[nickr]

Every increase in processor power will give you more - someone will prove with a benchmark that the gui renders faster on an i7 than a i5 etc etc.

However for current use the 2955u (ie celeron) chromebox will do all people should want from a xbmc/kodi box. The boundaries will always challenge the current. The boundaries now centre around:

- bigger than 1080p ie 4K/8K

- h265/HEVC particularly in combination with 4K/8K.

But an i3 doesn't necessarily solve the boundary cases anyway.

You have to ask yourself too

- How much 4K material am I actually going to have access to in the next couple of years (probably damn all)

- Can I avoid having to decode HEVC until the chromebox/nuc of the day can do it in hardware? - (probably yes)

TL;DR get the 2955u model, it'll see you right for some considerable time, given the life cycle of computer hardware in general.

Sorry I know nothing about CB's wireless, and I don't do wireless for media.

[charliebrown]

i gotta give cred, it was dirt simple to install by following the instructions. openelec working like a dream.

1 question though, if you release a upgrade to the bios, how do i get back in the menu to upgrade it?

Do i just plug in a random usb stick and press esc to get to the menu?

Thanks for all your work!

[D-an-W]

Thanks nickr, some great info there. The icing on the cake would be if they also work with the Measy RC11 controllers

[wackid]

And a Rii mini One i28 keyboard?

[Matt Devo]

i gotta give cred, it was dirt simple to install by following the instructions. openelec working like a dream.

1 question though, if you release a upgrade to the bios, how do i get back in the menu to upgrade it?

Do i just plug in a random usb stick and press esc to get to the menu?

Thanks for all your work!

As per the wiki/OP, there is a separate firmware update script listed for OE users, you would simply open up a SSH session to the box (using Putty, eg) and run that script from there.

[charliebrown]

i gotta give cred, it was dirt simple to install by following the instructions. openelec working like a dream.

1 question though, if you release a upgrade to the bios, how do i get back in the menu to upgrade it?

Do i just plug in a random usb stick and press esc to get to the menu?

Thanks for all your work!

As per the wiki/OP, there is a separate firmware update script listed for OE users, you would simply open up a SSH session to the box (using Putty, eg) and run that script from there.

Aa great, thx for answer, ive noticed that some freeze stutters accours Sometimes, and from what ive read its a intel driver thing with vaapi. Anyone know if this is fixed in uppcomming kodi? (i know the patch right now is turn sw off, but it makes the cpu load higher)

Again matt thx for the script!

[hdmkv]

You may add my Ortek too.
http://www.amazon.com/Ortek-Windows-Infr...B00224ZDFY

Exact model is VRC-1100

Receiver and included remote work great (editing keymap would have to be done for perfect match)
Works great with harmony, and harmony has a profile ready for ortek, than just add MCE or Windows Media Center.

Have you done this? What I'm missing is the button for context menu.

[Matt Devo]

Aa great, thx for answer, ive noticed that some freeze stutters accours Sometimes, and from what ive read its a intel driver thing with vaapi. Anyone know if this is fixed in uppcomming kodi? (i know the patch right now is turn sw off, but it makes the cpu load higher)

Again matt thx for the script!

use the recommended settings as per the wiki and you shouldn't have any issues. Lots of things related to VAAPI acceleration are changing in Kodi, and hopefully we'll have a fixed Intel video driver soon too.

Have you done this? What I'm missing is the button for context menu.

on an MCE remote, it's the guide button

[ATV1-canada]

Well, following that dumb fix the Rosewill IR605 continues to function flawlessly in 4.2.1.

I can also confirm that the ASUS Xonar U3 USB audio stick functions as plug-and-play. I have not actually tried the SPDIF output just yet, but the option comes up in XBMC, and headphone output is otherwise great (sounds WAY better than the built-in analog audio).

I can further confirm the SPDIF output does work with the ASUS Xonar U3 USB - passing DTS and DD . the caveat is does require some editing in putty since the digital output on this card is muted by default.

I followed the instructions from this link - works perfect:

http://openelec.tv/forum/41-supported-ha...-soundcard

kindest regards

[hdmkv]

on an MCE remote, it's the guide button

Thanks. Ordered a FLIRC to try out as well.

[furii]

for anyone else having trouble getting their harmony hub based remote working with openelec:

in the harmony app or myharmony software you want to add a new device, select computer, for the OS select windows as it has the most buttons available. next you'll want to create an activity using that device. after you've done so sync the hub. next you'll want to be on the openelec bluetooth settings screen and have a keyboard available. in the harmony app select the new activity you just created and it should say pairing. in openelec you should see the hub pop up called harmony keyboard. select that and hit pair and trust (i believe). in the harmony app you should see that it has paired and you should now be able to control xbmc.

you'll likely want to edit the buttons via myharmony and keymap.xml (wiki) as there are several that do not work out of the box. for instance none of the colored transport buttons translate to xbmc so you'll need to use other buttons for those. instead i have the red button mapped to Record, the green button mapped to Windows, the yellow button mapped to FullScreen, and the blue button mapped to AudioLanguage. i then set up a custom keymap.xml so that pressing the red button while at the xbmc home will update my library but if i'm playing a video it will turn subtitles on and off. it takes a little work to set up but is worthwhile.

if you set a button in myharmony but it doesn't do anything, or what you intended, in xbmc your best bet is to log in to openelec via putty (with debug logging enabled) and run the following command:

Code:

tail -f .xbmc/temp/xbmc.log | grep OnKey

press a button on your remote and you'll see a line similar to this:

Code:

12:45:17 T:140024275273536   DEBUG: OnKey: return (0xf00d) pressed, action is Select

if you get nothing popping up in your log then that means the button isn't recognized by openelec for whatever reason and you'll need to use another key. i think the harmony menu button doesn't work or is non-existent so for that button i have it set to Mute instead since i control volue with my avr.

i just opened the harmony app and it looks like logitech added even more buttons you can possibly use. still no number keys for some reason though, not that i use them but some might. worst case you can open the harmony app and use the soft keyboard for those.

[Rojo]

Got my Hp Chromebox a few days ago and set it up today, it's working great, im really happy with it, thanks for the advice particularly wrxtasy.
Also, I have to say it was very easy to set up cheers Matt for all your work!

[dchabby]

not sure what I did but hope someone can help

i was farting around with my raspberry pi and some hard drives and somewhere along the line trying to access a hard drive it asked me for a username and password. I just entered the ones i usually use for this kind of stuff and it didn't work.

Fine but now i hooked those drives back up to my desktop and when i tried to access them it asked me for a password when it didn't before.

So i rebooted my chromebox and now I cant even access my desktop shares at all, it keeps giving me a 'could not connect to network server' error.

I tried removing my desktop as a source but now i cant even add it back as it keep giving me a 'function not implemented' error.

Please help !!!

[randy37]

Hmmm... this is rising above my skill level. Not sure where to go from here.

Thanks again

how about a fresh reload of OpenELEC to rule out any software issues

Hmmm... this is rising above my skill level. Not sure where to go from here.

Thanks again

how about a fresh reload of OpenELEC to rule out any software issues

Good idea, I will give it a try

Hi Matt, I did a fresh reload of OpenELEC and soon after my chromebox shutdown again. The odd thing is it was running for quite some time with the boot screen up while I was making another bootable usb on my laptop but shortly after I rebooted into OpenELEC/XBMC it shut down and once again no light, no power...nothing. BTW when I was monitoring the temp the other day it said it was 137 degrees F not C if that makes a difference? I wish I could narrow this down to a replaceable component and not junk the whole box.
Again, your help is appreciated. Thanks

[Matt Devo]

Hi Matt, I did a fresh reload of OpenELEC and soon after my chromebox shutdown again. The odd thing is it was running for quite some time with the boot screen up while I was making another bootable usb on my laptop but shortly after I rebooted into OpenELEC/XBMC it shut down and once again no light, no power...nothing. BTW when I was monitoring the temp the other day it said it was 137 degrees F not C if that makes a difference? I wish I could narrow this down to a replaceable component and not junk the whole box.
Again, your help is appreciated. Thanks

137°F isn't a problem at all, so don't think we're dealing with a thermal protection issue. I'd reload the stock firmware / ChromeOS (see wiki) and see if it misbehaves there. If so, have the box replaced under warranty.