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+--- Thread: Newbie Question (/showthread.php?tid=126885)
Newbie Question - sasigns - 2012-03-27
Hey guys I have been using my xbox 360 to stream over movies to my tv and its a huge pain with formats and re encoding and such. A few years a go I even bought a linxus media extender and it was really unreliable not to mentions that i had the same issues with the codecs. So today I heard about the apple tv and thought I would give that a try but only apple tv 3 are available. What is a great way to stream to your tv using the xmbc platform? any tips or ideas or just general help would be great!! thanks again everyone
RE: Newbie Question - DDDamian - 2012-03-28
why stream?
hook up direct and forget about codecs etc
RE: Newbie Question - sasigns - 2012-03-28
cause that would either a) mean building a box to hook to that tv. and or move mine up to the main tv.. more looking for a server option that can then serve to multiple tvs.
RE: Newbie Question - RandomNinjaAtk - 2012-03-28
Sounds like you already have a server, so build a small pc, and that will play all files from the server with XBMC and no requirement of re-encoding the files. Plus you'll have a killer interface to access your media as a result.
RE: Newbie Question - sasigns - 2012-03-28
sorry double post
RE: Newbie Question - sasigns - 2012-03-28
Would really like to avoid the additional boxes idea as I have 3 tvs that I will be doing this for and to get each tv their own box will get expensive in a hurry. are there no extender options you guys would recommend?
Wouldn't it be at least a couple hundred more like $300 for each box (something good enough to pull from the server)
when you can get an apple tv 2 for around $100 please educate me if I am wrong.
Thanks in advance
RE: Newbie Question - RandomNinjaAtk - 2012-03-28
Lot of people use apple tv's do the job, but isn't that the same as adding additional boxes? appletv vs htpc..... Just one is a little more expensive, but with that, you will have more control and you won't be limited on performance, because building a cheap i3 PC or llano, will enable you to not have limits on the video quality and customization. Just a thought...
RE: Newbie Question - Kirky99 - 2012-03-28
You need an apple product you can jailbreak, so I don't think you want an ATV3.
ATV2 is your cheapest option right now I think, but 720p is your limit. You could pick up ome Atom/ION based pcs as well, they have a little more power, but Netflix HD is trouble last I checked. Llano is probably best right now, but it is a full blown PC.
Yes, it means a PC at each TV. My TVs don't do anything without a PC, no cable/antenna only was on my server. Everyone in my house see so like it better that way. If I do get another TV, I'll build another HTPC.
The guides in the stickies can be used to build a pretty cheap capable HTPC. Straying off that course and you might be caught by a few surprises.
RE: Newbie Question - Trip Se7en - 2012-03-28
I'd like to know more info as to how I can take my appletv to a friends house and access my library on my home Mac mini over there... Any tips for that? Oh, and poster, I would reccomend the Atv2 if you need an immediate fix, or wait until a JB comes along for the atv3 which will do 1080p.
RE: Newbie Question - Kirky99 - 2012-03-29
FTP server at your house, and add the sources as such... I've never tried it, but have been meaning to...
RE: Newbie Question - Bstrdsmkr - 2012-03-29
Better than that, vpn. I believe ATV has vpn builtin if you go that route.
The "best," meaning balanced between price, capability, and PITA option is to build a couple of cheap htpcs. Sounds like you already have a media server, so get a cheap barebones htpc setup and boot xbmc from a usb drive.
ATV still has some weirdness to it and if budget isn't your only concern, I'd avoid them. If you just need something as cheap as possible, it's a serviceable solution.