[Duncan Miller]

Hi all,

My first post here but I have read a lot of the forum over the past couple of weeks

The main reason I am posting is to find out the general feeling is getting an ATV2 and installing XBMC on it worth it....?

I currently have;

QNAP Nas with

• 2tb storage sharing a mixture of TV shows/Movies/Comedy/Kids stuff
  
  
• 1 x windows 7 pc which I use to rip everything and manage the data on the NAS (I also store a mirror of everything on another 2tb drive on the PC for backup)
  
  
• 2 x WDTVLIVE with custom firmware to allow moviesheets (enabled for movies only at the
  

moment)


Now I have been a long time getting to this point and everything is running pretty smoothly - files are all organised very well etc...

All devices are connected via Homeplugs which give around 4-5 mB/s - the WD's stream every file I have very well (majority of files are 720p/420p mkv/mp4/avi - not many at 1080p)

The NAS is connected to router via direct ethernet connection and the router is connected to the homeplug network (router is also wireless N enabled)


The "sensible" thing to do would be to leave all as is but I have never been happy with the standard WDLIVE interface (I used to just have my PC and nice XBMC screens connected direct to TV in the lounge but changed set up when I moved) - I bought the WDTVs as a cheap but reliable way to get all the media into Lounge and Bedroom and they do that well

I flashed the WD firmware and used software to go through and create movie sheets for all the films (the custom firmware will display a backdrop jpg for each film). It all looks a bit nicer now but is quite slow at navigating and there is also the issue of having to create a new movie sheet everytime I do a new film and I haven't even started doing the TV shows yet as that is a mammoth task and will require a full backdrop for every tvshow to work properly



So we get to the ATV2 which a couple of weeks ago I realised has been jailbroken / can run XBMC and is reasonably priced - Thinking I could buy two of these and sell my WDTV's and get a nice little upgrade for not much cost


But having read through a lot of the forums I am starting to get the impression that maybe the ATV2 is not quite up to the task of running XBMC in a reasonable way? There seems to be performance issues and some missing/broken features to contend with....?

I am very close to going through the change and I am quite competent with getting to grips with any changes that might be needed but what I don’t really want to do is compromise the quality/consistency of the files being streamed (like I have now) and risk the wrath of my wife etc....

I really would prefer to have the xbmc interface and the atv2 seems to be the cheapest way to get it -so back to my original question really - is it worth it??

[Duncan Miller]

A couple of additional points

Since looking into this I have installed the latest version of XBMC for windows and have that running pretty nicely on that machine again

My NAS has MYSQL capabilities and I will probably give that a go before buying ATV2 to get it all working - although I have again read that this puts another strain on the ATV2....?

I guess the ideal solution would be a couple of dedicate HTPCs but that isnt really an option due to cost

[nethervue]

I used to use XBMC with the old xboxs years ago and switched to using PS3's to play HD content... While it was ok, I sure did miss XBMC for all the features it offered and its plain and simple (and gorgeous!) interface. I picked up an Apple TV and installed XBMC couple weeks ago and let me just say, I've since sold 2 PS3's and now own 3 Apple TVs.

Its SO nice to have XBMC back again!! It runs great, I only have a couple movies out of hundreds that seem to stutter but worked fine on the PS3.

IMHO, to answer your question...YES. Being able to point to network drives, scrapers, video addons, and all the customization you can do..its worth it. Just buy one and try it out, I bet you go get that 2nd one pretty quickly.

[thesuffering]

Hi all,

My first post here but I have read a lot of the forum over the past couple of weeks

The main reason I am posting is to find out the general feeling is getting an ATV2 and installing XBMC on it worth it....?

I currently have;

QNAP Nas with

• 2tb storage sharing a mixture of TV shows/Movies/Comedy/Kids stuff
  
  
• 1 x windows 7 pc which I use to rip everything and manage the data on the NAS (I also store a mirror of everything on another 2tb drive on the PC for backup)
  
  
• 2 x WDTVLIVE with custom firmware to allow moviesheets (enabled for movies only at the
  

moment)


Now I have been a long time getting to this point and everything is running pretty smoothly - files are all organised very well etc...

All devices are connected via Homeplugs which give around 4-5 mB/s - the WD's stream every file I have very well (majority of files are 720p/420p mkv/mp4/avi - not many at 1080p)

The NAS is connected to router via direct ethernet connection and the router is connected to the homeplug network (router is also wireless N enabled)


The "sensible" thing to do would be to leave all as is but I have never been happy with the standard WDLIVE interface (I used to just have my PC and nice XBMC screens connected direct to TV in the lounge but changed set up when I moved) - I bought the WDTVs as a cheap but reliable way to get all the media into Lounge and Bedroom and they do that well

I flashed the WD firmware and used software to go through and create movie sheets for all the films (the custom firmware will display a backdrop jpg for each film). It all looks a bit nicer now but is quite slow at navigating and there is also the issue of having to create a new movie sheet everytime I do a new film and I haven't even started doing the TV shows yet as that is a mammoth task and will require a full backdrop for every tvshow to work properly



So we get to the ATV2 which a couple of weeks ago I realised has been jailbroken / can run XBMC and is reasonably priced - Thinking I could buy two of these and sell my WDTV's and get a nice little upgrade for not much cost


But having read through a lot of the forums I am starting to get the impression that maybe the ATV2 is not quite up to the task of running XBMC in a reasonable way? There seems to be performance issues and some missing/broken features to contend with....?

I am very close to going through the change and I am quite competent with getting to grips with any changes that might be needed but what I don’t really want to do is compromise the quality/consistency of the files being streamed (like I have now) and risk the wrath of my wife etc....

I really would prefer to have the xbmc interface and the atv2 seems to be the cheapest way to get it -so back to my original question really - is it worth it??

i got rid of my wdtv live plus for the atv2 for xbmc. a majority of my library is 720p or under. wdtv's ui sucked, and while movie sheets made it look nicer, it was still a pain.
i run my atv with a nightly (as well as my windows 7 machine) with the alaska revisited thread and the library shared from my windows 7 machine via mysql. speed and navigation are more than acceptable. Im quite happy with it. i wouldnt go back to wdtv if you paid me

[Zapa]

Very close to my setup, and I had it just like you, the wd interface just didnt replace the old Xbox good enough
Got my first atv2 saturday, ordered the second a few hours later and sold he wds the day after
The atv2 still have some issues, but where it is right now and the focus developers have on IOS, Im confident it will become a great player
And the wife factor was amazing, when she saw the good old XBMC interface

[teedd]

Just to repeat what allot of people have said here. Used to have xbmc on my old xbox, but when I got a new tv at Christmas, and realized the SD output looked horrid on the new set.

Played around with DLNA on my PS3 for awhile but missed the interface of XBMC. So about 2 months ago got an apple tv 2 and haven't looked back, my setup is similar to yours AppleTV Ethernet to dlink router, Homeplug to Windows 7 pc with my movies on. I've got a growing collection 720p mkv's that play great. Occasionally on fast frame rate scenes (e.g. inception when everything starts exploding in Ariadne dream at the beginning.) I experience minimal buffering that lasts for less than 30 seconds and then plays fine for a few mins.

The only thing I would say is make sure your 720p rips are all mkv's and your be fine, I've found either avi's or mp4's at 720p to not play. As for the other limitations you mentioned everything works like the windows build apart from a few small things, and I feel as the project evolves this will get resolved.

[Duncan Miller]

Thanks for the quick feedback guys

Are you all running network or wireless?

I also noticed that there is now a new apple firmware out - does the Jailbreak work with that still ?

[Duncan Miller]

The only thing I would say is make sure your 720p rips are all mkv's and your be fine, I've found either avi's or mp4's at 720p to not play. As for the other limitations you mentioned everything works like the windows build apart from a few small things, and I feel as the project evolves this will get resolved.

Most are and I guess not really an issue to run the ones that aren't back through handbrake

[jgawera]

Firstly, i've got no HD content so can't comment on that.
However, i've been using XBMC on the xbox for about 7 years now, and wouldn't be without it.

My xboxes are a bit old now, and I tried replacing them with a PC running XBMC on windows. But due to various annoyances this didn't work out. Once the ATV2 version came out, I decided it woudl be worth a try. I love the fact that it is so small and silent. Also, the fact that I can just leave it on, and it is "pretty much" a dedicated XBMC box means that it passes the wife test too.

For the price, i'd say definately give it a go.

As for the bugs, i'm sure the devs are on it, and we will be seing more releases soon. I've only had one real problem which is with one particular movie file which crashes XBMC, apart from that it works jsut fine.

[akid1]

i also sold my wd hd live and got me an atv2, much nicer with all those nice features you only get on wd with hard work (gathering moviesheets etc.).

for me, everything works very nice at the moment - no complains!

[Duncan Miller]

you guys are definately swaying me

Sounds like you are all generally running with no problems but have a few issues that aren't causing major concern

I guess having spent many man hours on those movie sheets and many more to spend if i want to do the TV series or a few to spend getting 2x atv jailbroken and all set up nicely I want to make the right decision

[Zapa]

only running wired here, haven't tried how well wireless works, as the cables are already in place

[nmat]

I am fetching movies wirelessly from a shared drive and it works great. 720p streams without any problem. The UI speed has been improved and it is very good now. Not as snappy as on my PC, but perfectly usable on the Confluence skin.

As a last remark, I would like to point out that there are some constraints in the supported file formats. 1080p files with a high bitrate won't work (besides, the output will always be 720p) and some HD XviD files won't work because hardware acceleration only exists for h264.

[teedd]

Yeah the 4.3 firmware update breaks hd playback, (apple changed the calls to the video tool box or something) this has been fixed in the unofficial nightly builds.

Hopefully with some luck, your atv2's will come with 4.2.1 preloaded, if so happy days, just run Greenpoison RC6 on the firmware already on the apple tv. (don't let your apple tv do any updates) and your have a tether free jailbreak and you can follow the instructions around the site to block any atv updates and install xbmc.

Worst case the atv2 ships with 4.3 firmware (btw apples firmware doesn't match up to what it reports on the device, so 4.3 appears as 4.2 on the atv and 4.2.1 appears as 4.1.1 bizarre).
Your have to use Seas0nPass which is a tethered JB (tethered means if the atv2 looses power it needs to be connected to the pc to boot again, its not the end of the world.) But I recommend glancing over the jailbreak process for both and familiarizing your self to ensure your happy with the processing before committing.

Thanks for the quick feedback guys

Are you all running network or wireless?

I also noticed that there is now a new apple firmware out - does the Jailbreak work with that still ?

[Maetrik]

i have been a xbox/xbmc user for serveral years. after the atv2 was able to run xbmc, i bought two of them to replace both of my xbox consoles. i did not regret it. the atv2s are silent, super energysavers and do everything i want.
i dont use database stuff (to much work to maintain in my opinion) and i am still in file mode and use pm3 hd like i did on xbox. i dont see any difference in performance and the wired atv plays 1080p very fine. the wireless one in my sleeping room is fine with 720p also, but most of my stuff is xvid anyways. i love those little black boxes