[matbor]

So has anyone fired up 720/1080 content on Dharma RC2 + APTV/Linux + Crystal yet ? Any performance improvement ? Will give it a go tonight.... if I can pry the APTV/XBMC remote out of my wife's hands!!!

Matt.

[Jimmer]

I have it running now without issues for me with 1080p/720p with the following set-up

Dharma RC2
CrystalHD r161
nVidia 190 drivers
Minimal Karmic Install + XBMClive

Just to be clear I'm not running Pin's/Sam's image any more which are based on a Hardy minimal. So YMMV.....

Only XBMC issue I have is unrelated to CrystalHD and 720p/1080p content: when I try to do a small skip back with ISO movies, then XBMC does a small skip forward instead. There's probably a fix around somewhere (or one in the works) and it's not a massive issue....

Hope this helps....

Jim

[DrPepper]

@Jimmer

why are you not running Pin's/Sam's image anymore ? does that have any specific means ?

do you have a link or anything to install the other one ?

Cheers

[Jimmer]

@Jimmer

why are you not running Pin's/Sam's image anymore ? does that have any specific means ?

do you have a link or anything to install the other one ?

Cheers

Well, there's a story behind that:

I recently re-discovered my old Roku Soundbridge M2000 network music player. Now this is perfectly capable of being streamed to by mt-daapd. Except 2 things 1) iTunes 10 support broken 2) crashes hard all the time.

I noticed that some one has forked the code (not updated for many years) and has re-written it extensively to work with newer itunes and also make it more stable. Only problem is it won't compile on Hardy. It WILL compile on Karmic... Thus the install

However, there is a massive problem with forked-daapd: It just maxes out the CPU at 100% until there's nothing left for anything else and X Server dies hard. Then afterwards I realised that XBMC has a daap server that can serve my music to my Soundbridge. So really I did the whole install for nothing!

Since I haven't experienced any problems (and I finally got xbmc usplash themes to compile and work) I've stuck with it... there's no point in me going back now since I don't use the HDMI audio anymore (this is broken under Karmic onwards since you can't compile the one version of the nVidia drivers that support HDMI out). So, unless you need to compile something that won't work under Hardy, I'd stick with that....

Also, I can't compile a custom mach_kernel that will boot, so I have to do the old kexec double-boot thing by using the existing mach_kernel from the project and calling a script (probably only adds a few seconds to the start of the boot - but there you go). Finally, there is no image that I'm aware of, you have to do it by hand - Karmic Minimal netboot + OpenSSH (ie no X-Server, etc) then build the system you want. I don't recommend it if you have no commandline chops....

Jim

[rolandb5]

I have it running now without issues for me with 1080p/720p with the following set-up

Dharma RC2
CrystalHD r161
nVidia 190 drivers
Minimal Karmic Install + XBMClive

Just to be clear I'm not running Pin's/Sam's image any more which are based on a Hardy minimal. So YMMV.....

Only XBMC issue I have is unrelated to CrystalHD and 720p/1080p content: when I try to do a small skip back with ISO movies, then XBMC does a small skip forward instead. There's probably a fix around somewhere (or one in the works) and it's not a massive issue....

Hope this helps....

Jim

Any reason of running version r161 compared to the latest r174?

[Jimmer]

Any reason of running version r161 compared to the latest r174?

Yeah the 8 DMA buffers for Linux. My experience is that the ATV struggles with 16... Think it was put back to 16 for a later rev. than 161 (couldn't tell you which off the top of my head) You can edit one of the source code files for later revs and put it back to 8 again and then compile, but I haven't seen any compelling reason to do this.....

Jim

[thnmnt]

Is there a difference between how the BCM70012 and 0015 handle the DMA buffers? I feel that my older (ebay) 0012 card struggles a lot more than my logicsupply 0015 card does.

[Jimmer]

Is there a difference between how the BCM70012 and 0015 handle the DMA buffers? I feel that my older (ebay) 0012 card struggles a lot more than my logicsupply 0015 card does.

Yeah, I definitely think so. I have one from the first batch of eBay cards and 8 DMA buffers is what makes the difference for me. Think Davilla posted that the 70015 is better able to cope with 16. Couldn't swear whether I actually read that here somewhere (maybe it came to me in a dream!)

Jim

[matbor]

What is the quick why to tell what rev of crystal driver running?

[^tWiSt^]

I have it running now without issues for me with 1080p/720p with the following set-up

Dharma RC2
CrystalHD r161
nVidia 190 drivers
Minimal Karmic Install + XBMClive

Just to be clear I'm not running Pin's/Sam's image any more which are based on a Hardy minimal. So YMMV.....

Only XBMC issue I have is unrelated to CrystalHD and 720p/1080p content: when I try to do a small skip back with ISO movies, then XBMC does a small skip forward instead. There's probably a fix around somewhere (or one in the works) and it's not a massive issue....

Hope this helps....

Jim

So are you saying that you're able to play 1080p content with an 0012 card?

I've the same setup can you please post step by step guide (or links to follow) to obtain your exact setup?

Thanks

[Jimmer]

So are you saying that you're able to play 1080p content with an 0012 card?

I've the same setup can you please post step by step guide (or links to follow) to obtain your exact setup?

Thanks

You did your own minimal Karmic?

Well, there are no guides that I know of (apart from one which has missing info and is inaccurate). In the end I just followed the atv-bootloader guide to installing a netboot minimal distro (substituting the vmlinuz and initrd from the Karmic netboot) then, once I had a SSH capable no graphics system, I just ssh'd in and added what I wanted.

Just added the basic X-windows stuff and install xbmc-live from apt to start xbmc at x-windows start

Since I operate in an enviroment with macs I also built netatalk (you need to build it yourself and enable encryption to get it to work properly) and avahi. This allows AFP. I also installed SABNZBD+ and transmission. I also run ddclient to keep my assigned IP in sync with my dyndns static one...

Since I'm running these extra packages I removed OpenSSH and installed dropbear (Half the memory usage). I also trimmed the virtual terminals down to 2 (won't be needing 6). Blacklisted the power management stuff that doesn't work with the ATV...

I've stuck with revisions of crystalhd that have the 8 dma buffers limit. But yesterday I compiled r174 and manually edited the file to limit it to 8. I haven't really tested it out yet... if it's no good I'll go back to an earlier rev....

Again, all this assumes that I have some 1080p encodes that are like your 1080p encodes.... not all 1080p content is created equally and mentally high 1080p encodes will not work with the 70012. Whether they work with 70015 is something you'll have to ask others....

Jim

[jthunder]

Jim, are you streaming your content over the network, do you have any stuttering rendering issues with some of the high-bitrate 1080p mkvs (blueray rips)?.

If not, would you be willing to do a small writeup or maybe provide a disk image that others could use to image their ATVs?

Thanks.

JT.

[^tWiSt^]

yes a disk image with your configuration will be fantastic...

[Jimmer]

Well I feel like a bit of a tit, because I thought I was using the last iteration of the drivers with the 8 dma limit on Linux. Turns out I was checking out the latest version! I was suffering from a bit of a memory leak with Karmic and was wondering if this was the cause. Another user on here using Arch has reported a similar issue to what I was having. Might be an issue with 70012 and newer kernels... I think you're better off sticking with pin's image. It's almost perfect IMHO.... my install is a work in progress and I'm sure if you're having issues with the mature and stable image's posted by Sam and Pin, you wouldn't want mine!

Just a FYI though, since I have manually edited the relevant files to change the DMA limit to 8 and recompiled, I have not seen the problems I was having earlier. That's not to say that they won't reappear tomorrow though.... plus I still have an issue with my install properly unmounting drives on shutdown. And I won't be responsible for frying anyone's data (apart from my own!)

Also I have the 'double-boot' thing going on - and I haven't worked out how to fix that yet!

Jim