[ilovemymac]

I hate windows. It's bloated and Linux is better for running Xbmc on. It's lean.

With a user name like Ilovemymac and you ask me to use windows haha

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What drivers? All the boxes that run Linux don't need drivers. Plus for a keyboard I can use a wifi or Bluetooth.
Netflix I have on my Apple TV 2. 1 click would be nice but its not end of the world.

[navigates]

I hate windows. It's bloated and Linux is better for running Xbmc on. It's lean.

With a user name like Ilovemymac and you ask me to use windows haha

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What drivers? All the boxes that run Linux don't need drivers. Plus for a keyboard I can use a wifi or Bluetooth.
Netflix I have on my Apple TV 2. 1 click would be nice but its not end of the world.

Agreed ! however in my opinion windows 7 works just fine. I tried windows 8 and that was clunky as well. I'll give the metro another shot once 8.1 comes out. I have a hdclone image of my windows 7 so If I have to revert back it takes no more than 15 minutes to get back to the backup state.

[ilovemymac]

I dont like windows on anything. I have used windows in the past and i have done enough xbmc set ups on windows and a few with win 8( dumbest OS ever) and i dont like it. I have been using Apple since back in the IIc days and then Mac since os 6. I have had to use windows in the past and just always hated it. So many work arounds to do something so simple.
I dont really like linux as a desktop because it lacks so much in support but for an XBMC box it can run very lean and clean. Someone said the Raspberry PI but i dont know anything about that.

[navigates]

Its what you are comfortable with. Agreed that windows 7 is bloatware but its fast and if needed can be used for other applications or games as well. I'm planning on adding mame with a bluetooth controller. Give windows 7 another honest try. You may not be so disappointed. Would you like me to make a video of my bootup's and netflix seeming integration?

[ilovemymac]

You can. I mean i have an Apple tv 2 now and it works great. However it 1 doesnt do 1080P which for where I sit and my screen size it doesnt matter. However i am building a dedicated home theater with a projection screen and then 1080P will matter. But all i want is something lean and runs XBMC. I wont run netflix or i doubt it since netflix would not look good on a large projection screen.

[ilovemymac]

What about jynx box with Linux

[Ned Scott]

ATV 1:

I sold 3 and replaced with 3 artic mc001 for what its worth, (which is an atom d525 and ati series video card. gigabit lan etc. They were 120 each after memory purchase. I sold the ATVs for around 140-175 each, equiped with CHD first gen cards.

Its just too damn slow with a library of any decent size and fanart. Can it play 1080P hd, well yeah, if it doesnt trip out on memory usage issues. If it buffered out it was just another issue altogether. I used openelec but also tryed ubuntu builds too. Over 2 years or so just wasnt doing it. I guess the good thing is if you want to try it, you can resell it and get your money back. I picked all of them up used on craigslist for around 30-40 each over a span of 2 years time.

Its a box from 2007, if you already have one and a crystal hd card maybe worth seeing what its about, but at this point, I would go with something with more than 256MB ram, isnt so dated cpu. etc.

Its great what was done with ATV1, but dont invest in it at this point is my opinion.

I disagree. My ATV1s are still the king HTPCs in my house, and never have had out-of-memory issues with video playback. Besides, v12 can buffer to the HDD and avoid RAM usage all together. I can load it up with a huge library and it's very snappy and quick. I have no issues with the UI, unless I use a heavy skin like one of the Aeon skins.

I love OpenELEC, but for the ATV1, Crystalbuntu 2 is much better. For a while I was worried because the Crystalbuntu 2 test builds weren't running as well as CB1 and Eden, but now CB2 blows CB1 away. My only issue right now is that airplaying keeps crashing, but that seems to be more of a bug than a performance issue.

If you can get an ATV1 in good physical condition for under $50, then you can also get a BCHD 15 card for about $20 on ebay, then you have something that beats the living crap out of most ARM boxes, and some ATOM boxes.

Certainly not saying the ATV1 is better than what you replaced yours with, but I would say the ATV1 is still an excellent box for XBMC. It's what I use when I just want to watch movies and actually use XBMC, rather than test stuff like I do for other devices.

However, if I had to buy something right now, I wouldn't go any lower than a Celeron G540. They're cheap as heck, and powerful. You can get them in a miniITX mobo with either a quiet fan or a fanless heatsink case. Celerons seem to be the best price-per-power right now for an HTPC.

[getafix]

Is there another option out there can play ISO (BR and DVD) DVD format and dolby True HD.

For me these are essential as all my BR's are in ISO format as well as most of my DVD's.

[ilovemymac]

ISo format? You must have a ton of space. Seems a odd way to go vs putting them into like a more useable format

[cwide]

Is there another option out there can play ISO (BR and DVD) DVD format and dolby True HD.

For me these are essential as all my BR's are in ISO format as well as most of my DVD's.

Prebuilt? Just get anything with a Sandy Bridge or Ivy Bridge processor.

Intel Celeron NUC is a good place to start.

[ragedogg69]

ATV 1:

I sold 3 and replaced with 3 artic mc001 for what its worth, (which is an atom d525 and ati series video card. gigabit lan etc. They were 120 each after memory purchase. I sold the ATVs for around 140-175 each, equiped with CHD first gen cards.

Its just too damn slow with a library of any decent size and fanart. Can it play 1080P hd, well yeah, if it doesnt trip out on memory usage issues. If it buffered out it was just another issue altogether. I used openelec but also tryed ubuntu builds too. Over 2 years or so just wasnt doing it. I guess the good thing is if you want to try it, you can resell it and get your money back. I picked all of them up used on craigslist for around 30-40 each over a span of 2 years time.

Its a box from 2007, if you already have one and a crystal hd card maybe worth seeing what its about, but at this point, I would go with something with more than 256MB ram, isnt so dated cpu. etc.

Its great what was done with ATV1, but dont invest in it at this point is my opinion.

I disagree. My ATV1s are still the king HTPCs in my house, and never have had out-of-memory issues with video playback. Besides, v12 can buffer to the HDD and avoid RAM usage all together. I can load it up with a huge library and it's very snappy and quick. I have no issues with the UI, unless I use a heavy skin like one of the Aeon skins.

I love OpenELEC, but for the ATV1, Crystalbuntu 2 is much better. For a while I was worried because the Crystalbuntu 2 test builds weren't running as well as CB1 and Eden, but now CB2 blows CB1 away. My only issue right now is that airplaying keeps crashing, but that seems to be more of a bug than a performance issue.

If you can get an ATV1 in good physical condition for under $50, then you can also get a BCHD 15 card for about $20 on ebay, then you have something that beats the living crap out of most ARM boxes, and some ATOM boxes.

Certainly not saying the ATV1 is better than what you replaced yours with, but I would say the ATV1 is still an excellent box for XBMC. It's what I use when I just want to watch movies and actually use XBMC, rather than test stuff like I do for other devices.

However, if I had to buy something right now, I wouldn't go any lower than a Celeron G540. They're cheap as heck, and powerful. You can get them in a miniITX mobo with either a quiet fan or a fanless heatsink case. Celerons seem to be the best price-per-power right now for an HTPC.

Honestly, I would agree with you, but the price of used apple tvs are no longer under $50. In fact, I would be happy if I could find one for under $75. It also does not help that I just downgraded back to Crystalbuntu 1.0 from 2.0 because of sluggishness playing media. I really think the audio engine is really taxing the apple tv. Unless you encode your media "just right," expect to have it stutter the first few seconds on pressing play. This was not a problem with Crystalbuntu 1.0.

As far as the king, maybe if you needed component video, but I would much rather recommend another route if you are spending $100+ on an XBMC box.

[ilovemymac]

I like the intel box but also looking at the Jynx box.

[Ned Scott]

Honestly, I would agree with you, but the price of used apple tvs are no longer under $50. In fact, I would be happy if I could find one for under $75. It also does not help that I just downgraded back to Crystalbuntu 1.0 from 2.0 because of sluggishness playing media. I really think the audio engine is really taxing the apple tv. Unless you encode your media "just right," expect to have it stutter the first few seconds on pressing play. This was not a problem with Crystalbuntu 1.0.

As far as the king, maybe if you needed component video, but I would much rather recommend another route if you are spending $100+ on an XBMC box.

CB 2 was only sluggish for me in pre-release. I did a side-by-side the other day of CB 1 vs CB 2, and the performance boost is fantastic. I haven't had any stuttering or anything. The only exception to this is a larger issue that affects anyone using the Broadcom Crystal HD, and that's that live TV freaks out using BCHD. Crazy enough, XBMC with CB 2 is able to software decode 1080i without dropping frames, so it's kind of a moot point, but does mean you have to manually turn hardware decoding on/off when you need to go between Live TV and 1080 h.264. Thankfully for myself, I really only use the Live TV feature to test things out, since there's almost nothing good on TV.

I do see what you mean about the price increase. I didn't think the ATV1 was that in demand, but one a-hole wants $100 for his broken ATV1 on ebay, holy crap.

I still stand by what I said, that if one can come across an ATV1 for $50 or less, then it's a fantastic deal. I guess that might be pretty hard, these days. I'm kicking myself now, too, because I sold like 10 of these on ebay once, and they had the BCHD 15 chip and were in great condition, and I sold them at a slight loss. If only I had held on to them longer...

[ilovemymac]

Someone said there is a quad core box out there. But can Xbmc even use a quad core?

[Ned Scott]

Someone said there is a quad core box out there. But can Xbmc even use a quad core?

The GUI can make use of it, but software decoding/video playback won't make much of a difference. XBMC software decodes only using one thread, so only one core will be used at a time for that. However, it's normally the GUI that people see issues in (being sluggish, etc), so it certainly would help on more demanding skins and such.