a different one though, since it was on discount), an Asrock ION 330


Done so far:

- Installed Windows 7, done with the updates and driver stuff etc.
- Installed XBMC

Everything seems to be working quite well so far, videos play as they should and the interface loads up quickly and everything is nice and snappy.

Tried my Neo Geo emulator with the launcher add on and it worked with no problems. I saw more add ons that would display the rom screenshots directly and not have to load the emulator interface, have to try them next.

In addition to the htpc i bought 2 of these:


and a wireless keyboard with an integrated trackball:


I have ordered an ir receiver also to be used with my Harmony One remote.


Next steps are to remove the explorer shell so that the machine boots right up to XBMC and to configure the video sources correctly and whatnot.

I'll post pictures and a more detailed info about the machine later on when I make some more progress.