[mythtv-users] MythTV on XBox

[Wouter Lagerweij]

On Sun, 2005-01-09 at 10:33 -0800, Joe Votour wrote:
> You could probably run the backend and the frontend on
> the Xbox, but for most purposes, it's just not
> practical.

> Also, depending on the hardware revision of the XBox
> that you get, you might get a noisy fan...  I've found
> a way to fix that, I'm just no so sure I want to get
> that drastic with the hardware mods yet.  ;)

Hmmm... I'm interested... My crystal x-box is too noisy. I'm planning on
slowing down the fan a bit, but if anyone knows a better way.

> If you just want a portable media player and don't
> care about the PVR functionality (which is really
> MythTV's bread and butter), then check out XBox Media
> Center.  From the screenshots and text I've seen about
> it, it's supposedly very good at being a media player.
>  It will, however, be somewhat difficult to find a
> binary download, although the source code is freely
> available (XBMC uses the Microsoft XBox SDK, which is
> not legal to possess, unless you are a licensed
> Microsoft XBox developer, due to copyright).

Actually, that's not all that hard (using edonkey or the likes, or
reading the faq at xbins.org).

I've used xbmc for a while, and it works very well. 
There's even work going on in the xbmx forums for a python script that
can be used as a (limited) MythTV front-end.
It allows one to schedule recordings, browse existing recordings, and
even view them, as long as their in myth's mpeg2 format. (no mplayer
support for the mpeg1 and mpeg4 myth formats, unfortunately.)
And lately, people have even been working on getting live tv working!
(with the same mpeg2 caveat, so I haven't seen this...)

have fun,

Wouter