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Hardware for Linux and XBMC
BLKMGK Wrote:Lastly, I think some of the developers may be using a tiny ASUS box and it has had some hacks written to support it's less than robust chipset. Search around, it might have even been mentioned in this thread....
AOpen, (not ASUS), AOpen MiniPC is as small as a Mac Mini as uses a Intel GM965 chipset with Intel GMA X3100 and yes special code have been implemented in the XBMC to support this chip and GPU even though it does not support OpenGL 2.0
http://minipc.aopen.com

The latest Mac Mini which features Core2 Duo processors uses Intel GM945 with GMA950 GPU, ...D4rk who implemented the special code for the Intel GM965 chipset with Intel GMA X3100 has said that it may work for that Intel GM945 chipset as well (maybe it is good enough for 720p), but no garantees.
Always read the XBMC online-manual, FAQ and search the forum before posting.
Do not e-mail XBMC-Team members directly asking for support. Read/follow the forum rules.
For troubleshooting and bug reporting please make sure you read this first.
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BLKMGK Wrote:That would be a P5E VM HDMI. So far as I know no one has tested this board but I hope to tomorrow and will report ASAP when I know something for sure.
That's the exact board I'm planning on using when I build my system in the near future so please report back anything you can about using it with XBMC! I'd be especially interested in any information on using the HDMI port and audio via HDMI. Thanks.
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Hi,

I'm still spec'ing my system which I plan to purchase in the next 6-8 weeks and I'm stuck between going dual core or quad core.

My choices currently are either a Q6600 2.4GHz quad core or one of the new E8500 3.16GHz dual core chips.

Can XBMC currently take advantage of quad cores? If not, what's the likelyhood of it doing it in the next year? Would the raw speed of the E8500 be better suited for XBMC than the extra cores of the Q6600? I need the system to be able to playback 1080p x264 rips without a hitch.

Thanks for any insight anyone can give.
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Gamester17 Wrote:AOpen, (not ASUS), AOpen MiniPC is as small as a Mac Mini as uses a Intel GM965 chipset with Intel GMA X3100 and yes special code have been implemented in the XBMC to support this chip and GPU even though it does not support OpenGL 2.0
http://minipc.aopen.com

The latest Mac Mini which features Core2 Duo processors uses Intel GM945 with GMA950 GPU, ...D4rk who implemented the special code for the Intel GM965 chipset with Intel GMA X3100 has said that it may work for that Intel GM945 chipset as well (maybe it is good enough for 720p), but no garantees.

Thanks very much Gamester17. Yes, I recall another thread somewhere where Yuvalt (lead Linux coder) said he had the Aopen Mini in his living room! No wonder the special case has been added. I wonder if d4rk has one too.
* Iceman-UK will prolly get the Aopen Mini 965 with the best C2D I can afford.

Anyhow I have a few ideas:

Idea A:
I had an idea of producing a user-editable database of hardware that people are using to run XBMC-Linux on. Maybe in Wiki format whereby there is one page per machine and multiple pages per user. On the page they can list in several fields the CPU, mobo, RAM, HDD, videocard etc. They are also able to upload photos of the case and the thing in action. Perhaps also with FPS/freetext benchmarks against a selection of reference clips that the community could produce.
The benefit of storing this stuff in structured fields is that I can produce stats of the "average system", "most popular CPU", "how many users are running C2D T7700" etc. This may be useful to users wanting to build their own system and to Team-XBMC who can use it for average system profiling and what the average user is running. Or Team-XBMC may ignore it totally which is also fine but the user community may value it. We/I/someone would maintain it because Team-XBMC have too many other plates juggling in the air. The website would be seperate from this.
This idea was inspired by the "Slug" (http://www.nslu2-linux.org/) whereby there is a huge, long wiki page showing that cool applications people are using it for: http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/Info/Wha...irSlugsFor
Folks are putting their Linux-XBMC success stories in the forum which is all well and good... but it's unstructured and messy.

Idea B:
Now this is way ahead (and maybe "way out there"), but it would be cool if the XBMC-Linux "Live CD", on installation could automatically "call home" and submit the hardware profile of the machine in a database somewhere. I got this idea from being on the SmoothWall Express Team (http://smoothwall.org). I was/am the developer of the my.SmoothWall system (https://my.smoothwall.org) whereby we do just that. In fact, we go one step further and give each installed system a unique ID and tie each system ID to a user account, with simple online management of registered systems etc. A cool idea we had was that one could store the SmoothWall Express firewall config in this account in an automated way perhaps. Scale this to XBMC where one could tarball the UserData folder and store into this online account.
You could produce some really nice stats from such a database that may help shape the future direction of XBMC-Linux in some fashion.

My 2 UK pence worth.
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I think its also very important to have a set list of sample video files that everyone can run and test on their system. The Planet Earth 'Birds' sample is one candidate but perhaps as little extreme on most systems. A good range of sample content is vital to make any such hardware list work as different encoding bitrates/settings can mean 1fps or 24fps on the same system.
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herg Wrote:You probably won't find many of them in the "wild", but having it work as is would be one of the criteria for me to buy a HD/Blu drive.
So far you find pretty much every title "in the wild", as you put it.
I think serious thought should be given to some way of using CoreAVC as an external decoder for h.264 content. I know some builds of mplayer allow this, maybe it's possible even with ffmpeg.
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That would be fantastic, but it's up to the ffmpeg developers, not the XBMC ones. Unfortunately they very clearly stated that they will not support binary codecs for idealogical reasons.
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Weavus Wrote:That's the exact board I'm planning on using when I build my system in the near future so please report back anything you can about using it with XBMC! I'd be especially interested in any information on using the HDMI port and audio via HDMI. Thanks.

Here's another with intrest in that board. It's what I'm thinking about for my HTPC
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Weavus Wrote:That's the exact board I'm planning on using when I build my system in the near future so please report back anything you can about using it with XBMC! I'd be especially interested in any information on using the HDMI port and audio via HDMI. Thanks.

Set it up tonight, or at least am TRYING to. I am using it with a D-vine MCE303 case -> http://htpc.mce701.com/product_info.php?...2c8d2c09f6

So, I fired up Mythbuntu tonight. On my previous board with an 8500GT setup was smooth. This has been anything but - so far. For starters if I reboot the machine without it being set as source on the receiver the machine comes up in some funky video mode. Previously this wasn't an issue and I'm hoping that dorking with the modelines will fix this. On the plus side the video drivers recognize the video chipset and are open source. The audio however doesn't appear to be recognized, ALSA mixer doesn't show any devices except Intel HDA. I will mess with this more right after I get XBMC running again - I have the optical expander board on order asI don't wantto use the coax. The IRDA receiver and the VFD are also not working (yet), previously with the MCE USB remote device it fired right up - not so this! This page -> http://venky.ws/projects/imon/ seems to say that Lirc ought to handle it - not yet for me, not sure how to set it up! Oo

Frankly, my previous ASUS combo was close to a cakewalk. This one so far hasn't been close to as smooth for the basic stuff. If my older board had been mATX I'd have been happier sticking with it and an 8500. Stay tuned though, I'm not done and I might yet figure this out. I'm not the sort to give up easilyNerd
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Okay, XBMC is at least running after the last recompile. 3FPS max, CPU at 50%, XBMC reportedly using only 3% of the CPU. Console is warning that "Some other thread is trying to leave our critical section". How depressing! This might be something other than the hardware here causing this, I'm not sure. If no one else is seeing issues like this than I'd say it's the video chipset\driver combo. I may throw the 8500 in tomorrow night and see how it does, I'll need to get or fab a low profile bracket for it :-(
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Yah what motherboard are you using? if you're using the EVGA 7150/630i I got all the video and audio drivers working properly
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nevermind I found what mb you're using. I am using the dvine mce303 as well and haven't yet gotten the vfd/ir working. I will keep trying but you mind keeping me updated on your progress? maybe by pm and I'll do the same.
BLKMGK Wrote:Okay, XBMC is at least running after the last recompile. 3FPS max, CPU at 50%, XBMC reportedly using only 3% of the CPU. Console is warning that "Some other thread is trying to leave our critical section". How depressing! This might be something other than the hardware here causing this, I'm not sure. If no one else is seeing issues like this than I'd say it's the video chipset\driver combo. I may throw the 8500 in tomorrow night and see how it does, I'll need to get or fab a low profile bracket for it :-(
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Sad 
gzusrawx Wrote:nevermind I found what mb you're using. I am using the dvine mce303 as well and haven't yet gotten the vfd/ir working. I will keep trying but you mind keeping me updated on your progress? maybe by pm and I'll do the same.

Not to worry I'll keep folks posted just bear in mind a Linux expert I am NOT. I did get it to allow a 1920X1080 mode last night - screen was hash but I could actually see the top menu bar for onceShocked I also THINK I've got the audio working using a different ALSA mixer I downloaded (grumble). I'll know for sure when the optical adapter shows up.

Looking it over it's loaded an "experimental" Intel video driver. Interestingly enough the EDID information showing up in the logs looks MUCH saner than what the damned NVIDIA driver reportedAngry I enumerated the USB bus and found a Falcon something or other device for the VFD. What is irritating is that if you go out to the manufacturer's WEB site they mention the possibility of having to reflash the VFD board for proper functionality. The troubleshooting of this being done via Windows of course. The retailer's promise of drivers for "other" OS as well as directions for modding the case for "high performance" power supplies is non-existent as well.

Let's just say that LATE last night when I rolled into bed I was NOT a happy camper. I hope that this afternoon I'll have my second wind and get moving on this. Last night I was pretty tempted to just go back to what I had that was working perfectly. As it is I may end up back using the NVIDIA card since I KNOW it works, I might even go for a different mATX board if the audio gives me too many issues. I had learning to do with the other board too but I thoguht I was mostly past all that.

Anyway, stay tuned if you're pondering this board and I'll try to explain what does and doesn't work. I am, of course, open to suggestions!Blush
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They do have a link to the irtrans driver for linux:
http://www.irtrans.de/en/download/linux.php
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gzusrawx Wrote:They do have a link to the irtrans driver for linux:
http://www.irtrans.de/en/download/linux.php

Whoa, where was that? It says it's in the kernel but IRW says "connection refused." How should it be setup in Lirc? What they have included there is a couple of kernel diffs, that's not exactly terribly helpful...
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