Sunday, January 6, 2013

What is the best Linux Media Center Distribution?

Q. I am looking for something that I can boot right into that will allow me to play all of my videos, music, and hopefully old video games like SNES, NES, and other systems. I've seen Ubuntu Media Center and I am waiting for that but other than that I really can't find any media center that I can just install by itself without having to install a distribution underneath it. If there is a MythTV, Freevo, or other media center ISO that I can install as my main OS then that's what I'm looking for. Just gimme anything that's out there.
I also wouldn't mind hearing about speeding Media Center Application that can be installed for a Windows XP PC. My PC isn't that fast and I am looking for a good solution.
Once again, I'm looking for an OS that is a media center by itself without having to install anything at all.

A. Check out Linux MCE

Linux and WinXP Media Center at the same time in different screens?
Q. I have 1 laptop and a spare monitor. I want to use windows xp media center edition and linux (pardus) in seperate screens. But
I don't know
how can I install linux without partitioning my harddisk?
and how can I work with linux and win XP at the same time in same machine but different screens?

I'd appreciate your help
I have WinXP Media Center now.
How i'll install linux to boot with a Virtual Machine program ?

A. Use a VM (virtual machine) to emulate a pc running linux and then use dual screens (supposing your graphics card supports it) and just put the VM on that screen.

Here's a link to a good VM: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/default.aspx

Well, you have a linux cd right? Insert it in and select it as the boot device in your VM program - you should be able to install it as you normaly would and it won't overwrite anything in windows. Dont boot it from your bios, boot it from INSIDE the VM.

What is a good Linux Media Centre for the PS3?
Q. I want to be able to easily stream media files to my PS3 over wifi, however the PS3 OS doesnt support many of the files and I dont like alot of the transcoders (e.g. orb, tversity, etc). So I was wondering if the was a good media centre software like XBMC for PS3 linux?

It has to be able to work on an SDTV (576i).

A. Sure, it's called Mplayer.

That's kind of a joke. There is a "media center" version of Ubuntu but I don't think it has a ps3 platform release.

The first thing you must do with linux is break the addiction to the do-it-all software that people use with windows. Nobody makes that stuff i linux because there's no money in it; but on the other hand, having to do it yourself clues you in to the secret they don't want you to know, that it's easy and you don't need to depend on all the commercial stuff and malware (for example, ps3video9 which spies on your pc).

Here is where to get ps3 ubuntu:

http://www.psubuntu.com

Try intrepid or Jaunty, Hardy never quite worked right on ps3. (i.e. use version 7.10, 8.10, or 9.xx)

Once you've got it installed, open synaptic package manager, run a search for Mplayer, and download and install it. Find medibuntu.com for the restricted codecs you'll need, because they don't include them on the install disc.

Mplayer can watch any video stream and pretty much handle any format, and under ps3 linux, it's the only decent video player. It's been patched to compensate for the RSX being locked under linux. The video doesn't look very good, but it's not so crappy either.

If you want a upnp client specifically, use synaptic to search for one, I'm sure they're there. But with Mplayer, all you really need to do is set up a stream with WMP or VLC from your pc, then you should be able to view it with Mplayer on your ps3.

Ubuntu does work in SD but it's not very much fun. There aren't really any good distros for 576i. Video will work, but not look so great.

You might want to just get a better transcoder. I don't know what tversity uses but there's lots of good gui's for ffmpeg. Try getting firefox 3.0 if you don't already have it, then find and download the download manager add-on, and then the manager's converter add-on. This converter is basically an ffmpeg GUI and you can hand it entire folders of video, with default or custom conversion instructions. If you've got a bunch of downloaded .wmv videos, you can just pass them to the converter with settings to convert to .mp4 under lavcodec, same quality, audio libfaac, and you'll end up with a folder of videos your ps3 can watch via upnp, within an hour or two.




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