[mythtv-users] OT: I'm streaming Netflix on my Linux box

[Willy Boyd]

On Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 9:54 PM, jedi <jedi at mishnet.org> wrote:

> On Tue, Oct 07, 2008 at 09:01:30PM -0400, Matt Emmott wrote:
> > On Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 6:33 PM, jedi <jedi at mishnet.org> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > > >
> > > > XBMC, in my opinion, is a much better front end for audio & video
> than
> > > Myth.
> > > > The interface and usability are slicker and more usable than
> mythmusic
> > > and
> > > > mythvideo as far as I'm concerned. But yes, it does not add much more
> in
> > > the
> > >
> > >     Well, how exactly?
> > >
> > >    We can corner some of the devs in a room and not let them leave
> > > until they make some improvements... '-)
> > >
> >
> > First let me say that I'm in no way poo-pooing on any piece of Myth or
> its
> > developers. The programmers have done a fantastic job with this product
> and
> > I don't pretend to know the first thing about programming. Not to mention
> > they do it for no money and the only thing I've ever put money towards
> other
> > than hardware is a Schedules Direct subscription, andhave received a
> > wonderful product in return.
> >
> > That being said, the look, feel and general UI of Mythmusic & Mythdvd are
> > just terrible. XBMC looks nice, is very snappy and is (for the most part)
> > pretty intuitive. It's still buggy, sure, but for the most part will
> throw
> > any video format thrown at it, be it an ISO of a DVD, Xvid / Flash / Mkv
> /
> > Quicktime / etc. On the audio side it plays all the happy formats you'd
> > expect, offers a library option to index all your songs, will read iTunes
> > DAAP data and playlists, and has some pretty nice fullscreen
> visualizations.
> > Oh, and it downloads the album art / DVD covers for all your media on the
> > fly without need for a third-party scraper.
>
>     Beyond the just-in-time metadata management, I am not sure you've
> identified anything beyond good looks that XBMC that MythVideo and
> MythMusic doesn't already do.
>


First let me say, like the other poster, I have utmost respect for the
MythTV devs and hands-down, the PVR functionality of Myth is top-notch and
have served me extremely well for quite a few years.  I don't remember the
first version I hopped on Myth, but numbers like 0.13 or 0.15 sound familiar
(??)

But I also discovered XBMC just recently, and it has now completely replaced
all but the PVR functionality on my mythbox.  I removed the menu entries for
MythVideo, MythMusic, the optical dvd/cd entries, etc.  XBMC runs freakin'
circles around Myth in that department.  I really don't want to offend but
it is true.

And it's frustrating when some want to diminish improvements in an interface
to just "looking pretty".

The media "areas" in XBMC are built around sources.  It's quite easy and
intuitive to "add a source" for music or videos right from the GUI.  That
sound can not only be a local directory, but a SMB share, UPnP server,
Shoutcast in the case of audio, and I think there are others.  I'm a pretty
adept linux guy so all my network shares are defined in fstab, but this
makes it so much easier for others to use.

A source can also be a plugin that serves up content, and one of the default
plugins that came with the OSX version of XBMC is one that lists Apple Movie
Trailers, complete with all the metadata.  I promptly copied the plugin over
the the linux boxin the livingroom and it works like a dream there, too.  (I
can't honestly think of why it's included in one platform version and not
all?).

Yeah I know about Mythstream and I've played with it.. played with options
to do some of the above over the years... but it all feels like a big kludge
compared to XBMC.

Music stays playing throughout the entire interface, with a really nice
overlay dialog that shows cover art
and current track, next track, etc.  Myth only recently started supporting
this; I think the XBMC execution is better but at the least they're on par
there.  As for video playing, you can also exit out to top-level menus and
this overlay shows a miniture video player with the video playing.  Kind of
like the Program Guide does in Myth, but again throughout the interface and
for any video playing session (TMK).

I, like many others, have had no shortage of dvd viewing problems with
MythVideo, and like many others, this is frustrating because I took out my
real dvd player a long while ago to rely on this one "mythical convergence
box" to do it all for me.  First I moved to a xml menu item for launching
xine, and now I've thrown several movies at XBMC so far with not a single
issue.  We'll see if this remains the case.  (Anyone know of specific movies
that still give Myth the fits, speak up!  I'd love a good comparison test).

Sure the interface DOES look really nice.  The default skin and some of the
others I've downloaded look amazing.  It's all full OpenGL rendered, and all
the animations and transitions are very very smooth.  Audio feedback on most
actions (which can be turned off).  And nice looking skins tells me one very
important thing: the skinning architecture for XBMC must be very solid for
there to be such high-quality work being done.  Even some of the best skins
I've used on MythTV are sometimes missing pieces or have issues on
un-official plugins.  I can download any media source plugin for XBMC and
pretty much except it to work smooth as butter like the rest of the app.

Again, no offense to anyone, but I'm not apologetic about my opinions of
XBMC either.  There is nothing wrong with using the best tool available.  I
wouldn't be a linux user if I didn't feel that way.  PVR?  MythTV all the
way.  Media player?  XBMC trumps MythVideo, MythMusic, DVD playing, etc.
Period.
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