[kassysimon]

Hi all.
I have a pretty basic setup; the media is stored on a the home PC and Kodi plays on the HTPC in a separate room, both running Windows 10, no add ons other that Aeon Nox.
I'd like to run Linux on the home PC but I have never used Linux before.
Will I have to run Linux on both machines?
If so, is there anyway to keep my library and its history intact?

And is setting up Kodi on Linux easy?
I've been here but I don't understand it. http://kodi.wiki/view/HOW-TO:Install_Kod...rom_source

Thanks.

[nickr]

No you will not need linux on both machines

Backing up and restoring the database will require a bit more information.

If you install Ubuntu or a derivative in the ubuntu family, Kodi is no sweat.

[DaVu]

First you have to decide which kind of Linux you want to install. I would recommend Ubuntu in the version 16.04 as Kodi works pretty good on it.

Kodi on Linux is easily able to connect to the network shares your Windows 10 machine provides. For testing and playing around with Linux and to prevent to break things, I would recommend to use some left over HDD you might have and install Linux on that. So you are able to drop that Linux installation completely, plug in the other HDD again which contains your working Windows installation.

After installing Ubuntu is done you have to understand how Linux works in general. In windows you are able to download some files, double-click them, hit "next" for a few times and you are done with the installation. That's a bit different for Linux. Software is provided in so called "repositories" (repo in short) which you can imagine as a box which contains several software. If you install Ubuntu, you the Ubuntu-repo is already installed and you are able to get most of the software you need from there.

If you need other software, which might not be in that repo, you have to install an additional repo. There is also the case that you (for example) have version "10" for a specific software in the ubuntu-repo and a newer version in an additional (software-specific) repo. That's for example the case for Kodi. The Ubuntu repo ships Kodi 15.2. We are currently at Kodi 17.3. So you see the difference. You won't get Kodi 17.3 from the Ubuntu-repo so you need another one. The important part of the wiki you linked is that part:

sudo apt-get install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:team-xbmc/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install kodi

Those are the commands needed to install kodi from the "team-xbmc/ppa". PPA= Personal Package Archive = repository

Let's dig through those commands:

line 1:
that's needed to manage the repos that you install software from

line2:
That will add the specific repository where you are able to get current stable Kodi from

line3:
that will update all existing repositories to check if there is a newer version of the software they provide.

line4:
will install kodi

To prevent any problems you might run into, I would like to know which kind of hardware you are using. The gfx-card is most important in that case.

[nickr]

Re-reading the OP says

the media is stored on a the home PC and Kodi plays on the HTPC in a separate room ... I'd like to run Linux on the home PC

So does s/he want to install linux on the desktop (which is serving the files and doesn't seem to be using kodi) or on the HTPC machine that gets the media off the desktop and plays it to the TV?

Nickr (confused).

[Shryp]

One nice thing about most different versions of linux that are available these days: They will all run from a DVD or USB flash drive and don't need to be installed on the hard drive. This will let you try them out for a couple hours or even a couple weeks and and any changes you make will simply be gone when you reboot your computer. As long as you don't choose to install anything or mess around with your hard drive much your computer will go back to Windows 10 without even knowing you were messing around with linux.