[waldo22]

Money and ability to decode have fuck all to do with one another. Go to Sigmatel's website and read about their SoC line.

AlTheKiller meant "Sigma Designs" website.

SoC is "System on a Chip".

Basically, Sigma Designs has this small chip based on the ARM processor architecture that is VERY highly optimized to decode video, including MPEG-2, MPEG-4 (like xVid) and MPEG-4 AVC (h.264) and VC-1.

Because it's based on the ARM architecture, XBMC would have to be ported to that processor in order to run.

In addition, these Sigma Designs chips don't have any open-source libraries, so the only folks who can program for it are those who have a contract with Sigma to use their development kit.

Finally, these processors don't support OpenGL for 3D acceleration, which XBMC needs in order to properly render its GUI.

So yes, these cheap boxes do a good job of decoding video, but until

1) XBMC gets ported to the ARM architecture
2) Sigma Designs opens its driver source and provides the libraries we need
3) they support OPENGL 2.0
4) a developer finds it a compelling platform to port to...

It won't be possible.

[davilla]

Sigma Designs has this small chip based on the ARM processor architecture that is VERY highly optimized to decode video

Actually the ARM does nothing with respect to decoding video. It's the custom ASIC married to the ARM that does the heavy lifting.

[waldo22]

Actually the ARM does nothing with respect to decoding video. It's the custom ASIC married to the ARM that does the heavy lifting.

Yes, I know. I think my wording was ambiguous, I was trying to say 2 things in one sentence, sorry.

I realize that the ARM does the basic processor tasks to run the Linux distro and such, and that the rest is specialized hardware, but since it's all on the same chip anyway, my point is really the same.

I was trying to say that:

1) the code would have to be ported to ARM
2) we would have to have tarballs to have our video decoded by the Sigma chip
3) There is no 3D accel hardware, so no OpenGL 2.0

[pender]

I don't understand the apple tv 40GB is $200 and the popcorn hour is $180. The pch does does 1080p and the apple tv 720p. So how does the PCH have more power to do 1080p at a lower cost but can't run xbmc?

PCH has a Sigma H.264 decoder chip. Apple does use a dedicated hardware H.264 decoder chip for its iPod line but could not use it for the Apple TV because ATV runs a modified OSX OS, so they stuck with a workstation GPU by Nvidia that allowed some Hardware accelerated decoding. The Nvidia 7300 was enough to decode the 720p content that is available on iTunes, so this was enough for Apple.

The PCH is supposed to be a Media Tank that will play any DRM-free media. The Apple TV has a different purpose to only play iTunes HD content (but can now be hacked to perform the former).

I don't see Boxee being ported to the PCH successfully. The linux kernel communicates with the PCH through proprietary binary drivers. If Boxee/XBMC were to run on this platform, it would not be able to play anything without the help of the Sigma decoder. And before you say it, it is difficult enough to create a HAL wrapper for a display adapter/ decoder module, but to make it fully functional for Video decoding is too big a task for anyone to invest.

In the US, you can buy a mATX PC with a fast enough DC CPU to play 20Mbit 1080p in XBMC. If you need to more juice, wuite XBMC and play natively in the OS to get GPU acceleration - not the worst thing in the world. In the US, should cost about $320 for parts and that includes HDMI audio passthrough.

[natethomas]

Not to be a jerk or anything, but I think this discussion was resolved in the negative about six months ago.

[vskatusa]

Popcorn Hour C-200 is king of hardware + xbmc is king of UI!

If xbmc can run on Popcorn Hour C-200 -- this will be the best HTPC!

[midgetspy]

Also there's a sticky about this exact topic at the top of this very forum...

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=40236

[tstack77]

I have no desire to get a pch, but I checked out their site and the next generation soon to be released has an optional blu-ray player/drive. Since pch is a form of linux, how is this possible?

C-200 "Add a Blu-ray drive to turn your Popcorn Hour C-200 into a full-featured Blu-ray player."

[Haggy]

That does not necessarily mean that the player software has to be FOSS. Nero and LinDVD do exist for Linux as well and are closed source apps.

[nogetmedx]

Does anyone know if it is possible to use xbmc on a Popcorn Hour C-200?

I am currently using xbmc on my windows PC but i would like a dedicated settop mediabox insted of a htpc.

I considered buying an Apple TV but i is to slow when playing HD material.

So does anyone know if xbmc wiil work on a Popcorn hour c-200?

[Bob___]

No, it is impossible!

[waldo22]

Does anyone know if it is possible to use xbmc on a Popcorn Hour C-200?

Here's a thread on why this won't work:

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=40236

I considered buying an Apple TV but it is too slow when playing HD material.

In a few months, the Apple TV should have hardware acceleration of 1080p.

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=55042&page=3

Keep an eye on that forum.

-Wes

[fatsarmstrong]

So what are we thinking here? I picked up an Acer Aspire a couple months back and am now seeing this Popbox hardware that will be released soon plus it is rumored to run about $130. 1080p compatible through HDMI out it seems like decent hardware to run XBMC on, does anybody see any potential got ya's that will stop us from using the hardware? I haven't researched the software that comes stock on the box so maybe that is a problem but I just thought I would get the conversation going.

[Geekzilla]

It is based on a Sigma Designs chip, so XBMC is not an option.

[fatsarmstrong]

Too bad, I like my Acer but would like to venture out into some new hardware. althekiller seemed pretty pissed off in the thread you linked, I guess they get bugged about Sigma Designs chips all the time. Thanks for the response, like I said I am relatively new to the XBMC world and am just now exploring the possibilities.